Samsung's Unpacked is confirmed for 22 July, and the watch leaks are the real story

Samsung has locked in its next Unpacked event for 22 July in London, where the Galaxy Z Fold 8, Z Fold 8 Ultra, Z Flip 8, and two new watches are all expected to show up. It's the company's first Unpacked outside its usual US venues in a while, and the guest list of new hardware is unusually long.

The foldables will get most of the headlines, but they're also the least surprising part of the leaks. Fold phones have followed the same script for a few generations now: a brilliant inner screen, a chunkier body than a normal phone, and a price that keeps climbing every year. Nothing in the pre-launch chatter suggests Samsung's about to break that pattern.

The Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 is where it gets genuinely interesting. Leaked firmware points to a new Wear Elite chip built on a 3nm process, the first Snapdragon wearable silicon with its own dedicated Hexagon NPU. In practice that should mean smarter on-watch AI features, smart replies, text summaries, an AI fitness coach, without draining the battery by lunchtime the way earlier attempts at on-device AI have.

Firmware leaks also point to 4G, 5G and Wi-Fi-only variants, which suggests Samsung is widening the watch's audience rather than just refining the existing one.

Should you care? If a foldable's on your shortlist, wait the eleven days rather than buying last year's Fold now. If it's the watch you're actually after, this could be the first Snapdragon wearable chip worth getting excited about.