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iPhone Foldable Display Said to Feature iPad-Style 4:3 Aspect Ratio
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In any case could be Apple iDuo, but I even don’t think so, since that name IMHO doesn’t have enough appeal nor marketing punch needed for a completely new iPhone line.
As somebody mentioned yesterday, Apple might bring back the "iBook" and "PowerBook" names, which BTW I like them a lot.
Macrumors writers very soon to be replaced by AI are resistant to use AI that will replace them to quickly edit their next-level writing skills.
No, they aren’t going to test the folding and durability. They figure it isn’t necessary.
Touch ID makes a lot of sense to me, due to actually that would be a way to cut down costs (as I suppose is cheaper to implement TouchID instead of FaceID), so this way Apple could help to equilibrate higher costs of its foldables.
No one would make a ‘clamshell’ smartphone because that defeats the entire purpose of engineering a foldable.
A smartphone is designed to fit into a pocket and be held in a hand. It is designed such that the width is not too much to be held or slid in a typical pants pocket. It’s designed to be not so tall that it is of nonsensical aspect ratio or too tall for a pocket.
You do not waste time and resources making a device that only makes a larger bulge in your pocket. It makes absolutely no sense whatsoever.
You do make a device that folds like a book such that it fits in your pocket with nearly identical dimensionality (aside from depth), as they do now—except this one can unfold into a much larger screen. That is the point. The only point.
Excellent point. I had not considered this aspect.
I still wonder if Apple will be able to devise something as seamless as Face ID that can avoid the need for doubling the sensors, without falling back on Touch ID.
Which extra bulk?
Analysts have said that a closed Apple foldable would be as depth as current slab iPhones are. That’s why Apple is actually developing the iPhone Air, to be the precursor of Apple foldables.
This should not be rewarded and is honestly ridiculous.
In 2025, with the flexible software tooling at hand to adjust to various sizes and form factors, we should not be getting rigidly forced into huge screens due to lazy development.
The problem with a foldable is that multitasking is nearly useless. Think about a 4:3 screen. They simply don’t offer you much, they are more distracting than anything in terms of added app content.
Look at the Messages app. On bigger screen all they do is slap the message threads list on the left side which is nearly useless and I argue distracting and ugly over the iPhone experience where it’s just a single message thread and you instantly swipe back to the threads list to move between. Having the thread list perpetually there is simply bad.
The same goes for most other apps, like mail. It basically just expands the app and places the previous page on the left hand side which just simply gets you next to zero time savings and like I said…it’s just distracting. Now, you could argue having a separate app open on the left and one on the right offers you something but not much at all because again multitasking like that is just distracting and/or virtually no savings over quickly switching between apps.
The only real benefit to a larger screen is larger media playback. Unfortunately a 4:3 aspect ratio is very very inefficient toward that goal. Why? Because almost all media content is presented in 16:9 or 2.39:1. So that results in very large letter boxing (black bars), rather than a lot more content.
Solution? The foldable phone should unfold 2 times, so that you get closer to a 16:9 aspect ratio and moreover, that aspect ratio would be in the same plane you always hold the phone, so you wouldn’t be rotating the phone anymore, you’d simply unfold it twice. I remember seeing one Chinese foldable like this and I thought yeah, that’s how you’d do a foldable because that actually gets you what you want: a very large media consumption device, and not just a gimmick multitasking device.
Look at the Messages app. On bigger screen all they do is slap the message threads list on the left side which is nearly useless and I argue distracting and ugly over the iPhone experience where it’s just a single message thread and you instantly swipe back to the threads list to move between. Having the thread list perpetually there is simply bad.
The same goes for most other apps, like mail. It basically just expands the app and places the previous page on the left hand side which just simply gets you next to zero time savings and like I said…it’s just distracting. Now, you could argue having a separate app open on the left and one on the right offers you something but not much at all because again multitasking like that is just distracting and/or virtually no savings over quickly switching between apps.
The only real benefit to a larger screen is larger media playback. Unfortunately a 4:3 aspect ratio is very very inefficient toward that goal. Why? Because almost all media content is presented in 16:9 or 2.39:1. So that results in very large letter boxing (black bars), rather than a lot more content.
Solution? The foldable phone should unfold 2 times, so that you get closer to a 16:9 aspect ratio and moreover, that aspect ratio would be in the same plane you always hold the phone, so you wouldn’t be rotating the phone anymore, you’d simply unfold it twice. I remember seeing one Chinese foldable like this and I thought yeah, that’s how you’d do a foldable because that actually gets you what you want: a very large media consumption device, and not just a gimmick multitasking device.
I have no interest in a folding iPhone, and the 4:3 aspect ratio of my iPad is the "defect" (personal opinion), that I notice the most. I would love an iPad with a 16:10 aspect ratio. Our phones and monitors are definitely in the widescreen / ultra widescreen areas, why not tablets?
You're completely dismissing the #1 thing I spend time doing on my iPad
Browsing the web
A large 4:3 screen is perfect for that
This feels a bit hyperbolic -- you are talking about very similar ratios in practical usage
I’d be impressed if Apple actually manages to bring this to market. It wouldn’t be the first time that Apple gives on something at the last minute. 🤷♂️
Watch for WWDC for Apple to talk about iPhone apps supporting all four orientations (most support just 3) and/or to push devs who have iPhone-only apps/layouts to think strongly about supporting iPad as a platform. Apple has, since the start, had support for shipping fat binaries that include iPad and iOS versions in the same bundle, and then later, the App Store added "thinning" to the process, stripping out UI resources and executable code that wasn't needed on a per-download basis (e.g., downloading for iPad with M1, strip out iPhone-specific images, and UI, and the A-series compiled code).
By no one, you mean those:
1. Samsung Galaxy Flip
2. Motorola Razr
3. Oppo Find N2 Flip
4. Xiaomi Mix Flip
5. Nubia Flip
?
Talking for myself, I’d rather prefer a clamshell iPhone instead a bookstyle.
Your preferences are not everyone preferences, so just write and talk by yourself.
Source: https://www.stuff.tv/features/best-flip-phones/
The other day I posed my own guess based on the rumoured 7.8 and 5.5 inch screens, and tried to line them up to proportionally correspond.
Apparently I'm doing anything to avoid work so I thought I would model them up really roughly to see what it looked like. Bezels are a bit 'optimistic' when I got them into 3D though.
Apologies, I'm not a product designer or anything so this is flawed and the rendering is pretty rough.
Again, this is just my guess based on nothing but my assumptions from the previous rumours, please don't hold any stock in the veracity of this!
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I can say what’s not attractive, thick raised plastic bezels that I’ve seen on folds/flips. Seemingly with multiple layers or gaps.
Love this! I actually got even more excited about the release than I already was!!
Roll on 2026…
Hopefully there will be an Apple pen … I would also like to hear about the foldable iPad 18 inches with Mac OS making both together the perfect combination