iPhone Fold: Launch, Pricing, and What to Expect From Apple's Foldable

[MacRumors]

Apple is expected to launch a new foldable iPhone next year, based on multiple rumors and credible sources. The long-awaited device has been rumored for years now, but signs increasingly suggest that 2026 could indeed be the year that Apple releases its first foldable device.

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Below, we've collated an updated set of key details that have been leaked about Apple's foldable iPhone so far. Apple will allegedly call the device the "‌iPhone‌ Fold," which is the name the media has already adopted when sharing rumors about the product.

Overall Design
Book-Style
According to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman, Apple's foldable iPhone is similar in style to Samsung's Galaxy Z Fold, which uses a book-style folding mechanism, rather than the clamshell design of the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip. Industry analyst Ming-Chi Kuo expects the foldable ‌iPhone‌ to measure between 9 and 9.5 mm when folded, and around 4.5 to 4.8 mm when unfolded. More recently, Weibo-based leaker Instant Digital has said that the foldable iPhone will have a thickness of at least 4.8mm.

Display Sizes
Dual Screens
When folded, users will interact with a 5.5-inch outer display that is similar to a typical iPhone screen, while unfolding it will reveal a larger 7.8-inch iPad-style screen. These dimensions have been corroborated by two reputable sources. According to one rumor, the inner folding display will be approximately the size of a piece of A6 paper and will use a 2,713 x 1,920 resolution, while the outer display will use a 2,088 x 1,422 resolution.

Crease Visibility
'Crease-Free'
The inner display is said to be virtually crease-free, thanks to Apple's use of a metal plate that can disperse and control the stress generated by bending the display, according to analyst Ming-Chi Kuo. Apple is said to be using liquid metal in the hinges to improve durability and help eliminate screen creasing. Liquid metal, manufactured using a die-casting process, has been chosen by Apple to address this common issue with foldable devices, according to the analyst. Citing supply chain sources, Chinese site UDN says that Apple has solved "the crease problem" that has plagued most foldable smartphones, and the foldable ‌iPhone‌ will be the first crease-free foldable smartphone on the market.

Chassis and Hinge
Durable Materials
The foldable iPhone reportedly has a titanium chassis, with the hinge constructed from a combination of titanium and stainless steel, according to analyst Ming-Chi Kuo. The frame itself will use a titanium alloy to prevent bending issues – a solution that has worked well for Apple's new ultra-thin iPhone Air. However, analyst Jeff Pu believes that Apple is using aluminum and titanium, whereas Kuo believes a mix of stainless steel and titanium has been chosen.

Cameras
Front and Rear
The foldable iPhone is expected to include a dual-lens rear camera, with a front-facing camera for both folded and unfolded states, according to Kuo. Bloomberg's Mark Gurman recently corroborated reports that the device will have four cameras consisting of one front camera, one inner camera, and two rear cameras. Prolific Weibo-based leaker Digital Chat Station claims that the rear dual lenses will be 48 megapixels each. Other sources have claimed that the inner display features an under-screen camera (USC), while the outer display – in the device's folded state – will have a punch-hole camera.

Authentication
Touch ID
Kuo believes the phone will forgo Face ID authentication, and instead use a Touch ID side button as a means to save precious internal space, and Bloomberg's Mark Gurman recently... Click here to read rest of article

Article Link: iPhone Fold: Launch, Pricing, and What to Expect From Apple's Foldable

 

[MacUserFella]

A first gen device? A high starting price? People having little to no reason to buy it?

Sign me up!

 

[SnowPenguin]

I expected it to be so expensive. It will probably make the Galaxy Fold cheap by comparison (who knows).

I also expect it to (hopefully) help make foldables more mainstream.

Since it is technically an iPad. It must support the Apple pencil, and (hopefully), it will support it when it is folded & when it is not.

 

[leonremi]

Thanks but no thanks.
I'll stick with my Pro Max.
I need a reliable daily driver, not a useless accident waiting to happen.
To each their own I guess (or not, considering how the Air has been a bust)

 

[Digital Dude]

I’m interested, despite Apple’s track record of falling short of expectations. I have no doubt that Apple will prevail in the hardware, but the software has been their Achilles heel these days.

 

[Chomp81]

When you see what Huawei is doing, Apple feels so far behind.
The foldable is a nice gimmick, but can't really see the use.

Nevertheless; to think 4 cameras in a device is impressive.

If I upgrade from my 16PM, it'll be the 18PM; but needs to have significant upgrade in camera.

 

[Virinprew]

A first gen device? A high starting price? People having little to no reason to buy it?

Sign me up!

As with everything in life, just get it out first then refine it later. The first iPhone was lacking in many things.

 

[nuff_said]

When you see what Huawei is doing, Apple feels so far behind.
The foldable is a nice gimmick, but can't really see the use.

Nevertheless; to think 4 cameras in a device is impressive.

If I upgrade from my 16PM, it'll be the 18PM; but needs to have significant upgrade in camera.

Huawei is where “innovation meets gorgeous design” now resides and has for a few years. If I could get Google Services on it without jumping through hoops I’d get one.

 

[nuff_said]

As with everything in life, just get it out first then refine it later.

Or flop so large gen two never sees the light of day

 

[Virinprew]

Or flop so large gen two never sees the light of day

You never know until it has been tried.

 

[SoldOnApple]

One day all phones will be like this. They may even get so thin that you can unfold it a second time for a 4x bigger screen. Then sometime in the future the screens will get so thin and so cheap that they'll be everywhere, even on disposable packaging.

 

[the8thark]

Could foldable phones exist?
Sure. Companies can make them if they wanted to.

Should foldable phones exist?
No.
They do not do anything better than a standard tablet style phone - ie. the iPhones we already have.

We have had foldable phones for ages. The old flip phones folded. The screen was only on one side though.

Until someone explains how foldable phones are better than the existing non folding tablet style phones we have now - I am not sold on the idea.

As a proof of concept, a foldable iPhone is pretty cool. However, for a daily driver we will need a reason why they are better than what we already use now.

Apple need to sell the concept to us.

 

[SnowPenguin]

As with everything in life, just get it out first then refine it later. The first iPhone was lacking in many things.

Yeah, right, but that's also a reason not to get the first generation. If one could help it.

 

[jdawgnoonan]

For me to buy one, and I am interested, it needs to cost less than an iPhone Pro Max plus an iPad Mini if I was purchasing both at once. Yes the foldable device brings features, but it brings more compromises than features. A pro max is a better slab phone than the outer screen will be and the iPad mini is a better tablet than the inner screen will be. It will also be a more fragile device than either stand alone device is. I had a Galaxy Fold and I did like it a lot. Just not well enough that I thought that the compromises were worth it (especially when the os was Android as I think iOS is superior in most ways). I am game to try an iOS based foldable for the right value proposition. The folding gimmick alone is not enough. It should cost less than the two devices it aims to replace if they were purchased at one time.

 

[Warped9]

Could foldable phones exist?
Sure. Companies can make them if they wanted to.

Should foldable phones exist?
No.
They do not do anything better than a standard tablet style phone - ie. the iPhones we already have.

We have had foldable phones for ages. The old flip phones folded. The screen was only on one side though.

Until someone explains how foldable phones are better than the existing non folding tablet style phones we have now - I am not sold on the idea.

As a proof of concept, a foldable iPhone is pretty cool. However, for a daily driver we will need a reason why they are better than what we already use now.

Apple need to sell the concept to us.

This is the crux of it. Lots of things can be done, but the key is does it do what it does better than what already exists? Does its supposed utility justify its cost or is it largely a flashy curiosity that most will pass by?

Mobile phones have been tried in a wide variety of sizes. Presently we’re at the point where the optimum size(s) have been reached. Giving a mobile phone a folding capability to give you are larger display strikes me as counterintuitive because you are now increasing the size of the device again which isn’t optimally convenient. Unless you want the unfolded screen to be really no bigger than what we have now so the device when folded is more compact such as what already exists—to me thats the only rationalization.

But I think it comes down to introducing added and unnecessary complexity to something that doesn’t need it. This is a novelty to show it can be done, but I doubt it will improve on what we already have. It will be attractive to the higher market crowd, the influencers and those who like gimmicks.

The folding phones themselves might never, likely won’t, attain a large market share or popularity, but it might influence technology in other ways such as the folding display used in other and larger applications.

 

[phuklok1]

i kinda wish they would make this with two separate displays rather than a constantly folding plastic screen. with edge to edge displays, the brain would begin to overlook a tiny line in between and it would be way more robust. using multiple displays for years it’s not really a big deal. also if i was really criticality watching a movie or something it would probably be on a larger screen anyway. i also don’t want to have to worry about constantly flexing a screen every time i use my phone.

 

[Lizzard899]

No one is gonna buy a phone thats $2,000 or more......this is why no one likes apple. Ive been saying theyre gonna go out of business by 2030 cuz theyve been bad with ios updates and phones. Tim cook ruined apple after jobs died sadly

 

[H.E. Pennypacker]

A first gen device? A high starting price? People having little to no reason to buy it?

Sign me up!

First-gen Apple foldable with insane engineering, a premium build, and a price that matches the tech? Yeah, sign me up. Sorry it intimidates you, not everyone is stuck in 2014. Some of us actually like living in the future instead of whatever bargain bin timeline doubters are shopping in.

 

[leonremi]

A folding phone is still a phone.
Most of the time ,it will remain folded, and the extra screen is smaller than a Pro Max.
So you are basically trading a bigger everyday screen for a less durable, more expensive, actually SMALLER screen for most situations, just to have a bigger screen for rare circumstances (which may not even really include video depending on the screen ratio).

 

[H.E. Pennypacker]

Could foldable phones exist?
Sure. Companies can make them if they wanted to.

Should foldable phones exist?
No.
They do not do anything better than a standard tablet style phone - ie. the iPhones we already have.

We have had foldable phones for ages. The old flip phones folded. The screen was only on one side though.

Until someone explains how foldable phones are better than the existing non folding tablet style phones we have now - I am not sold on the idea.

As a proof of concept, a foldable iPhone is pretty cool. However, for a daily driver we will need a reason why they are better than what we already use now.

Apple need to sell the concept to us.

Foldables aren’t supposed to replace slab phones they’re just the next form factor. Pretending they’re useless because they’re new is the same tired take people had about smartphones, tablets, and literally every leap forward. If someone needs a power point to understand why a phone that expands is useful, that’s on them, not the tech. An Apple foldable doesn’t need your permission to exist. Some of us like seeing tech move forward instead of waiting for the world to freeze exactly where we’re comfortable.

 

[Dark_Omen]

Doesn’t matter when the release date is because a small group of people will preorder all the prerelease models and sell them for triple the price. Kinda like what happens to the Xbox and PS5.

 

[Evil Lair]

The tiny iPhone-mini size outer display and only dual cameras would be a huge mistake. It sounds like it will have worse specs than my current Pixel fold, which acts like a normal plus-size phone most of the time with three decent cameras and a large outer screen, but also turns into a mini tablet when needed. Maybe Apple can differentiate and succeed with a smaller version of a foldable phone, but like the Air this will get hurt by having fewer features than their competitors while coming in at a higher price.

 

[iMac The Knife]

Two predictions:

1. The iPhone foldable will not launch in 2026 - Apple delays almost everything anymore. It's really sad.
2. If/when the iPhone foldable does launch, it will bring foldables closer to being mainstream than they've ever been before.

 

[iMac The Knife]

A folding phone is still a phone.
Most of the time ,it will remain folded, and the extra screen is smaller than a Pro Max.
So you are basically trading a bigger everyday screen for a less durable, more expensive, actually SMALLER screen for most situations, just to have a bigger screen for rare circumstances (which may not even really include video depending on the screen ratio).

This isn't true at all, in terms of usage anyway. I use my Z Fold 7 unfolded approx. 75% of the time, and folded 25% of the time. I'm far from the only one with these numbers. And, of course my phone remains folded most of the time when I'm not using it. That's a no brainer.

 

[KES3059A3]

Could foldable phones exist?
Sure. Companies can make them if they wanted to.

Should foldable phones exist?
No.
They do not do anything better than a standard tablet style phone - ie. the iPhones we already have.

We have had foldable phones for ages. The old flip phones folded. The screen was only on one side though.

Until someone explains how foldable phones are better than the existing non folding tablet style phones we have now - I am not sold on the idea.

As a proof of concept, a foldable iPhone is pretty cool. However, for a daily driver we will need a reason why they are better than what we already use now.

Apple need to sell the concept to us.

I travel a lot (20-30 countries a year).

A foldable appeals to me because I hate lugging more gadgets than necessary.

I've always wanted a device the size of a tablet, but that can fit in my pocket. One that I could have multiple apps open on, or just one that I'm not relegated to the mobile experience when using a browser, maps, photos, email, or word processing app.

A phone can't do that. Neither can a tablet. But a foldable phone can.

And I will absolutely pay a premium price for that.