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I’ve been using apps on the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 7’s cover screen with this download — but I’m not totally in love with it
Samsung has made the Galaxy Z Flip 7 one of the best foldable phones you can buy right now. But no device is perfect, and there’s one glaring flaw with the Flip in particular.
The cover display, despite being enlarged to 4.1 inches and given a 120Hz refresh rate, is still stuck using only widgets. This can be plenty useful, saving you from having to open the phone quite as regularly. But you can’t use apps in their standard form on the exterior screen, something that larger foldables like Samsung’s own Galaxy Z Fold 7 or rival flip-style foldables like the Moto Razr 2025 can both handle.
However, there is a Samsung-endorsed solution to this problem. It’s called Multistar, and I’ve been trying it out to see if it solves my biggest issue with the Galaxy Z Flip 7.
How to get Multistar
To enable full apps on your Galaxy Z Flip 7’s cover screen, you first have to install Good Lock from the Galaxy Store. Not the Google Play Store where you likely get all your apps from normally, but Samsung’s own digital storefront.
Good Lock should be easy to find once you’re there, as it’s one of the most popular apps. It’s made by Good Lock Labs, who work with Samsung to enable all kinds of unique, customizable experiences. Think of it as a secondary Settings menu for advanced users.
With Good Lock installed, you next have to install the Multistar module. This module does a lot of different things, all revolving around using more apps in more places. But what we want can be found under the I ♡ Galaxy Foldable heading, and specifically the Launcher Widget.
Once you’ve set up the Launcher Widget with up to 12 apps of your choosing, you can then add the widget to your Cover Screen carousel. And from there, you can open up these apps on the outer display of the Z Flip 7, with all the features and functionality you’d get on the inner main display.
How does Multistar work?
The main hurdle to clear with Multistar is that your apps are not designed for a square display that’s almost 2 inches smaller than the typical smartphone display sold these days. With an app open on the cover display, you can switch aspect ratios, using either the full screen, the portion above the cameras or a miniature vertical view. This helps in some cases, such as shrinking the viewing window in BlueSky making all the bottom navigation buttons available. But apps like Slack do not fit well into any of them, with the Tinder-style catch-up tool freaking out when you try and use it.
Trying to type on the outer screen is an exercise in frustration. The default keyboard doesn’t have a special small version for the outer screen, so all you can see of your app is the bottom-most line of your message.
Gaming isn’t much better. The small and square screen means you only get part of the game’s intended view, and buttons are shrunk down to compensate. You’ll need a precise touch to navigate menus, especially in an RPG game like Ex Astris, my current mobile game of choice.
How good is Multistar really?
Before this year, I wouldn’t have wanted to use Multistar on a Z Flip for long due to the irregular shape of the cover display. But with the Z Flip 7 and the latest generation of Multistar, we’ve hit a weird middle ground.
With a four-sided display, you can now see your apps consistently on the home screen, and if you’re using an app passively, scrolling through and reading without really interacting, it works well. But the moment you need to input something, like text or other commands, things get trickier.
Plus, we can’t ignore that to enable this in the first place, you have to download two separate things. It’s hardly convenient, and could put off anyone who isn’t a confident power-user of their Galaxy Z Flip.
For my money, Samsung needs to fix the following — a) Make cover screen apps an option in the regular Settings app, even if it lives in the Labs section; b) Create a compact keyboard for when users need to type on the cover screen; c) Ensure that at least Samsung’s own apps format properly on screens of this size.
Dy doing all of this, Samsung will be able to offer users the most from their Z Flip’s cover screen, while still indicating that widgets are the official preferred way to use this display.
It’s now about a year until the Galaxy Z Flip 8 likely launches as I write this. That gives Samsung plenty of time to work on this. But if the phone maker wanted to give us these capabilities in a One UI update before then, I certainly wouldn’t complain.
