Seven years. That is how long Apple sat out after Samsung shipped the first Galaxy Z Fold in 2019, watching Huawei, Honor, Oppo and Samsung iterate through early hinge problems and crease complaints. On September 9, under new chief executive John Ternus, Apple finally arrived with the iPhone Duo – and priced it as if it had invented the category rather than joined it late.
Full disclosure: I have been rooting for this one. I have been reading more on my phone than I would like to admit, and a device that unfolds into something closer to a Kindle has been the pitch that finally got me paying attention to foldables.
Ternus called the iPhone Duo “the most transformational change to iPhone since the original”. The more useful comparison is the one he did not make: this is a first-generation product wearing a seventh-generation price tag.
Closed, it is shaped like a passport, wrapped in a titanium frame. The 5.4-inch outer display unfolds into a 7.6-inch canvas – big enough for a decent reading session, small enough to still fit a jeans pocket. Apple’s own A20 Pro chip inside runs two apps side by side, and battery life stretches to 24 hours of combined use across both screens.
It comes in Night Sky and Star White, starts at S$3,099 for a configuration with 256GB of storage and tops out at S$4,899 for 2TB. The price of entry is a good S$600 more than a basic Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 launched in July.
This is according to Apple’s usual playbook – arrive after the market’s first attempts and let competitors absorb the R&D pain. That is a legitimate strategy. What Ternus did not explain is why it took seven years and an entire generation of imitators before Apple felt ready to try.
That question lands harder in Asia than anywhere else. The iPhone Duo is not introducing anyone here to the foldable format. It is asking buyers who have already owned one to switch brands at a premium.
Singapore and the rest of Southeast Asia have been comfortable with foldables since Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold 3, and Android phone makers have spent years training the region on what a fold-out phone should cost.
Apple is not betting entirely blind. Globally, Pro and Pro Max models went from roughly 37 per cent of iPhone shipments in 2020 to about 65 per cent in 2025. Buyers have been walking toward the expensive end of the lineup on their own for half a decade, Asia included.
However, the regional ceiling looks lower than that trend suggests. A consumer survey by investment bank KeyBanc found that ahead of the iPhone 17 cycle, consumers were really curious about foldables, with most respondents wanting one under US$1,500 and only a thin slice willing to cross US$2,000.
Southeast Asia, where per-capita smartphone budgets sit well below the United States, and where Samsung’s own foldables already undercut the iPhone Duo, is where that ceiling should bite hardest.
The launch calendar backs that up. Apple’s iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max, the regular new candy bar phones, open for pre-orders on September 12; the Duo does not open until October 16, five weeks later.
Anyone in the region who wants a new iPhone now gets funnelled toward the Pro line first, with the foldable held back as a slower second wave rather than a genuine day-one option.
That is not a supply constraint dressed up as strategy. It is a purchase play and it is most visible in exactly the markets where Apple has the most ground to make up against Samsung and Huawei.
The iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max, also unveiled on September 9, are the safer story. The A20 Pro chip is the genuine leap: Apple’s smallest, most efficient silicon yet, fast and cool enough to handle on-device AI without the phone turning into a hand warmer.
A longer-lasting battery, faster charging, and a camera that finally adjusts its aperture like a real lens rather than a fixed one.
This is a phone that earns its “Pro” label instead of just wearing it. It is faster, it lasts longer, it shoots better photos. A good, honest annual refresh.
It also costs S$130 more than last year’s model, which Apple attributes to rising memory and storage costs. If you are still on a iPhone 15 Pro or older, the upgrade justifies itself. If you already own an iPhone 17 Pro, you would be paying more for a phone that does the same job slightly better.
As for my reading-device dilemma: the iPad Mini is still the more obvious answer – compact, purpose-built, and rumoured to get a refresh as soon as October, weeks after the iPhone Duo ships. I’ll wait before deciding.
