The iPhone Fold Doesn’t Need iPadOS to Be a Great “Tablet”

I meant to link this at the beginning of the year, then I forgot, but I guess the story is still as timely as ever given the state of the latest rumors. A few months back, Jason Snell 3D-printed a mockup of the upcoming iPhone Fold (which I still think should be called iPhone Duo), which revealed a surprising design decision:

If these mock-ups are real, this folding iPhone is not going to be what you may have pictured in your head: a modern iPhone, roughly the shape of an iPhone Pro, that folds open to reveal a larger screen inside.

Instead, Apple may be making a device that’s much wider and squatter than existing iPhones when it’s folded up. The mock-ups people are printing show a phone that’s squatter than an iPhone mini and wider than an iPhone Pro Max! If that shape is right, the iPhone Fold will look a bit more like a mini notebook when it’s folded, unlike any iPhone that has ever existed.

And:

The shape makes sense, however, when you imagine what that phone looks like when it’s unfolded: a screen with a 4:3 aspect ratio, the shape of an old-school television and—more importantly—an old-school iPad. In fact, this rumored design would make the unfolded iPhone the shape of an iPad, just slightly smaller than the iPad mini. (The iPad mini’s screen is 8.3 inches when measured diagonally, while this screen is rumored to be 7.76 inches.)

In the intervening months, the rumors seem to have settled around a 5.5” cover screen and a 7.8” inner screen when unfolded. So: an iPad mini inside, and a short, passport-style cover display outside – like the ones they don’t make anymore. There’s more: according to Mark Gurman, the upcoming foldable won’t run iPadOS and iPad apps when open, but instead will sport a special version of iOS with support for Split View and iPhone apps featuring tablet-style sidebars:

Apple is developing new iOS app layouts and revamping its core iPhone programs to add sidebars along the left edge of the screen, similar to many of its iPad apps. Developers will also be able to adapt their iPhone software for the new interface, which will use proportions similar to an iPad in landscape mode.

Despite offering an iPad-like app experience, the foldable iPhone will run the standard iOS — not iPadOS, the company’s tablet operating system. This means it will retain a simpler multitasking system, rather than adopting the more desktop-like interface introduced in iPadOS 26. It also won’t run existing iPad apps out of the box. While the foldable iPhone won’t run several windows at once like an iPad mini, it will be able to show two apps side by side. That matches a key feature of the foldable phones offered by Samsung, Alphabet Inc.’s Google and others.

I’ve been obsessed with the idea of an Apple foldable for years. As a longtime iPad user, the idea of my iPhone having an iPad-esque second nature ticks all the boxes for what I want from an Apple product: a foldable iPhone could be both my pocket and couch computer for when I want to read, watch videos, or play some games. In fact, I’ve been so fixated on understanding foldables, I’ve tried a bunch over the years. I never wrote about them on MacStories, but they’ll be the topic of next week’s episode of AppStories: I tested the Z Fold 3 several years ago, then the OnePlus Open, and Pixel 9 Pro Fold, which I dual carried with the iPhone 16 Pro Max for a while. Then, around Christmas I got myself a refurbished unit of the original passport-style Pixel Fold to get a sense of what Apple may be going for; and for the past few weeks, I’ve been carrying a Z Fold 7 alongside my iPhone Air. I’ve even been getting some work done using DeX mode with the Z Fold 7 plugged into my external monitor, which will be the topic of next week’s AppStories Plus segment.

Split-screen apps on the Z Fold 7. I love this setup for catching up on RSS and social media. I expect it to be equally nice (if not better thanks to the rumored landscape form factor) on the iPhone Fold/Duo.

In using the original Pixel Fold for a while between December and January, I rediscovered the joy of being able to reach every part of my phone’s screen with one thumb. Yes, it’s very strange to go from “traditional” smartphone display design today back to an experience revolving around a short display, let alone a short and wide one. But it’s nice not to have to stretch my thumb to reach the status bar nonetheless. Of course, if the first generation iPhone Fold is successful enough, this design choice could also give the company the opportunity to do a larger, “iPhone Fold Max” in the future with a more traditional phone design on the outside. Or maybe Apple will be able to sell people on the idea that, actually, shorter displays are cool again? Samsung seems to think so, and they’re already preparing their own take on a “wide foldable” to counter Apple’s move. I wonder if Apple will be able to find success where Google didn’t with their original Pixel Fold and make it a trend across the industry again.

Anyway, what every foldable has also taught me is that it’s just so nice to realize you can open your phone and be taken into a quasi-tablet environment without having to go grab a separate device. This happens to me all the time: I’m doing some research and realize I want to keep my browser next to, say, ChatGPT; without interrupting what I’m doing, I can open the Z Fold and continue the task, now with two apps shown on screen. I can watch a YouTube video and catch up on social media at the same time. I don’t think I need to explain to you what multitasking is. What I do need to highlight is the great feeling of being able to do lightweight multitasking in one continuous flow, on the same device. Everything else is icing on the cake: Samsung’s One UI lets you do floating windows on top of apps in split-screen; OnePlus has an excellent Open Canvas UI that allows you to effortlessly move between full-screen and split-screen apps. I like that I can drag in apps from the dock on my Z Fold or from a toolbar on the right side of the screen; and that’s not to mention the ability to run a full-blown, iPad-like desktop system when plugged into an external monitor with Samsung DeX, which will be a story for another time.

With DeX mode on the Z Fold 7, I can run a desktop-like environment by simply connecting the phone to my monitor, which is pretty wild – and I bet Apple won’t support this for the first generation of iPhone Fold/Duo.

All this to say: if you’re the kind of person who gets work done on their phone or uses it a lot to “consume content” during the day, multitasking and larger app windows can be great for that. But here’s what gets me excited about Apple entering this space: the company has decades of expertise in designing polished UIs, windowing controls, and multitasking systems that they can bring to the table and instantly one-up every other Android manufacturer. Apple can literally go shopping in the iPad’s long archive of current and former multitasking UIs and choose whatever they see fit for an iPhone Fold. Split View? Been there, done that…multiple times. Want to support multiple windows for the same app? They can choose from years of Exposé and even a Shelf interface. A dock? We have docks. How about drag and drop? It’s been a thing on iOS for years. What about invoking system-wide search or choosing which apps you want to open in Split View? Macs and iPads have floating Spotlight, the App Library still exists, and there’s even an old interface they could repurpose for the occasion.

For the iPhone Fold to be a compelling productivity device, Apple doesn’t need to bring iPadOS to the iPhone. Instead, I suspect the company will do what they’ve always done: they will reimagine existing features for a new product category, and they’ll put a new spin on familiar concepts to accommodate the different nature of an iPhone that suddenly becomes a small tablet. Just like macOS influenced iPadOS, so I think it’s now iPadOS’ turn to teach iOS a few tricks.

I just really hope they call it iPhone Duo so I can score some points.