“Apple's new foldable changes the canvas iOS developers are designing for”: The Mobile Mavens on the iPhone Duo

• “The Duo might shift that a bit once you've basically got an iPad Mini folding into your pocket, the bigger, more demanding games aren't such a hard sell any more.” - Adam Smart.
• "The challenge is that the unfolded screen is much squarer than the 16:9 format many games target, so a rigidly designed game could end up letterboxed." - Ipek Kavuzlu.

Apple has unveiled the iPhone Duo, its first foldable iPhone, priced at £1,999. 

The new design brings a larger display to Apple's smartphone line-up and raises questions around how developers will approach the device and what it could mean for mobile games.

We reached out to the Mobile Mavens to get their thoughts on Apple's latest device and what it could mean for the mobile games industry.

Here's what they had to say.

Christian Lövstedt

CEO at Midjiwan

I don’t believe foldables will become mainstream mobile devices in the foreseeable future, especially not at the prices indicated for the Apple Duo.

I also don’t see high-performance mobile phones as particularly good platforms for graphics-intensive games, especially considering the constant struggle with battery life.

So, from my perspective, these releases will not have a major impact on the games industry. For Polytopia, the Duo will essentially offer another iPad-like gaming experience, which is fine, but the iPad has been around for a long time and still represents only a relatively small part of our player base.

Adam Smart

Director of Product - Gaming at AppsFlyer

I don't think the iPhone Duo needs to sell in enormous numbers to be important. At £1,999, it's clearly not a mass-market iPhone, but that's almost beside the point. It gives Apple a new form factor to experiment with and, for gaming in particular, that larger screen could be really interesting.

Apple has already spent the last few years experimenting with premium console games on iPhone, with titles like Death Stranding and Resident Evil. I see that as a lot of trial and error: testing what works, what doesn't, and where the friction is. A console game on a relatively small touchscreen, particularly when it can be considerably cheaper on PC or console, was always a difficult sell.

The Duo might shift that a bit once you've basically got an iPad Mini folding into your pocket, the bigger, more demanding games aren't such a hard sell any more. And there are already rumours Apple's working on its own controllers, possibly through Beats. Put a foldable screen, Apple's own chips and a real controller together and you're basically describing a handheld games console.

What developers will actually want to know is whether this creates a new category rather than simply another screen size to support. If Apple can build enough of an audience around the form factor, developers could start designing experiences that genuinely take advantage of the larger display rather than simply scaling up an existing mobile game.

That's maybe the bigger clue about where Ternus wants to take things and a £1,999 foldable is a fairly bold way to start. It suggests an Apple willing to experiment with hardware categories again, even if the first generation is expensive and relatively niche. The Duo itself might not be the mass-market product, but it hints at where Apple wants the iPhone to go next, gaming included.

Evelin Herrera

Founder, Apps and Games M&A

First of all, I'm traumatised by the design: the golden days of Apple design are long gone with now squared and rounded mixed corners.

For developers themselves, it only seems like screen time will increase significantly with (i) making it easier to put the phone absolutely everywhere in a comfortable position to watch/play, and (ii) having two-sided screens. People will scroll and play at the same time. 

On the bright side, I think this gives developers a unique opportunity to create engaging experiences using one, two, or both screens that amaze users and win on that first impression. On the dark side, I think this is terrible for humanity.

Jared Steffes

Co-founder at Muxy

The Apple Duo will sell just fine and become a standard refresh path for Apple. The market for these foldable devices is already established because Android manufacturers have been making these foldable phones/tablets for years at a similar price. The big point that makes me feel comfortable is that they continue to invest and iterate on their devices.

I've been using a Samsung Flip for a couple of generations and the device continues to get better with each iteration. The Flip has been a nice icebreaker for conversations at gaming conventions because it remains a new experience for many Apple users.

I'm curious what launch deals cellular and brick-and-mortar store providers will offer. In the USA, Google and Samsung have offered trade-up and launch deals. The holiday sales days in November will really set the tone for easy adoption for a lot of prospective customers.

Browsing forums, it seems that iPad Mini users are excited about the potential of having a Duo. The industry estimate is that the iPad Mini accounts for 10% of total iPad sales, but Apple doesn't disclose sales figures. 

My team's designer is especially interested in how the UI/UX from traditional iPad and iPhone experiences will translate to this new form. I personally believe that Apple's team is experienced enough to study how other devices had difficulty building for the adaptive formats during the early days of foldable devices. They should have a thorough plan that should not be too disruptive for app developers.

Since the Duo has been in planning for quite some time, I feel this is a tee-off for John Ternus to get comfortable with device launches from the captain's chair. 

Ipek Kavuzlu

Product Lead at Poki

Apple's new foldable changes the canvas iOS developers are designing for. The inner and outer displays use the same aspect ratio, so developers aren't dealing with two fundamentally different screens, but the challenge is that the unfolded screen is much squarer than the 16:9 format many games target, so a rigidly designed game could end up letterboxed.

Web game developers already solve a similar problem by building responsive experiences across different mobile and desktop resolutions: 44% of gamers play titles on 16:9 screens, with the rest split across more than a dozen other screen shapes.

That mindset translates well here. Combined with the A20 Pro and WebGPU, developers have more headroom to make those adaptable experiences significantly richer visually, while still needing to scale performance intelligently across a wide range of devices.

The launch of Apple's Game Porting Toolkit 4 in June 2026 provided new support for developers, and I hope this assistance continues for devs bringing titles to new form factors.

Dmitrii Mamontov

Product Lead at Rokky

At first glance, the iPhone Duo looks like a very exciting step for mobile gaming. The combination of significantly more powerful hardware, improved cooling, and a much larger display could bring gaming experiences to mobile that previously made a lot more sense on PCs or consoles.

The challenge, however, is accessibility. The Duo starts at around $2,000, which puts it at the very top end of an already premium smartphone market. Even though premium smartphones are growing quickly in popularity, they still represent a minority of global smartphone sales.