Apple Announces Foldable 'iPhone Duo'

https://www.macrumors.com/2026/09/09/apple-announces-foldable-iphone-duo/

43•TomAnthony•43m ago

Comments

retired•40m ago

No SIM slot. So I have to carry a mobile hotspot if I want to browse the internet outside my home.

It’s like Apple forgets there is a world outside the US where eSIM is not a thing.

avidruntime•36m ago

Apple has been doing eSIM for something like 4 years now.

retired•35m ago

On the international market iPhones have had SIM slots.

avidruntime•24m ago

Ah. about 30 seconds ago they mentioned in the (still ongoing) keynote they said it was removed to recoup space for internals. I recall the 3.5mm jack removal being motivated along similar lines. I wonder, assuming the space where the SIM slot would've gone was filled with increased battery size, what that delta would in duration. I'm from the US, cursory reading about global eSIM adoption surprised me (only 30% and most of that 30% is in the US vs. my assumption of >50%). What prevents adoption elsewhere? Consumer demand for swapping? Curious to hear your POV on it.

AlexandrB•5m ago

eSIMs give a lot of control back to the carrier. My carrier does not allow transferring eSIMs between phones, but I can trivially move their physical SIM card.

1over137•35m ago

Where is eSIM not a thing?

retired•33m ago

Currently living in Spain and I’m not able to switch to eSIM on my current plan.

lwkl•23m ago

That sounds like typical ISP bullshit where they try to move you on a new plan that’s worse for you by annoying you with minor inconveniences.

nunez•33m ago

C2 doesn't support physical SIMs. eSIM only. Honestly, I can go either way. Physical SIMs are nice but I love the convenience of eSIM and can see people being frustrated over its removal.

retired•27m ago

I use both around six SIM and eSIM cards but my main phone subscription needs a physical SIM card so I will not be getting the Duo.

Edit: Reply to nomel as I am rate limited

Cheaper than roaming cost. I have eSIMs for countries I frequently visit.

This is Europe. I can do a short walk and cross multiple countries borders. It's nice to have coverage everywhere. I just toggle my eSIMs for that. When I'm out on a boat trip and I pick up a Moroccan signal from across the Strait of Gibraltar I turn on my Moroccan eSIM so I'm not paying €2 per megabyte in roaming cost. When I get cheap gas in Gibraltar I switch on my Gibraltar eSIM and turn off roaming on my main line. When I cross into Portugal I switch to a Spanish provider since they give 15 gigabytes of roaming for free.

nomel•9m ago

As someone who has only ever had one, what's the use of six?

selectodude•30m ago

No, they just don’t care. The TAM in countries that don’t support eSIM for $2500+ phones is probably a rounding error.

Cider9986•36m ago

Dupe: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49630648

drunkonvinyl•34m ago

looks nice, but if i still can't use terminal or closer to native cli, the pixel fold 10 with termux is still the right device for on-the-go development. termius is ok, but with termux i can run emacs on the pixel.

nunez•34m ago

- It works with the pencil! This is a big big deal. I can do whiteboarding with customers quickly without having to break out a separate device, for example. Definitely unfortunate for the reMarkable Move and devices like that.

- They actually might have nailed the hinge and crease problems.

- I've been excited for this release ever since the rumor of the iPhone Air being a prototype of sorts for this came out. Two iPhone Airs fit very comfortably in my hip pack (though I only ever have one at a time).

ronsor•33m ago

I still don't get the fanfare over folding phones. They tend to be more fragile, and if I really need a larger screen, I'd much rather use a laptop or tablet.

mostlysimilar•28m ago

For many people the phone is the only computing device they use. Keeping portability and offering a larger display is a compelling offering for those people.

I tend to agree with you.

bigfishrunning•25m ago

> For many people the phone is the only computing device they use.

I suspect the crossover area of the Venn diagram between people who spend what a foldable costs on a phone and people who have no other computing device is extremely small.

mostlysimilar•15m ago

Why so? For most people a computer (in the traditional keyboard/mouse sense) isn't a leisure device, a phone is. They scroll social media feeds and watch YouTube or whatever.

I'm sure most of us on HN use them for leisure, but for most people a computer is a device for work, not for play.

nunez•25m ago

I no longer need an iPad Mini in my bag with this thing...

fishtoaster•24m ago

I quite like the idea of a tablet I can keep in my pocket. If there was some sort of first-party attachable keyboard (a la the iPad magic keyboard), I'd be strongly considering getting this. In the age of AI and increasingly-mature cloud agents, I can get a lot of my work done from a setup like that.

yesfitz•32m ago

iPhone Duo is more like iPad Pocket. Touch ID + Apple Pencil Support coming later this year. It looks physically uncomfortable to hold.

I was really hoping they were going to slap an Apple Watch screen on the back of an iPhone Air and fold that in half.

I'll be waiting for an iPhone Duo Mini, I guess.

snailmailman•31m ago

Interesting that there seems to be no FaceID? They only mentioned TouchID. I assume it’s a limitation of the under-screen camera.

They’ve been doing Touch ID instead of faceID with some of their products a few times, I think some of the iPad models? but unfortunately touchID has like a 20% success rate with my fingers. FaceID works 100% of the time for me. I’ve never had good luck with any fingerprint scanners. I hope they can someday solve the issues with FaceID under the screen.

I wasn’t going to buy this product anyway. My current phone works and I have zero reason to upgrade. But if I was in the market, no facial recognition is honestly a dealbreaker.

rootusrootus•29m ago

They need to just do both, honestly, whenever possible. Both methods have legions of fans and detractors.

nozzlegear•27m ago

I might be wrong, but I'm pretty sure they mentioned both Face ID and Touch ID in the stream. They wanted to add Touch ID because of the various angles people might use the phones with. Also mentioned that it'll unlock with your Apple Watch, like the Mac does right now.

wpm•26m ago

Hard agree but only because I think TouchID on the sleep/wake button sucks. The home button-less design and gestures introduced on the iPhone X were obviously designed in tandem and only work with FaceID. I have Touch ID disabled on all of my devices that have it because it's so damn annoying now.

m3kw9•26m ago

prob tech and UX issue. FaceID can't do side ways, and people opens side ways half the time. Maybe there are also functions unlockable wihtout clamshell opening. can't put 5 faceID on each side and facing every which way.

ggcr•30m ago

Seems like a big engineering feat by Apple, but for real, who asked for this?

I haven't met a single non-techie person who wants/has a foldable phone. Maybe it's a me problem and there is tons of interest out there. Valid.

nunez•29m ago

Everybody since the Galaxy Fold?

kenjackson•24m ago

Everyone in my family wants one... assuming it works well. We spend a lot of time on our phones, and a lot watching video. This seems like the ideal device for that.

speak_plainly•17m ago

I think you're right. We're at the point where Apple is sort of out of steam in terms of hardware and software and their products are mature and the company has become more risk averse. They need gimmicks to get people to upgrade and I'm sure we will see more attempts like this in the future. These sorts of devices have limited use cases, like people who are on the road a lot for work or leisure, and of course this appeals to tech enthusiasts or the vanity tech crowd.

It'll be a nice device for some, but I think we're at the stage where device upgrades are no longer going to be a yearly or even biennial thing with all things considered.

swyx•12m ago

meet more people man

SepiaSapient•

low_tech_punk•30m ago

This made history because Apple never copied Microsoft before. https://news.microsoft.com/surfaceduo/

rootusrootus•25m ago

They made a better version of a Microsoft product, this seems like par for the course.

avidruntime•20m ago

Always loved the Surface Duo. I really liked the separation of the screens too; felt like dual monitors vs. ultrawide. It also forced the technology to focus the valueprop on multitasking versus more immersive/more bigger/more better. I'm curious about the iPhonr Duo; I have not been a huge fan of iPadOS or iOS, the former making me often wish for a macOS experience and the later having felt slower and less responsive over time (mostly due to animation speeds/aesthetic choices rather than a hardware defect).

kemotep•30m ago

The real trick is waiting to see if they make a iPhone Duo 3 or 4. Knowing they are committed to the form factor and it’s not another Mini would be nice to know.

Also time to work out the hardware and software issues. Not trying to spend serious money on beta testing like a Vision Pro.

mrheosuper•27m ago

I think it will be like Apple Vision, a device that is more for developers than end user.

$2000 for an iphone, just insane.

selectodude•17m ago

I will gladly bet you an iPhone Duo that they’ll be unobtanium deep into 2027 and that they’ll sell millions of them on day 0.

akmarinov•8m ago

Yeah this will singlehandedly triple the percentage of foldables out there

haunter•30m ago

The new iPhone Duo in single screen mode is the same size (5.4") as the iPhone 13 mini but with a different aspect ratio

https://photos.reportinglive.com/p/2026-09-09/f-bf86c6f5adb3...

mrheosuper•28m ago

It's uglier than the z fold 8 imo. Idk why manufactures even bother with the corner curve. It look imbalance.

AlexandrB•22m ago

A smaller closed size than current phones would be the main appeal for me. Phone bloat has gotten out of hand.

Cider9986•10m ago

That's why I'm interested in the Motorola flipping phones which seem to be really small folded up and will support GrapheneOS.

ukd1•28m ago

$1999

nomel•3m ago

For comparison, Samsung Galaxy Z Fold is ~$1700.

It's good to see Apple is taking the fold transition seriously. I have a Z Fold, and Samsung elegantly handles the app transition from fold to unfold by force closing and restarting the app for you, even if you fold it just a little. :D

skunkworker•25m ago

I'll be curious to see how the hinge holds up against wear, tear and small particle intrusion over time. If people get to 2 years and it's still going great. Then I may pick up a Duo 3. But my adoption really comes down to the problems around the hinge.

m3kw9•25m ago

App developers gonna have extra work

kittikitti•22m ago

I'm really happy about this new form factor. Things were becoming too conformist where everyone needed to adopt the lowest common denominator in order to fit in. It seemed like anything different was met with significantly more skepticism than curiosity. I embrace informed skepticism but most of it is ignorant. I think people will still be skeptical about the foldable iPhone but mainly out of ignorance of this form factor.

This phone will suck for the concern trolls who are best described as deeply conservative but will try their best pointing out concerns while masquerading as whatever will convince people.

ClimaxGravely•14m ago

I guess it's not cool but if i had a fold phone I'd much prefer it be like the nintendo DS with 2 separate screens (taking up the whole space though). If they can make it foldable they should be able to have 2 screens without a bezel

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