Remember the tiny tray that used to live next to your SIM card? It might be returning. Rumors bubbling up from Chinese supply chains and social posts on Weibo suggest several phone makers are quietly weighing whether to reintroduce the microSD slot as memory chip prices surge.
What's changed — and why it matters
The blunt fact behind the chatter is simple: DRAM and NAND are getting more expensive. Reports point to sharp year-over-year increases in mobile memory costs (one leak even pegged a 12GB LPDDR5X component at roughly $70 versus about $33 earlier in the year). With memory makers reorganizing their consumer businesses and AI demand eating into capacity, phone makers face a choice: raise retail prices or give customers another way to expand storage.
For buyers, a return of expandable storage would be a welcome, tangible fix. Choose the cheaper base-storage model, then add an affordable card later. That’s still cheaper than paying a manufacturer premium to double internal storage.
The tech that makes a return realistic
A lot of the old objections to microSD cards — chiefly speed and durability — have softened. The microSD Express standard uses a PCIe interface and can deliver sequential reads up to around 800 MB/s, narrowing the gap with onboard UFS storage for everyday tasks and high-bitrate video capture. Meanwhile, manufacturers have long solved waterproofing through clever tray seals and combo SIM/SD designs, so a slot no longer implies a compromised IP rating.
Samsung is an interesting case because it makes memory chips itself. That vertical position didn’t stop the company from reportedly tightening internal memory allocations earlier this year, but it does mean Samsung has the technical know-how to support high-performance card slots if it chose to. If a microSD resurrection happens, one plausible place for it is the next S-series refresh — our Galaxy S26 preview looks at the kind of trade-offs Samsung could be weighing.
How companies might fit a slot back into modern phones
Rumors point to two practical approaches:
- A hybrid SIM/microSD tray that avoids adding extra openings and preserves water resistance. This is a compact, low-cost retrofit that many Android mid-rangers already use.
- Targeted support for microSD Express so performance bottlenecks are minimized for large media files and app storage.
Design teams could tuck a combo tray into the frame without upsetting battery size or internal layout too much — and designers are already testing unusual form factors that shuffle internal space, such as Samsung’s tri-fold prototype, which shows how companies are rethinking inner real estate to balance features and durability (/news/samsung-galaxy-trifold-unveiled-at-apec-showcase).
Why some manufacturers may still hesitate
Even with the technical hurdles down, there are business reasons to resist. Selling tiered internal storage is a high-margin, low-friction revenue source. Allowing users to buy a base device and expand later can erode those margins. There’s also the industry's long-term nudge to cloud services and seamless backups — features that are monetizable in their own ways.
And a practical point: phones already in late-stage manufacturing won't be redesigned, so any slot revival would likely appear in models shipping from late 2026 onward, not in imminent releases.
Not just nostalgia — a pragmatic choice
This isn’t about taking a step backward for the sake of nostalgia. It’s a pragmatic response to supply-chain economics and consumer price sensitivity. If memory costs keep climbing, reintroducing expandable storage becomes one of the clearest levers companies can pull to keep street prices palatable.
Whether the industry embraces that lever remains to be seen. For now, the rumor adds a little hope for users tired of paying a steep premium for a few extra hundred gigabytes. Keep an eye on next year’s flagship announcements — and on how quickly card manufacturers ramp up microSD Express availability and pricing.