6:37
First-generation devices. are always the most fun to review. And for the past, like, month, everyone I talk to has been asking me, "What do you think of the iPhone Duo? Like, should I get a foldable. iPhone? Is that for me? Who is it even really for? You've been testing it for the past week, right? Yeah. So most new pieces of tech. are fundamentally like a solid idea at their core. And then they can be a little bit rough around the edges, but that'll get better over time. The iPhone Duo specifically, as the first folding iPhone, is. very polished. around the edges, but kind of rough. in the middle, if that makes sense. Let me explain. So
Apple does this annoying thing when they come out with new products where they kind of ignore the rest of the world and pretend the competition just doesn't exist. So it can be kind of brutal. listening to them go up on stage and pretend that they're inventing something and explaining something we've never seen before. But the honest truth is, for a lot of people, they really. actually haven't yet seen this before. So we know, like you and I know, that this first folding. iPhone is years behind, like eight generations behind. the first folding phones we saw back in like 2019. But for a whole mass of people, this. is the first one they've ever really even considered buying. So it kind of forces them to think very deliberately
about that question and forming a cohesive, understandable reason. why they should spend $2,000 on this. So like this animation everyone's been talking about since the launch between the closed. and. opened Duo's displays, it's not just good because it's smooth. I mean, it is smooth, but. it's good because it's literally. teaching first-time foldable users what is happening. My theory, and a lot of people have also shared this, is I think it was inspired by this lenticular sheet, which. obviously. is pretty cool! I could be wrong, but it's nearly the exact same. visual effect. When the sheet is on top of something, you start to lift it up and it slowly. diffuses what's underneath it,
right? So now enter. iPhone Duo. When you start opening it up, it slowly diffuses what's. underneath it, and it's super responsive to the hinge angle as you open. or close more for realism. Makes sense. But not only that, then you get to the open half, and all of this reflection and this diffusion. implies that there's more underneath that. So it's all designed to help people intuitively understand that they're opening to reveal an extended display. There's a bunch of other super clever, really well-considered, polished stuff like that. all around this phone that I'll get to in a second. But also then the hardware, it kind of, it does feel very first-gen.
So this is a very pretty phone. And even though we've seen folding phones for years, it's still pretty striking to finally see a folding. iPhone. The back glass is one piece. and curves up smoothly onto the camera plateau where the dual cameras sit. That's nice. And the side rails are titanium, very shiny, very premium. feeling, also very fingerprinty. But then yeah, you open it up and it. feels solid because the hinge weight. is actually variable. So right at the point of opening when you're prying the magnets apart, it's really sturdy. Then it smoothly opens to like halfway, then it slows down again. so it can stop.
at various half-open states for certain apps, which I'll also get to in a second. And then the last bit. snaps open. That's nice. And then the same thing when you're closing it. There's some real effort required at first, and then the reward is that satisfying clap shut with the magnets. All that's not even mentioning the IP68 dust and water resistance rating that this has, which is pretty elite for a foldable. So I mean, you can splash it, you can toss it in your bag. I'm really just treating it. like a regular phone at this point, minus I'm never taking it to the beach.
I think it's clear that these things don't like sand. My prediction, by the way, is that Zack. bends it slightly? but doesn't break it. It's my prediction. But I'm saying a lot of nice things. Why do I also say that this feels. very first-gen, right? Well, thick. and heavy, right? So look at this. This is the Samsung Z Fold 8. Same idea, obviously, passport-shaped foldable, but it's now Samsung's. eighth. year doing this, and say what you want about Samsung, but they've clearly iterated quite a bit on this stuff. So this phone. is significantly thinner.
and like 20-something percent lighter, and that stuff makes a. big difference in daily use. Also, the sides being flatter, I think, makes it much easier to pry open than the slick. rounded titanium sides. The Duo feels significant and solid, and that's what you want when you're spending $2,000+ obviously. but I'm telling you, after you use this thing for like a week or two. you would be happy if it was 20%. lighter. And I just keep replaying in my head that Time Magazine interview quote where John Ternus recently called a bunch of the other foldables "cheap. and crappy." And maybe this is the hot take, but making. everything metal and glass and heavy doesn't necessarily
make it better to use. Like, it feels good in the hand, but it's like that, sometimes works against them. It's just kind of like the permanent Apple design default. And that's great for like a MacBook Pro or an old Mac tower when you want it to feel. metal and substantial, great. But it sometimes backfires, like Vision Pro. Vision Pro is all metal, super heavy in a world of. all plastic VR headsets. So does the Vision Pro feel premium and significant to hold? Yes. Does it kind of, at first glance, make the other plastic ones feel. cheap and crappy? Kinda, yeah. But then when you're wearing it on your face for a while, do you also. kinda wish it was lighter? Also, yeah. And same with over-ear headphones.
Like, most are plastic for a reason. It's lightweight, you're wearing it on your literal head for a while. AirPods Max comes along, very premium, feels solid, it's metal, very heavy, maybe a little bit too heavy. Now you're not wearing an iPhone Duo on your face, so obviously it's not as dramatic, but the point still stands. This reminds me a lot of the first-generation Pixel Fold, just a little thicker and heavier than you're hoping it was, but. clearly the right idea. Other things I've noticed that are just kind of nitpicky but totally real, uh, this is a very right-handed phone, so your thumb naturally rests right on the fingerprint reader/power button when you hold it this way.
But then. they kept Camera Control all the way down near the bottom right corner. It's this little cutout, by the way, and it's a little out of the way, but maybe you're also rotating it into taking a photo or a video, so it's not bad. But then that also means there's not quite enough room for the volume buttons on that side. So they put them at the top of the phone. Again, just slightly outta the way. And then in iOS, so this launches with 27.1 out the box, you pull down from the right corner for Control Center still.
You pull down from the middle anywhere, and that's Siri, which means. all the way to the left, that top left corner, is where you pull down to get notifications. And even with big hands, that's just. a little bit of extra hand gymnastics. And while we're at it, the case situation's also kind of interesting too. So Apple made two. first-party cases with the. iPhone Duo. This is the Folio case. It's $130 and magnetizes to the back and then kind of. slides to expand to cover the front. So it's a one-piece case. The kickstand is cool, but it leaves the rails totally unprotected.
They also made their Silicone Case, two pieces, one for the back, one for the front, but this one leaves the hinge totally exposed. So then there's third-party cases, and channel sponsor dbrand has their $60 Grip Case. And I might be biased, but I think they've done a better job than Apple, at least at making something. that's. actually protective, 'cause they got the back hinge protection piece. And this doesn't use like mechanical parts like most folding cases, no moving parts, just. one integrated piece. So if you're paranoid at all about durability and want the cleanest looking case that actually has hinge protection, this is probably the best move. And hey, since they are the channel sponsor, this whole Duo lineup with this case
and the Prism screen protector is available at dbrand.com/duo or nationwide at Best Buy. Now the inside screen. is the part of the Duo that does not feel first-generation at all. They did an incredible job with it. I love it. This is a 7.6-inch OLED. It's 120Hz display. It matches the 3,000 nits of the outside display. And this nanotexture finish is so good. Obviously, it does a great job of hiding the already mostly imperceptible crease, but it also, it just feels nice to slide your finger across it.
I did just for fun put it under a microscope to try to see if I could see the micro lenses that make up the nanotexture, but they are. absolutely tiny. That over there. on the right. is the cutout in the nanotexture for the under-display selfie camera. You can clearly see the nanotexture does slightly diffuse the light, so there's a little bit less sharpness when reading text, or watching videos, but at no point did I find that bad. But speaking of that selfie camera, yeah, that is, that is very first-gen and it is bad. The photo quality is trash. It looks a. little better on like a FaceTime call with video than just straight up taking pictures with it. But yeah, Apple clearly has done the math. Like they've assumed people won't use this camera very much
and they've accepted the trade-off. of image quality versus having this big dramatic uninterrupted inner display. We'll see if they also bail on that in future generations like Samsung did, or if they stick with it. Now, other things that are good for a first-generation phone, the hinge, like I talked about, with the variable weight, excellent. Battery life, this is another thing. So we finally actually got the quantity, the size of the battery. It's about a 4,900 milliamp-hour combined battery split between the two sides. And it's really good.
Like, if you use this phone, let's say the normal ratio is like. 75%. closed, 25%. big screen open, this is gonna be an all-day phone and then some. That 2-nanometer. A20 Pro chip is doing lot of heavy lifting and performs great, but it's also super efficient. It feels right on par with the 17 Pro I came from, and. with a ton of high-brightness use, I'm regularly ending the day with like 30-plus percent left. Now, if you do decide to do. way more. big screen use, of course it'll be. a bit more battery 'cause it's the bigger display, but honestly not much.
It's a very efficient phone. And then the cameras on the back, right on par with the rest of the foldables out there. So you've got dual cameras back here, one. standard 48-megapixel ultra-wide. I was trying to find out exactly which 48-megapixel sensor they were able to fit in this Duo since it specifically needs to be something thinner. And you'd think naturally they'd take from something like the. iPhone Air because it's so thin, but the literature actually seems to point more towards using the same camera as the. iPhone 17e, which is not like some insult where it's like incapable of taking great photos.
It is capable of taking really good photos, but it does mean that. as lighting conditions deteriorate, this smaller sensor, it does have to crank up the ISO earlier. and get noisier earlier. than. those bigger Pro cameras. But I have taken a lot of photos and videos over the course of the past week and a half, almost none of them have surprised me. Like, it's a solid camera, it's an okay camera most of the time. The ultra-wide is like. baseline useful to have, but it's not gonna take incredible. corner-to-corner sharp photos. And then not having a zoom does mean that shots past about 4x. are just dramatically worse than the Pro phone, which has an actual zoom.
Side by side with a 17e and an 18 Pro. in weaker lighting, it's definitely closer. to the 17e. in terms of sharpness and noise. But guess what? I also shot the entire. Tesla Roadster reaction video on the. iPhone Duo, believe it or not, and there were almost no comments about it. Now, that doesn't mean. nobody noticed, and certainly I noticed as I was editing what very much. looks like. iPhone footage, but the Duo, despite having a Pro chip, doesn't have any of the Pro camera features. There's no ProRes, there's no log, it's just good old-fashioned 4K 30, and it generally looks fine. It's outdoors, of course the footage is usable.
This is not the iPhone you would choose if you are the iPhone filmmaker who. wants the absolute best possible pro tools and image quality, which is a little hard to swallow at first because this is the most expensive, therefore most premium iPhone, but yeah, it's not targeted at that group of people. It is much more like the productivity entertainment. iPhone. that happens to have good enough cameras, and it's good enough cameras that are on par with other foldables that are a tier below the slab-style flagships. Also, like other foldables, it gains the ability to turn on the rear display for the camera. So with this button up here, you can fire up the preview, which just shows the people you're taking pictures of
the exact framing that you're using. I think I'll call this one spouse mode. So when your spouse asks you to take a picture of them, they don't have to ask 5 or 6 times. They can just give you the instructions to get it perfect the first time. Spouse mode. And then there's Kid Cue, which plays colorful Snoopy-themed animations on the back, which should ideally get little kids to kind of look in the general direction of the phone when you're taking a picture of them. Cool. Kid mode. But if you flip the phone around, you'll see they've also added this. slide-to-open camera control.
You slide that, and it not only gives you the preview, but it gives you all the controls to take the highest quality possible selfie with the main camera on the back. And it also disables the back display to reduce accidental touches. Wow. Self-portrait mode. They did it. Nice. Bottom line is the hardware is fun. It is really fun. What's not fun though, right now. is the apps. So the app situation on the. iPhone Duo. is its biggest downside right now. Like, right now, as I release this video, at launch. See, the idea of the iPhone Duo, while it's closed, is it's basically a normal. iPhone. on the left-hand side, but anything that would typically be at the very top. or the bottom is moved over to the right.
where it's reachable with your right thumb. So on the home screen, for example, there's a normal grid of apps on the left, but the dock from the bottom moves over to the right, and the time and the battery and cell signal, all that stuff, is also over to the right in this clever little glyph. Makes sense. You open one of Apple's own apps. and that theme continues. The main content is on the left, and then the buttons that used to be on the bottom or the top. are over to the right where they're reachable. So this is a brilliant concept. It's cool.
It's sort of the blueprint for an optimized app. The problem is most apps, at least most of the ones I use right now, are not optimized yet, which means. they look like this. Just a regular app with the buttons still at the top and the bottom, and then a black bar down the right-hand side where the buttons are supposed to be. So Spotify looks like this, Google Maps, Waze, Discord, and Twitter are all like this. Google Calendar is like this. Like tons and tons of apps, big apps, most of them. are currently like this. And then when you open up the phone, they're mostly still just small, unoptimized iPhone apps in the. middle of this huge screen, which
is hilarious. Even if you turn it vertical, still very small. Very reminiscent of the old. iPad days where you could just hit the 2x button and it just made it bigger. So some apps. are slightly more responsive, like they'll partially kind of stretch out across this inner display, but. they're still clearly not optimized for Duo yet. Like Spotify kind of stretches things, Flighty. kind of stretches things, but the general experience. has been. flipping between a whole bunch of not optimized apps that look. pretty terrible on the Duo right now.
I think in about. six months, once developers get a bunch of these and start developing the Duo-specific versions of their apps, 'cause this isn't just an. iPad app, it's a Duo app that they have to make, then. things will start feeling way better. And this is one of Apple's biggest strengths, to be fair, like just dragging developers along for stuff like this. So I think most of the big ones. will. come along for the ride eventually, but. not all of them will. Not all of them are gonna make it. Like, I know now that I will have to officially abandon Arc Mobile as my browser of choice 'cause they're done developing that for mobile. Like, the gym app that I use every day, that's probably not gonna get updated.
So stuff like that. But I really can't wait. Like, I'm constantly checking the software updates I have available in the App Store 'cause I can't wait for the updated Duo versions of these apps. Shout-out to Instagram, just got the update today as I'm filming this. And also Carrot Weather, my weather app of choice, they did it. They've got all their stuff together. Closed screen, buttons are on the right-hand side now, and then open it up. and they've got the two columns, buttons are still reachable on the right.
Hopefully more get on this page soon. And I'll also mention, this has been kind of a buggy phone to test. I've had a couple of things like freeze up on me, not like full catastrophic restart the whole phone freezes, but a couple weird bugs, especially in that continuity animation. You know, obviously, okay, it's designed to be pretty quick. Like, you just open it, close it, that's sort of it. But if you slow way. down. or even stop halfway and then try to interact with the display, it can get kind of confused, mainly because there's so many different possible states
that it could be in that it's trying to figure it out. Like the hinge angle and the orientation, like should it be StandBy mode, should it be. between the apps on the right or the left? It can be a little weird. But that's also me kind of trying to break it. My biggest software gripe with this whole phone though is actually not a bug, it's an intentional feature. So you know how I said earlier, this is the first. foldable phone that a lot of people have seen, and so there's a lot of thoughtful. consideration and polish with the software to accommodate for that.
Well, this phone also doesn't have Face ID. We knew this, not enough Z-axis space, not thick enough, so fine. They've done what all the other foldables have done, which is add a fingerprint reader. on the power button. Great. But they've programmed in a massive, not massive, but a delay on that fingerprint reader. Now, if you've been using phones with fingerprint readers for a while, you've already known, like you've developed this behavior where. if you just wanna check the lock screen real quick, then using your registered finger is actually too fast. Like it just unlocks right away and skips the lock screen. So. to check your lock screen notifications,
you instead just tap with a different finger so it doesn't unlock, and then you can. read whatever. And then when you do wanna unlock, use the correct finger again and it opens up. With. iPhone Duo, Apple built in a delay with every single unlock. So you can tap with your registered finger, it pauses. on the lock screen for a beat, and then if you keep holding, then it unlocks. It's technically smart, like it's giving. people a chance to check to see their notifications real quick before it goes and unlocks it. And if they wanna deliberately hold it longer, it'll unlock, but I just, as someone who's used to the instant unlocks from Face ID, I was like, I need to find a way to turn this off, and I did not find that. Like,
it just makes the fingerprint reader feel slow. when it's not slow. Like, this new behavior I taught myself with the Duo is you can speed it up by waking it, then swiping up, then touching the fingerprint reader, and it unlocks basically instantly. It's really fast. I just wish I didn't have to do all of that every single time. I really think Face ID is gonna be the number one thing people miss coming from other. iPhones. Not the zoom cameras, not the thinner and lighter form factors. I think it's Face ID. So most new products, like I've said, have this good idea somewhere at the core, and then they can be a little bit rough around the edges, and that will get
patched up and better over time. iPhone Duo, as I've mentioned, is. very polished around the edges. All these sleek animations and all this stuff. But it is a little bit rougher. at the core, like just being a little thicker and heavier and having a bunch of apps not look good. But there are going to be people who this phone is really good for because this phone is really good at a few things, and I've seen. those flashes of greatness with it with my week and a half of using it. The obvious one is. two apps. side by side. Why would you do that? Well, there's actually tons of good reasons to. You just have to remember that you can do it, and then you'll just start doing it more.
Like. YouTube open on one side and note-taking open on the other side, very useful. Or maybe just replace YouTube with something else like a video call or anything really. Also copying and pasting like an email confirmation code from one side into a login portal on the other side, also extremely clutch, and just replace whatever copying and pasting you wanna be doing. If you have two apps open side by side and then tap on the divider in the middle, it locks them together in a pair and visually looks like a book. And so it sort of intuitively makes sense anytime you open one, they both open up together. And then you can unpair it the same way.
And then the back and forth with all the different windows. is super intuitive. You can go home on one side, not the other. Then you can swipe between recent apps. on one side, but not the other. It's all super clean. You can't do a third window. and you can't do. anything. other than two apps side by side, half screen, but- That's, of course, still better than a regular iPhone. I also had to try, just for the memes, to scroll Instagram Reels and TikTok at the same time. And technically you can do it, but it actually does. kind of bug out a little sometimes 'cause it wants to only play the audio from one, and then it kind of gets weird.
I'm gonna turn the volume on. It might get crazy, but this is- Hey Benny the TikTok audio. Inversion. But then it switches back. You see how it switched back to the Instagram? if you really start to look at it. I mean it is kinda cool. That's kind of cool. I mean if you just look at the progress So you, you can't hear. And then back to TikTok. both at once, and maybe that's a good thing. Um, but you can, you can- this could, this could be you, but don't, don't do that. But the other thing it's actually really good at, better than a lot of other foldables, is the halfway open state.
Because this hinge. is so sturdy in the middle, that it's probably the best foldable at just being partially open, and they've planned around that. So if you're typing, but then like sort of partially close it, the keyboard splits in half to avoid you having to touch. the middle. There's also apps that let you type or control on one half of the screen while you have content playing on the other half. We've seen that before. But then this is the first iPhone that automatically enters StandBy mode, even when it's not connected to power, when you just put it up in like a tent formation. So when it's vertical, it'll just show two different customizable screensavers and when it's in horizontal, it'll show one
big screensaver, like your clock. or weather. or calendar or whatever you want. It's really nice. And the phone has more than enough battery to sort of just sit on a desk all day showing notifications. and not have any issues. And there is, of course, the sort of awesome. underglow alarm clock. And then I just have to say, it does the continuity thing incredibly well. Like the speed that it goes from open to closed, and closed to open and picks up exactly where you left off. Like, you could be in the middle of writing an email with an attachment, this whole big thing, and you realize, you know,
want to do a little more multitasking to get this done. You just open the phone and keep it going. Just picks up right where you left off. You could be in the middle of reading something, open the phone. mid-scroll, and it finishes that scroll and keeps going. It's so good. And then the matte inner display, I can't say enough nice things about it. It is. the hardware highlight of the Duo.
It's nice to read things on, it's nice to watch videos on, it. really blocks reflections super well, and it's nice to hold it vertically like an. iPad mini. Matter of fact, this is the orientation that the volume buttons on the side make more sense, and I find myself holding it like this, reading stuff more than any other foldable I've used. But most of all. the polish. I keep talking about at the edges, it's just, it helps people to understand what is happening on the phone. So the opening and closing animation, like I talked about, the. two apps next to each other animation that I also talked about,
also the new Dynamic Island animation since it's over here on the side now. Did you catch that? Also, the inner display selfie camera, when you close the camera app, just shrinks up the pixels. to hide the camera. That is so clean. The condensed battery, time, and signal strength indicator over in the corner has become very easy to read, and I've gotten used to it. The dots at the bottom are your cell signal strength. It's all very well put together, and it's not a coincidence that the camera viewfinder fills up the whole display perfectly with no black bars because the camera sensor is the same aspect ratio
as the outer screen, which is. also the same aspect ratio as the inner screen rotated 90 degrees. So it always fills up your display. Such a nice touch. Man, I told you there's a lot with these. first-generation devices. So, okay, know that a lot of people, when they see that there are chapters in this video and there's a conclusion chapter, they're gonna skip right to this part of the video, in which case, hi. Shame on you for skipping. Watch the rest of the video. There's so much other good stuff in there. But okay, fine, I get it. Your finger is hovering over the order button and you just. need someone to tell you if it's good or not. Just someone
please tell us if we should buy this thing or not. Okay, first of all, I do think that by the time you actually get your Duo, if you're just now gonna order, in a couple weeks and months, there should be way more apps optimized for the Duo, so that's nice. But yeah, the idea is really simple in concept, right? It's $2,000 to get an iPad mini that can fit in your pocket. 120Hz iPad mini OLED fits in your pocket. Have you ever wanted that? They made it! They did it! Great! This is the first generation.
It's made for you. But also, yeah, it is polished but rough. Am I making any sense? There's gonna be a lot of attention. on this phone. because it's a new. iPhone, and people with other. iPhones are always curious if they should be getting. the newest iPhone. And for most of those people, the answer. is probably actually no. Like, if you're just a regular person who doesn't do much more than texting. and social media. on their phone, some occasional web browsing here and there, eh, probably no. If you are the. iPhone filmmaker who wants the absolute best cameras to go shoot their next thing, no. If you're the type of person who breaks your phone every like nine months 'cause you drop it all the time, yep, probably no. But if the $2,000 or
the difference between 35 and 55 bucks a month doesn't mean much to you and you just kind of like the idea and wanna jump in, I think after. the learning curve and getting used to not having Face ID, this is a really fun phone to use. And. it's really just 'cause that polish, that polish around the edges goes a long way towards the fun factor. So. the awesome animations, the incredible hinge, the. wonderful inside display, like all of that is just really nice. And it hides a little bit of the rough core, like it will feel a little heavy sometimes, and not all your favorite apps will be updated right out the box, but it is fun.
Apple can't completely engineer their way around the compromises of this form factor, like the slightly worse battery and the slightly worse speakers and the slightly worse cameras. Like, that's just physics. But what they have done. is. an admirable job. with their. first generation. Now I'm just gonna have to cross my fingers that a second generation. actually listens to some of that core feedback, 'cause that. could be. an amazing phone. If you are picking up this first-gen Duo though, it's also a good time to pick up some extras while you wait for it to arrive. And so of course I have some recommendations. from channel sponsor Ridge.
So first of all, their power bank. It's a 5-in-1, 10,000 milliamp hours, MagSafe, built-in cables, an Apple Watch charging pad, and it works as a hub while plugged in. It'll work with your new phone or your old one. And then second, their tracker card. It's the size of a credit card, so it slips right into your wallet, and it works with both Apple Find My and Google Find Hub. The battery lasts up to 10 months per charge, and it charges wirelessly. Ridge's Friends and Family Sale is on now, and. you know, I consider y'all friends and family, so. you can get three power banks for the price of two.
It'll work with your new phone like the iPhone Duo. 18 Pro. or any phone with USB Type-C. or Lightning cables. Head over to ridge.com/mkbhd to check out that deal. before it's gone for good. Thanks for watching. Catch you guys in the next one. Peace.
