How we really feel about the iPhone Duo

Hey, hey, hey. Heat. Heat. Hello and welcome to the Vergecast, the flagship podcast of nose typing. Everybody's doing it. It's the new revolutionary input mechanism for the iPod, the iPhone. >> I'm your friend David Pierce. I am here in the studio with two iPhone Duos and two iPhone Duo reviewers, Neil Patel and Alison Johnson. Welcome friends. >> Hello. Nice to meet you. >> Hello David. >> Nei has become a nightmare in the course of reviewing phones. >> So little. >> It's good. It's going to be great. >> So the the reviews out. It's been a big day full of reviews. Um I I'm I'm actually curious. You've both reviewed a lot of phones over the years and I think it's been a while, at least for me, since I have had so little guess what a bunch of reviewers were going to say going in. And I know one of the things as a reviewer that's weird is like what if I'm the only one who shares this opinion? Has this been a weird thing over the last week or so? Like new phone big new ideas, what if I'm the only one who feels the way that I do? >> I think so. I mean, and a foldable phone is so variable and how people are going to use it, how much you use the inner screen, what kinds of things you do like that work on the inner screen. So, yeah, it was it was a real kind of wild card waking up this morning being like, "Oh, what did everyone else think?" Yeah, we are lucky because we were talking to each other. >> True. >> Yeah. >> So, at least I knew we weren't nuts. >> Yeah. >> Like I had that one locked down. >> A little bit of sanity check is helpful. >> We're nuts in the right way. Yeah. >> Uh I you know it's like we have the same angle as like five other reviewers. Like we have the same angle as Joanna. We have almost the same thumbnail and headline as Marquez. So I promise you we did not coordinate that. >> Yeah. >> Um although I will say the you AB testing chose against me. The two headlines we chose were like the standard one like messy expense whatever that headline is whatever set of words and then my preferred one which was iPhone duo review emotional. >> I think the problem was it wasn't it didn't say emotional in all caps. >> That's the real problem. >> Our uh our >> you sobbing in the thumbnail that >> our head of video Kevin was like but you're not emotional enough. And I was like this is as emotional as I get. >> It's a first generation product. >> It would have done numbers. I'm just saying. Um, but like everyone had that same, >> oh, this is a really fun thing to play with. >> You should wait. >> And I and that seems down the line where where things are different and because it's affordable and it's really it's like how you use it is just going to change the experience. I got drastically worse battery life than everyone else. >> Oh, interesting. >> And I think it's cuz I had it open all the time. >> Yeah. I mean that a makes logical sense and b is sort of a weird cautionary tale about this thing that it's like more than most >> like how you use it physically will change the experience of the battery all day. But neither of you got what I would call like good battery life >> which is kind of a bummer. >> Yeah. Not for a brand new iPhone out of the box, you know, like Pro Max style. No. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. But if you look at Marquez or you look at David ML, they're like, "We love the battery life on this thing." >> Incredible. impressive in real life. I'm like, you had it closed. >> I know what happened here. You used a little bitty phone. >> It's the open versus closed that we most need to talk about. This has been like the number one thing on everybody's minds. It's the It's the main thing everybody's reckoning with in all of these reviews. And I think the the first question you are confronted by the minute you like pick up this thing and hold it is is this thing the right size? And I actually feel like you two might slightly differ on this one. So, I I want to I want to dig into this. They they went with the passport the passport size. We're doing the widefold thing. It's like almost the size of the Samsung ZFold 8, which everybody has really liked. Um Allison, what do you make of the actual size and shape of this thing? Did Apple do this correctly? >> I think I'm on board with the Passport shape now. Like I like everybody else, you know, earlier this year, we started seeing like renders of these and it was like that looks goofy. That looks like a goofy phone. And then you pick it up and you're like, no, actually this makes a lot of sense. It's pretty nice. So, I'm on board with that. That was everyone's reaction to the ZFold 8, by the way. Like, it was the funniest thing. Everybody was like, "That seems kind of" And then you hold it, it's like, "Oh, >> you really do go through the stages of of grief or something." Um, but >> so I'm on board with that. This phone in particular is heavy and it's a little thicker than the Zfold 8. >> It is heavy. >> So when you're >> like, it looks heavy so it doesn't sort of read as heavy when you pick up, but it is. >> This is a light, thin tablet. I guess you close it, you're like, "This is heavy. It's a heavy phone." So, >> yeah, I got a lot of questions from the iPhone mini crew. Shout out to my people. Um, you know, is this like it's a small screen phone and like it is not I can't say that enough or like loud enough. It is a heavy phone with a a tiny screen. >> There was definitely a contingent of iPhone mini stands who were like, "Maybe I can get everything I want out of this phone." And like I'm I'm so sorry to tell all of you. >> The world has left you behind. >> Not a little bit. >> No. I'm so sorry, my people. We can't. No. >> The app ecosystem has left you behind. >> Uh this it is a heavy phone and Apple definitely had to make some sort of trade-off between size and weight. >> Yeah. >> It's too small. >> And yeah, your argument is they made the wrong trade-off. >> They made the wrong trade-off. It I don't think this outer screen is useful enough. Okay. >> And that means I This is why I had it open all the time. I was constantly like, "Well, I can't read this whole email, so I'm going to open the phone." >> Would you stretch it in both dimensions? wider and taller, >> I think, >> because now we got a big ass phone. It's like you, this is the problem. You run this is this is about as big as you can get before at some point in some orientation, you're going to be like, "This thing is preposterous." >> Apple's very proud of the aspect ratio and fact that it's like in a piece of A4 paper and it opens and it's exactly the same. And all of this is very clever and it in practical reality the cleverness of the aspect ratios matching does not overcome the uselessness of the outer display. >> And I say useless that's like too mean. It's you can use it. I've been using the phone. But if you are used to a portrait phone running big portrait phone apps, you're like, "Well, this is pretty tiny and not very >> The shot in the review video that got me was the messages app where you you open up the messages app, it pops up the the keyboard and the, you know, the Chrome at the top and you can see a text." >> Yeah. >> There's one text in view and it's like, okay, this just isn't enough space. >> Yeah. And we had a question in our AMA that was like here's this long list of things I want to do and you can separate them into two categories. And one is anything you're doing where you're do an input. Can I make a quick note? Can I reply to a text? Can I change a setting that all that's fine on this display? >> The keyboard is is a fine size and you're like make a note, send a text. Anything where you need to read and react or consume any information, you're like this screen is too small. >> Especially if you're trying to do that interactively, right? So, it's two Slack messages. It's I want to leave a comment on a Google doc, which is a thing that we wanted to do all week. >> Not happening on this display. So, then you open it and now you're like, I'm holding a tablet with two hands >> and I'm having that whole experience. And this tablet is not an iPad, which is the single biggest thing I think everyone needs to understand about this. Apple looked at the iPad and said, "No." >> So, which which brings me to a game we're going to play later on in this episode called, "Should this have been an iPad?" >> It's amazing. for the second Apple product in a row. The question is, should this have been an iPhone? >> Looked at their own tablet, their decade old tablet and its whole ecosystem and went, >> "No, >> I think that is bananas." Just to spoil that. But before we get to that, I think one of the things that has come up a lot in comments. It came up in the AMA and you have both sort of alluded to it in your testing is the the idea of maybe a foldable in general, but particularly this foldable in this style >> changing your relationship to your phone. >> Um, and Alison, this is the thing you and I talk about all the time, right? Like how do you change the shape of the device to change your relationship to it? And it's you're like you want desperately to get rid of your phone and just use an Apple Watch, which is like slightly insane. But then this is like I think it was David Al who was posting that this turned into a much more taskoriented device for him that he's like I open it up I do a thing and then I close it and there was something meaningful about it and it's done. I think a lot of our audience actually really responds to that idea. Have you guys found that like you you settle into this like I just don't use this phone quite the same way? I think you have to uh for me I would have to go in with that intention because I I did find like if I was in the back of an Uber scrolling on the outer screen I was like this is kind of uncomfortable. I don't like it and I put the phone away. If if that's some kind of win for like my sanity I I don't know. >> Hollywood is betting on vertical micro dramas to save it and this phone is going to kill that whole plan. >> There's so many micro drama apps on this phone. Um, that's another story for another day. Um, >> watch out real short. The Duo came to take your business away. That's like what this phone is like. >> Yeah. And yeah, not being a vertical video person, I think, maybe kind of changed my experience with it. I do think I this would be a phone where I'm like, you know what? I'm going to leave it at home and I'm going to go exist in the world with the cellular Apple Watch. I'm I'm not letting that dream die. And I think this is this is kind of ideal for it where it's like you really get into it and open the screen and you're doing two apps or PDFs or whatever you're doing and when you're done just shut it and just have your messages on your wrist and go. That's my TED talk. >> I mean it does sound >> So you want a folding iPad mini without a cover screen? >> Yes. >> Slightly different direction than what Apple went in. Uh I look I I found the experience of watching Instagram or Tik Tok on this thing just completely absurd. >> Sure. >> Because it's too small on the cover display and it crops the video. >> It makes the video like Instagram will make the video more square. >> Tik Tok is not optimized. So it just like doesn't look right and doesn't work right. And then you open it and you're scrolling Instagram on a tablet and whatever whatever shame you can feel about using an app on a smartphone. You feel that shame. You're like, I shouldn't be doing this. >> I see. >> Um, will it lead to a resurgence in landscape YouTube videos? Is the 8 minute mid form YouTube video going to make a comeback because the iPhone like maybe because it opens from portrait to landscape. So the feeling of like, oh, I got to dive deeper, right? >> Immediately puts you into landscape and what what maybe you're just going to watch video that way. Now, >> I think this is the thing that I most cannot figure out about this phone. So, like you're you have the YouTube app open and you're on the you're on the outer screen and it has this big black bar on the right side that takes up just a shocking amount of the real estate of this relatively small screen. This is, if I understand it correctly, a sign of an unoptimized >> There's three categories. You got to you got Are you ready for this? >> Sure. >> So, there's there's not updated at all. >> Yeah. >> Which just looks like teenytiny phone apps. >> Okay. >> Then there's updated for iOS 27. >> Okay. Not the Duo. >> Yeah. >> And that gets you this the black bar on the side and a slightly bigger auto layout and everything about the only way to describe these apps is vibe coded. >> Okay. >> Right. Like just stuff starts happening and you're like it's bigger now but no one thought about this and like YouTube is >> but for the most part it just it goes from not stretching correctly to stretching correctly. >> Yeah. But if you look at I'm going to I can't show people this but if you look at uh Gmail which got updated like in the unoptimized way. I'm just going to show my Gmail spam folder. Hang on. Um, so this is Can you guys Can youall see this? This is Gmail. >> And you would expect in landscape mode that it would look like any email app in landscape mode. >> Inbox on the left. Nope. Message on the right. >> It's just a big list. >> Yeah. Okay. >> And if you open any email, you just get a giant email, >> right? >> So, this is optimized for iOS 27. >> iOS 27. So, you get for free in iOS 27 a little bit bigger on the Duo. Then there's the the big update. Mhm. >> Updated for iOS 27.1 where you get the Duo enhancements. You stop, you lose the black bar, you move the controls over to the side. And there's a bunch of those that happened over the past week. If you watch Joanna's video, she recorded her software section three times. Wow. >> She was insanely frustrated by the amount of updates that were happening. >> Uh we had a whole section, our video that was like, "Look at how dumb Instagram is." And then Instagram updated like yesterday. >> Instagram's a good example, though, cuz it went from being super dumb to less dumb. I would not say it perfectly uses the the screen Instagram is maybe the most vibecoded update of all where like it's very obvious that Claude was instructed to like figure it out and Claude made some decisions and like things are moved around and many of those decisions don't make any sense. And on the cover display in particular, there's all kinds of interface elements overlapping with each other. >> So, this thing has been updated for the Duo. It fills the space. the controls are moved over and open question whether Meta is going to keep refining that app or whether they're going to have checked the box and call it a day. And this is why, you know, our rule is you got to review what's in the box. I I can't tell you what Meta is going to do with its Duo design language. >> I can tell you for sure what Google's going to do, which is nothing, >> right? All of Google's apps are so Google gets into the Duo. >> Uh look, Google's new model is very powerful. >> Yeah, maybe anti-gravity. I like I legitimately think the power of AI assisted coding is going to help the the the Duo updates come faster and that will feel like something meaningful and then you'll actually use them >> and it's going to be rough >> for a year >> because yes, it will fill the screen. It won't be as silly as the little apps, but you can already see in this first wave they're checking the box. >> Yeah. >> They're not thoughtfully rethinking how their app should work. There are some apps that obviously do that, right? But the sort of like the big five, it's just vivecodated city. >> Yeah. Which I get, but is also a bummer and is a weird that it's actually a hard chicken and egg problem for anybody like including Apple. Apple is better at arm wrestling its developers to do what it wants than any other company. >> They didn't lean on the iPad. It's right there. The iPad, it's right there. The whole ecosystem of apps. >> Have either of you developed a theory for why this is? Because all the stuff you're describing where like what what it really is is most of the developers I've seen up updating their apps to do duo essentially land on sidebar on the left thing on the right and it's like could you be more inventive than that? Sure. But that works. It fills the space. This is also what everybody does on Android and Google has actually maybe done a better job of of pulling the the resolution targets in the right direction that way. Can either of you think of any reason Apple wouldn't have just pulled the iPad down onto the duo in that way? >> I think they're just precious about this is an iPhone and that's such a a core part of that company and they are so loathed to break anything about it. And um >> you know what they should have done is they should have just called this the Apple Duo. >> Oo. >> Let it let it live in the middle. Just blow everybody's mind. >> Just ambiguous. Is it an iPhone? >> Yeah. It's like oh you want an iPhone and a Duo and an iPad. you can do that. >> It might have been too hard. I mean, you know, iPad OS is its own OS. It has a lot of baggage at this point. The app bundles are not the same. >> Mhm. >> So, >> we have a commenter pointing out that Netflix is one that did a good job of Duo support. Is that true? I think you you guys mentioned that in the review. I think that Netflix >> like moves the player move the player and the controls into the right place. >> They did the trick with the reflections, you know, with it based on where the hinge is too. I watched British Bake Off on it. It was a lovely experience. I get to say that. >> Love that. So, yeah, this is the sort of thing where I think I think we can probably safely assume that everyone >> will support iOS 27, right? So, the the like the ones you guys have where it's basically an iPhone app sort of floating in nothingness on the Duo. My assumption is most of those will be gone pretty fast. >> Those are vanishing like by the day. It really was insane trying to review a thing that is changing every time you open it. >> Okay. Yeah, this works. It's like the screen up at the top and then I have the the controls now. It's like I'm holding a Game Boy Advance. Like this works. >> It's fine. >> Yeah. >> But you're just watching video on it, right? It's any app you have to change your interaction paradigm. >> But importantly, that is not a small amount of work. Like that that is a thoughtful redesign of an app, not a button you can check in Xcode. >> Yes. >> Which is what a lot of these things have been and kind of what Apple alluded to it being. So the easy path, it turns out actually doesn't do that much. And if you want to do the good thing, it's going to be a fair amount of work for developers. >> The the message out of Apple, for whatever it's worth, is the iPhone and the iPad are different products. They have different ecosystems. And vastly more people have iPhones. >> Yeah. >> So you you you can't assume that they understand how an iPad works. So we're going to build a new thing. And I would bet over the next two to three years, one to two years, >> that the iPad and the Duo just run into each other because there's there's no other outcome other than, okay, if you make the Duo tablet mode more useful, it becomes an iPad, >> right? >> And so Apple in its very Apple way was like, what if we threw out everything we ever knew about everything and we start it over and we like made an iPad from scratch and then eventually that will run into the iPad. The line I keep using is the Duo wants to be an iPad in exactly the same way the iPad wants to be a Mac, >> which is kind of a problem in both cases. >> Yeah. I mean, it's what is the every iPad review we've done for 5 years is like just let it >> either give this its own identity or just shut up and make it a Mac. >> And apparently we might get a touchcreen Mac. Like all of these things are just crashing into each other as fast as >> And somewhere in the middle of that is a home view that's like it's CarPlay. And it's like Apple's software story is about to be as chaotic and confusing as it's ever been. I think that is fundamentally exciting. This is a very conservative company lately and they're about to blow. They're just throwing bombs and everything and it's going to be a mess. >> Yes. >> Just a pure mess. And this is why I keep saying this is like first generation early adopter stuff. If you are excited about a mess and I'm like pretty excited about a mess. This is going to be really fun. If you are just trying to use your phone, you're going to be like, I don't know what happened to me. >> Mhm. And this is I think both of us had the experience of like we're reviewing this phone but I need to just do something and just pulling out a regular phone. >> Yeah. >> To be like I'm just gonna I'm gonna handle this business. >> Yep. >> Because it the your regular phone is not nearly as chaotic as this thing. >> And you get such a feeling of relief. Like we both experience this. You pick up a regular phone. It's like the thing where you're used to picking up a toddler and you pick up a baby. You're like, "Oh my gosh, I'm the strongest person in the world." You you get that little moment of like, "Oh, okay. This is nice." And yeah, you it's just what is your pain tolerance for the heavy phone? How much do you you really want to get out of the inner screen is what I keep coming back to forever. >> It does seem like the good news of all of this stuff though is that it is kind of it's a lot of like small little solvable things like there there doesn't seem to be unless you're on sort of team nei just fundamentally too small which I think I disagree with you on actually. I think the reason I started this off in the first place is I think if you just get rid of that stupid bar on the side and and >> so you change the aspect ratio of your phone entirely. No, just move it out of the way. You have to swipe control center in now. Just make me swipe control center in. Give me the screen real estate back. >> Like you may have solved part of my problem with the teeny tiny >> I'm worried that you don't understand how shapes work. What are you proposing here? >> I'm proposing >> as someone with an 8-year-old and a one-year-old. I've done shapes a lot. >> I'm proposing that the the black bar that is always here on the right side not be there on the right side anymore. >> So that it gets skinnier. >> No, no, no. I'm saying on the screen. Don't change the hardware at all. Just give me the give me the pixels back. >> Yeah. You want it to like disappear and you call it back. Yes. >> To use the buttons, >> which is how I would point out iPhones currently work. >> Oh, >> you know what's not there on the iPhone is a bunch of Wi-Fi controls taking up a bunch of space. >> So, the reason I can't do this, I I think I understand what's going on in your mind. Okay. >> I've known you for a long time. I think I think I understand the the neural >> I thought you can see everything less. I'm I'm a broken person today. >> The problem is that the camera is in the corner. So the the reason you have the black bar is Apple like Samsung on a fold camera here. They fixed that, >> right? But they because it's the top. >> So like Samsung to this is maybe the most interesting comparison of all is to the Fold 8. >> Okay. >> So Samsung is same basic size and shape. Uh it's a little lighter, but Samsung is like this is just a phone. >> And so there's a camera at the top and there's buttons on the bottom and they're just like it's a it's a phone but smaller, right? Apple was like, "We've reinvented the very concept of a phone." >> Apple. Yep. >> And so they're like, "The camera's off in the top right, and that means all the status stuff is on the right, and we're just taking that vertical strip, and the camera will it will be dominated by the camera in the corner, as opposed to what they do on on their phones now, which is the camera's at the top and you're not don't don't look at this, right? The whole dynamic island is like don't look at this, right? Like just assume it's not there. You'll learn to ignore it. This is like the camera dominates the entire interface because of that black bar. And so if you give it back to me, they they will have to make some other decision on the camera. >> They'll have to do what they did on the iPad, which is eventually relent and put it in the correct place. >> Yeah. >> The middle where cameras go. >> Look, a lot of this is like, should the camera be in the middle? Is this the right aspect ratio? Should it have Face ID in the front? Half the reviewers are just it should just have Face ID unlock on the front. >> Y >> um >> Yeah. How did you guys feel about this? There are a lot of people who are really mad about Touch ID instead of Face ID. Did it I I think especially having spent a lot of time getting used to face unlock. >> The going back does take some adjustment. >> Yeah. The thing I kept doing was I would pull up the phone and just stare at it and then wait for the notifications to unfurl and I was like, "Oh, oh yeah, I got to use >> I have to do something." >> Yeah, that was a little weird. There is that kind of lag of like, did it did I get my thumb there? It's got Okay, good. We're good. Um, >> you can turn that off apparently. >> Okay, >> I learned this. So, we had our own hidden settings and a lot of other reviewers found another hidden setting. >> Oh, wow. >> So, there's a hidden setting to turn off Touch ID delay. >> Oh, >> which I did not know about. Okay. >> Uh, because why on earth would you ever know about this in the world of Face ID, >> but there is a setting buried in the menus where right now if you just put your thumb on it gently, it'll unlock halfway and show you notifications. And you and it will say rest to unlock. >> If you hold it there, it'll unlock all the way. >> Can I say I enjoy it telling me to rest. That was nice. >> Please take take a beat while your phone unlocks. But you can turn that off and it unlocks almost instantly. >> Okay, >> so that's one hidden setting that I think Apple got wrong. And the the hidden setting I think Apple got wrong is so preposterously backwards. like it is it is the least intuitive default setting Apple has ever created where if you you can change you can have the volume buttons auto reorient themselves. >> Uhhuh. >> So you open it and then you always want to turn it clockwise and the volume buttons end up on the bottom right. >> Right. >> And then by default >> up should be up and down should be down. >> So by default the top button is volume down when it's this way that way. And there's a button. There's buried in settings. Uh, auto reorient volume buttons. >> This is another thing Apple has solved already on. >> So, yeah, it's it's already there and it's on by default. So, to make the button do the right thing, you have to go find a hidden setting and turn it off. >> And I like even just trying to like write it in the review, I was like, not this. I can't make these sentences make sense. >> That was it was an all-time high of getting comments from editors who were like, what are you saying? like I don't get this at all. I'm like no, there's on the other screen and this screen and this happens. It's like I'm I'm sorry. You have to >> We We also got a lot of uh comments from uh from Jake and Todd who are editing this. They were like, "Maybe this will make sense when I see the video." >> Yeah. Yeah. >> Like just like sort of like plaintively like maybe when I see it, it will make sense. >> Well, this was your whole thing about the way you instinctively rotate it being upside down. One of those things you described this to me. I was like that none of what you just said is English words. And then you you you hold it and pick it up and rotate it and it's like, "Oh, I I do kind of flip it over." >> So, in this case, the bumper case, which is ugly, but the only acceptable case. Um, the other case is I keep calling it the old lady case. Um, so if you I don't know if you all can see this. I hope you can see this. The this is the top of this case and it has a notch for the Touch ID button and the camera control button. And for all like everything you know about cases, >> that's the bottom. >> Yes. >> Because that's where you would plug in charger, right? Like everything you know about everything suggests this is the bottom. So every time you open it, you're like, I'm going to put the bottom at the bottom, but that's actually the top. >> Yeah, that's silly. >> And then the USB is on the side. >> We got a lot of questions about cases actually because uh a thing I forget as a person who proudly does not use a phone case is that everyone uses phone cases. >> Um >> are there literally there's just the two from Apple. Presumably there will be others, but I feel like foldable cases in general are hard to do well. >> Apples are particularly bad. >> Yeah. Allison, can you can you give us a demo of the the disaster zone over here? >> Okay. The the Karen case. >> It has a kickstand. I love a kickstand. >> It just it just looks like you're in a restaurant. You're going to call the manager every time I see it. >> Can we Yeah. So, it covers the the front display first of all, so you have to do a move to open it up. Um, and it it has Okay, here's the jump scare. >> It has this like elastic bit in the middle. Um, >> because it has to stretch over. >> It has to stretch over that. It's I mean kind of clever. Um but it >> is it though? >> It slides around to like a an alarming degree I think and then it turns into a thing I'm fidgeting with. >> That just looks like your case is falling off. >> Yeah. >> And in fact your case just fell off as you were doing that. It just fell off. >> When you you're like I need to do the kickstand. Do you like am I peeling the case off of the phone? You know like >> there I got there. But um yeah I don't I don't love it. It does remind me of a pair of shoes at Nordstrom Rack. I love Nordstrom Rack. >> It's funny. Everyone has like arrives at kind of the same insult, which is like this is an irritating wine mom's case. >> Yeah. >> Like just naturally, it's the way you look at and maybe that's >> there was a whole genre of these in the early days. >> There's a lot of those around >> and boy did we all learn better. All right, we have a bunch of other stuff to get into, but we should take a quick break and then we're going to dig back in. We'll be right back. Support for the show comes from Framer. If you want to create a website that looks great, feels handcrafted, and comes together fast and seamlessly, then look no further than Framer. It's a complete website platform, not just a builder, so teams can launch and keep improving their sites in one place. It helps creators, teams, and businesses ship productionready sites faster than ever while getting every detail right. You're able to prompt, inspect, edit, and publish in one place at a whole new pace. On Framer, agents and humans work in tandem. Agents bring speed and scale, while people bring taste, judgment, and control. And that all takes place in the same workspace where the real site is designed, managed, reviewed, and published. Thousands of businesses from earlystage startups to Fortune 500s are choosing to build their websites in Framer, where changes take minutes instead of days. Learn how you can get more out of your site from a Framer specialist or get started building for free today at framer.com/verge for 30% off a Framer Pro annual plan. That's framer.com/verge. Rules and restrictions may apply. All right, we're back. Couple more hardware things we should talk about. Um, the crease >> comes up every time anybody talks about these things. Um, I'm looking at Nei's phone as he's scrolling on one of the stupid floating apps in space. Um, I can see the crease. Like, it's there. I can see the crease. Are you But like both of you, I think, have said you you don't what what's the what is it perceptively? perceptually >> perceptually flat. >> That's such a great phrase. >> It is. It's very good. Um >> they they had a meeting like imagine >> you know you're in the spaceship >> and you know Greg Josak is like we're going to we're having a meeting and he puts like $10 million worth of Apple executives in a room and he's like how do we say you don't see it? And he just like stood there on a whiteboard >> and you're like almost invisible. He's like you're fired. >> Get out of here. Come back when you have a good idea. and they got to perceptually flat, which is just hilarious. >> Sure. Somebody got a raise for that and I'm excited for that person. Um, do you notice it? Like is it is the ex is the fact that one screen is two screens at all part of the experience of using this phone? >> It does not bother me. And even on previous foldables where it's more pronounced and you feel it, you see it more, you kind of at least I do, it sort of blends into the background for me. And when you're looking at the thing straight on, you know, it's not catching the light. Um, so even if it it is more pronounced, hasn't bothered me. This is especially well hidden. I think >> there's something going on with your phone. We didn't put this in the review and I noticed it last night and I said this to Alison, she got really offended with me. >> Your phone is so greasy. It's so much greasier than mine. And where from where I'm standing, it's starting to get to like galaxy fold levels of crease seeing. >> Oh no. >> Is it bothering you? >> It's cuz it's like shiny and you can see it. So the crease is there. >> Yeah. >> And it's not less there than on the ZFold. >> Okay. >> So the matte screen surface, which some people are saying is is like a screen protector that's on top, just does an excellent job of diffusing the reflections of the screen. So it's perceptually flat. >> Okay. Did you did you ever have the instinct to peel off the screen protector? >> I the second I the day I opened it I did >> really >> cuz it looks like it looks like one of those peelies on another screen and I was like should I Oh, shouldn't do that. >> Yeah, been there. >> Uh first remember the first Galaxy Fold reviews just people breaking the phones. Um >> so I saw it when I was watching uh Vision Quest the other night and just the way the light from the TV was reflecting in a dark room. It made this look shiny >> and you can just see it. It's the same ripple, exactly the same ripple as a Zula 8. And what's happening to Allison's? I'm not saying this is you. So, our video team has greasy fingers. Someone was eating a pizza and then touched that screen and it's greasier than the way mine is right now. And it is more vis. It's shinier. >> I mean, I I see it from here. >> You do have to work at it. And I think we just need a little spritz, you know. >> Yeah. So, there's something, you know, it's like you can make a matte display. It's like don't eat pizza with the phone. I don't know what to tell you. Like, you shouldn't do that anyway. >> Strong disagree. What are you talking about? The whole beauty of my phone is I can hold it in one hand and eat pizza in the other hand. Understand? >> Yeah, you got to unfold. >> And I type with my nose. >> Uh I mean that's like the the the secret to perceptually flat is the matte screen is the nano texture screen and they're very proud of it. They're very proud of exactly how much it diffuses. >> I think Mr. Mobile had a great video with like the Apple team. I thoroughly enjoyed watching it. He did a great job. And they just talked a lot about Yeah, it's matte. >> Why do you think it's not matte also on the outside? I was a little surprised by that. because they don't need to make the outside perceptually flat. >> So you think it's purely the the because you could make the case that you want the the nanoexture the matte stuff on the inside because just the screen is larger and the bigger the screen the more opportunity you have to be ruined by glare and reflections. >> Yeah. >> But you have that on the inside and so it's like well wouldn't it also be nice to have this lovely matte screen that Apple seems to agree is better also on the outside. >> But maybe it just doesn't matter that much. >> Put matte screens on all the phones is where I'm at. I've been radicalized. I think it's great. >> I mean, I see definitely the stuff you open the phone up for, like reading something, watching a video. You are by definition leaving your house with this device. You know, having that bigger screen, have the matte finish on it makes tons of sense. I think like dovetales very conveniently with the we're hiding a crease thing. Um, but as a I don't know, matte screen enjoyer, I sure, put it on the front. I love it. Let's do it. I I I think a lot of people were curious whether that would be like a thing and to me it's not. It's >> I I think having this screen, which is the exterior screen, which is going to naturally get dirtier, be easier to clean, >> is a good thing. >> Yeah, >> sure. >> That's that's fair. And I think especially like I'm torn on the inside screen being something you feel like you have to protect because like we're all so scarred by the early days of the Galaxy foldables where if a a speck of dust got in there it would just shred the phone to bits from the inside. >> One thing Apple definitely got right perceptually flat aside. And I do love the phrase >> it's accurate in its way. >> Yes. >> Greg really ran that team to the finish line. You know what I mean? Um, the display feels vastly more solid than any of the other foldables. Part partially because it's matte, so it has texture and it doesn't really have a lot of give. Like right in the middle, it has some give because that's where the hinge is. But other foldables, even even the ones that have GL, I think the ZFold 8 is a glass screen technically. >> Like it's a very thin, flexible glass. It still feels soft and plasticky. And this does not have any of that. >> Interesting. Okay, fair enough. Um, we're getting a lot of questions about the cameras, which I think is actually I expected this to be a very simple camera story, which is just like it has less cameras and they're worse. The end. These are the trades with foldables. But Allison, I feel like you ran into this is actually there are real pros and cons to this camera situation. >> Yeah. I mean, the the fun with the foldable is getting to use like from a camera perspective, you know, using these as a selfie camera with a preview on the cover screen. You can do fun stuff like this is now a tripod and you're taking a time lapse. Um, there's the adorable Snoopy animations, get your kid to look at the camera kind of thing. So, there are like things you just can't do with a regular slab style phone. Um, and I was I was really braced for like worse news from the camera that it was going to be like not good. Um, the the main camera is a smaller sensor. Um, which all things being equal will not be as good. Um, it is really not terrible comparing it to the 18 Pro, which is >> exactly what you want to hear on your $2,000 phone. It's not dot dot dot terrible. Yeah, it's it's really for it. The bottom line is that it looks like it's oversharpening to kind of compensate for a little bit more softness. >> I mean, that kind of makes sense. Apple's just like revved up its software pipeline a little more, >> a worse sensor. And yeah, put the A20 Pro behind it. >> Did more algorithm stuff. >> And the reality of that is, boy, the phone gets hot when you use a camera a lot because they're just revving that A20 Pro underneath that camera as hard as they can. >> Interesting. Yeah, this seems to be one of the things a lot of reviewers noticed is like this when you use this phone hard, especially FaceTime and and the cameras thing gets hot. >> Y if you do if you do all the camera features at once. So if you do kid and smart take and you know it's like automatically taking shots like this thing is just like roasting you. It's like wow that's a like enough so that it throttles performance to try to recover. Can I just say, by the way, that you just said Kid Q and Smart Take, and my immediate reaction was like, "Oh, that's some Samsung right there." Like, they're they're doing Samsung stuff right there. >> 100%. >> Here's here's some wacky stuff happening on the screen. >> The first thing Allison said about this phone, like in the first day, was this is some Android >> cuz that that first few days when it was like messy and none of the apps are optimized, like this is the most Android experience I've ever had in my entire life. >> We were messaging >> more so than Android. >> We're like, "How does this work? Did you get to this weird place in this phone? Yeah. >> I appreciate Apple being like, "We can make insane phones, too." >> Yeah. >> What do you want to have a phone with a bunch of settings? >> Did you see the video? Tim Cook this past few weeks has been in China >> just at events at like Chinese universities and like shaking hands and doing >> I think that's his job now. >> Yeah, that's his new job. He's Apple's chief diplomat and he just like travels around the world and he's like, "I love what you're doing here." >> Um, that's his job. >> Would you like to see my phone? >> Exactly. and he just had this quote where they asked him about the duo and he was like the market for foldables in China is second to none and we're excited to come and compete >> and you're like oh Apple like likes to print and they showed up first and no one has ever had these ideas before but here's Tim Cook in China being like we know you like the crazy phones >> here's here's one >> interesting so our commenters are having an argument about the cameras as they are as they are want to do and I think they're making me realize something really interesting which is like normally we talk about these cameras and it's like, okay, well, yes, they're a relatively iterative improvement over the one that you bought or over the one that came out last year. They're a giant improvement over whatever phone you're using now, right? If you're shopping for a phone, your phone is probably somewhere between 3 and 8 years old. >> It's going to be a huge improvement. The Duo is weird in that it is geared at people who probably bought a phone last year. So, like the the path is not from like the 13 to the Duo. Although, shout out to our friend Kevin Roose who I know did exactly that upgrade. He was like, I'm holding out for the foldable and I was like, that's weird, but here we are. Uh, >> but this is a lot like this is an early adopter phone, so presumably this is people who have not been sitting on really old phones and for them this might there might be real actual downgrades in the camera experience. >> For me, it's the telephoto. Like every time I went back to the 18 Pro, I would get the telephoto and be like, "Oh, this is nice. I can take a picture of that." I I use it a lot with my kid. >> Um, so that's I've been here uh not taking pictures of him for the past week, but that's going to be something I will miss. Um, >> everyone's now telling me that they're upgrading from a 13 to a duo. Listen, 13 to Duo people, I see you and we love you, >> but I think you're still 13. I think you you might still have a bigger sensor on the 13. I'm not 100% sure. >> Interesting. >> And so you're going to miss a bunch of like if you have a 13 Pro and you end up at an 18 Pro, you will obviously see the difference. >> I think there'll be some huge step. I think you might not >> with the Duo. >> Interesting. >> And I calibrating exactly how far back in time you're going with the Duo from an 18 Pro is will be just a fun adventure. >> Yeah. >> Like everyone's going to take a bunch of photos and be like it's the same as a 14 or a 15. But that's to in my estimation that's the trade-off here. You're getting the camera quality of several generations ago. >> Yeah, that makes sense. That's tough to stomach on a $2,000 phone. Like it is it is the trade you have to make on pretty much all of these foldables. Although again, I think the Zfold 8 got much much closer. Like it is it is much closer to parody with other >> Samsung. The other Samsung foldable makes no camera compromises at all. Right. >> Yeah. They went two directions. is there's the one that's shaped like this and the cameras are okay and then then there's the the book style very thin one pro >> the ultra >> the ultra yes sure sorry um >> it's called it's called smart take first >> when you use smart take on your ultra um >> that's the one that's a TV remote that's how I think about that that phone um no I think yeah that that set of trades is just hard and I get why it is necessary in a device like this I do want to say just for the record if you're going Pick two cameras. You do the normal one and the telephoto one, not the normal one and the ultra wide one. Everyone wants regular and telephoto. >> I I don't I don't know how no one has figured this out. Don't give me >> You're super wrong. >> I You're No, I'm I'm completely correct. >> It's easier. >> I'm going to say this. Uh >> oh. >> We're going to We're going to >> Let's get Neili in trouble. >> It's easier to get closer to something than farther away. >> Wow. That's a That's a I'm gonna need to sit with that for a while. >> Yep. >> I also don't agree >> at all because you Yep. You can just >> see what I mean. This you got to >> Now my sunset looks great. >> That's all I'm saying. The I think the There's a reason it's the ultra wide cuz there was a generation of phones where it was a main and a telly. Yeah. >> And they all landed it a main and ultra. >> And if you're supposed to take selfies with these two, you don't want a telephoto. >> You can you can crop. You cannot now you can generative AI the world around you like whatever I I saw the whole horizon >> just do that >> I didn't even go outside it took a picture for me um this yeah every the commenters agree with me don't read the comments >> don't worry about what they say they're all 100% on my side um >> by the way can I can I this is I think a very important point we didn't quite get to it in the review uh because it's hard to test and it's hard to explain like everything with the duo do you want 10 more minutes on the concept of iPhone handoff Uh, but I know a lot of people, myself included, our friend Casey Newton also thought this was going to happen for him. Uh, who assume that what they could do is keep their regular phone with a good camera and have that for the weekends and then seamlessly with the power of iPhone handoff >> use the Duo at work or whatever. And I this was my goal. I was like, I'm going to keep my 17 Pro. That's like the weekend phone when I just need to take a photo of the kids, whatever. And Apple will seamlessly hand the cell connection off between them. This only works with T-Mobile, >> right? >> Uh it's gonna cost you extra money. >> Is it? No, that's >> It seems very likely that it's gonna cost you extra money on all the carriers, but I think T-Mobile's actually charging you more money right now. I think it's like five bucks a month. >> Yeah. >> Uh it does not switch your Apple Watch. >> So your Apple Watch only remains paired to one device, >> which is a real bummer. >> Yeah. uh and uh the actual experience of it is like very smooth and very chill but you have two active iPhones. So like one of them like it's just like things like signal get very confused when you are doing this because they are built around you having one phone >> right and like pairing to one phone at a time. >> Uh my my whoop band is like furious that I have two phones right now because it's just built around one phone. Um, so there's just like a whole universe of and if you have AT&T, it's just like not even announced. Verizon is coming in the future. >> Okay, >> those of you with Project Gen 5 sis on the network, >> you have it now for free. Welcome. >> It turns out you have one Motorola phone and an iPhone. Um, uh, so this is the dream and I think Apple announced that feature and they launched it and launched T-Mobile. They've got to rearchitect how the watch works. They've got to make it so that having two active iPhones is a thing the entire iPhone app ecosystem understands and they got to bring it to all the carriers. >> So, I know a lot of people had this dream and I was like, should we put like a a box in the review? And I was like, this box will be 2,000 words long just to begin explaining what's going on here. >> Yeah. >> But it I even that a year from now when that is more refined, that might be the whole answer to this question. >> Interesting. >> I'm so mad that they've made me advocate for EIM. I'm like, just just switch your e SIM. Like, solves it. It's free. It if you're doing iPhone to iPhone, >> works great. >> That is true. >> Yeah. >> Have you done the eim switch? I tried to do it once in AT&T and in classic Apple fashion, they make it seem so scary. >> Yeah. Right. >> Like, this will deactivate your phone. And you're like, wait, that's what I want. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> That's the goal is to deactivate this phone. >> That's the goal. Yep. >> That's what we're doing here. Um, talk to me about multitasking, which is a thing I think every foldable is trying to figure out. like you brought up the the ZFold 8 Ultra and the whole pitch for that device is you can run two apps side by side like a boss. Like that's literally basically Samsung's tagline. Um this thing seems to have some slightly wacky ideas about how many apps you can run and in what ways. What have you guys found about the like doing a bunch of power user stuff >> on the Duo? >> This is like baby's first foldable honestly. You've got two apps side by side. That's it pretty much. You can't, you know, on on Samsung phones, you can kind of slide and resize the windows to fill a different space. >> Another thing the iPad does really well, the iPad's side by side is really powerful now. >> Yeah. No, this is it'll show you. It'll be like, look, you can scoot this and it goes right back. Um, so you can pair the two apps in that split view and and kind of send that off into the um the app switcher and come back to it. >> Wait, can I ask a dumb question about that? So, that's one of the things I really like about the way this does is you can pair two apps. And for me, it's like I want my email and my calendar next to each other and I want to be able to see them. But then if you go to open your email separately, will it let you open another instance of your email or does it go right to the split screen thing? >> This is a thing the iPad has been reckoning with forever and finally solved where now you can have multiple instances of of an app open at once and it is vastly >> you can do that with Safari. You can't do it with most apps. Well, you can get to this state where you have two apps open and like Netflix playing in the corner. Sure. >> But that's very iPady. >> Old iPad. Yeah. This is like before iPad got weird ideas about stage manager, that was what you could do on the iPad. >> No, it brings up the pair. >> Okay. >> Yeah, that's nice. >> I think that's fine. It's It's not as like power usery as I think some people might want, but it's probably the simpler version of this to understand. >> Yeah. Yeah. I would say not a power user phone. The ZFold 8 was just playing with it and it's like you want three apps, go for it. You can you can do three apps. you can resize this one and make it little and make it big. Um, which is fun. Like I enjoy that. I like putting Spotify in a little window and then an email in a big window or any of that. Um, this is very much like on training wheels. We don't want to overwhelm you or break anything. Two apps what you get. >> Okay, Nili, you did show me the thing where you can have a video playing up top and then an app down below it. And that I like a lot. >> Easily the messiest thing to do on this one. the video >> if I was to like go figure it out. Go ahead. Figure it out. There's the YouTube icon. >> All right, I'm gonna do this now. >> There were a whole bunch of people who were like, "We don't believe you guys that it'll do this because we tried it a bunch of times." Yeah. >> The video team was fully like, >> um, are you sure this >> You've already failed. >> One of the wildest things about Neil is that Nei has uh history turned off for his YouTube. So, you open up YouTube and just no recommendations. It is like It is It's probably the healthy correct way to live your life, but it is alarming. >> Uh, okay. So that's gone. I don't I don't know what just happened. >> You've already failed the thing that you thought you were going to do. >> It was supposed to go to picture and picture. >> YouTube play. I have YouTube Premium. I have all the stuff. Uh YouTube is not optimized for the dual so it doesn't work. So you can try it with Netflix. Now >> you tricked me, Patel. >> I did trick you because the most obvious thing that you think you're going to do is watch a YouTube video while doing anything else. So what you have to do is you have to find an app that supports this behavior, which is again not YouTube. For some reason it is YouTube TV. So, I've watched an infinite amount of broadcast television on YouTube TV this past week. Um, so YouTube TV or Netflix or Apple TV, they all support this feature. So, you open a video, you start playing the video, you close that app, >> and then you get your pit video. That pit video will still not have the button that makes it play at the top in portrait mode, right? So, then you got to get the phone into portrait. And keep in mind, you were just in a video app, so you almost certainly had the phone in landscape. So, you got to rotate to portrait. Then you got to open another app. And at that point, a button the the world's tiniest button will show up in the pit video in the pit window and then you can put a video at the top. >> Good lord. >> And and like none of that is sensible. >> No. >> Like >> those are clearly not how it's supposed to work. >> Yeah. It's like they they have some pip window mechanics and they just added a button to it. But what you really want to do is grab that window with your thumb and like pin it to the top. >> Yes. >> And they'll get there in a year. >> Yeah. I mean I think that's right. Like again, the the thing that is actually giving me hope about this phone is you have yet to describe a thing that feels fundamentally flawed about it. Like again, unless you think it's just the wrong shape and size, which I don't. >> I think it's too small. Yeah, that's that's the number one thing I have for you is I fundamentally I think it's too small. >> I to me I think that the small is is a feature more than a bug in a lot of ways. But the all of this stuff is stuff to be figured out. And Apple is good at generally looking at this stuff and figuring it out over time. And they will come out next year and be like, "Oh, all these dumb settings that were turned on, now they're off." And that'll be great. But I think part of what I'm so struck by with this phone, and I've been fighting with both of you about whether we like it or not all week, uh, is I there is some sort of expectation that comes with it's an iPhone that Apple has just done over time. And if they had presented this more like this is a completely new kind of device that we've made. Here is the very first one. Like nobody expected the Vision Pro to be without its insanities. >> The Vision Pro before it launched was being framed as a prototype. >> Yes. >> Right. This is a research project, >> right? And so I I think you just the the level of expectation goes down except for that it's $3,500. Maybe that's a bad example, but >> $2,000 to start. >> But with something like this, like people are going to buy this as their main phone. And you're going to get a lot of people who walk into an Apple store and this is on the list of things you might conceivably buy. And I just feel like all the things you're describing are things that those people should not be required. >> This is what again I'm going to just come back to the iPad. I think every anybody who walks in an Apple store and sees this phone is going to be like, "Oh, it's an iPhone when it's closed and it's an iPad when it's open." >> Right? they will just make that assumption, >> which is what so many people have been wanting for years. >> It it it's just especially if you put it next to an iPad mini, they're the same size. >> Yeah. >> So, you have a decade of teaching people that the iPad exists, more than a decade at this point, I think. Um and instead, something else is going to happen and a bunch of apps need to get optimized for it. And Apple made that decision. They seem very set in that decision. >> Yeah. And I that is the one that I think will get litigated over the next year is is this thing just going to have to be an iPad and our app developers going to make Duo specific apps and then they're going to realize that they've made apps that are perfect for the iPad mini and then do that and at some point that is just a lot of apps to make and a lot of auto layout inside of Xcode. What are we doing here? >> It is a lot of things. As Tedward in our comments just pointed out, next year is the 20th anniversary of the iPhone, which would be a terrific time to figure all of this out. Um, we have one more break to take before we get out of here. Let's take it. We'll be back in just a sec. Then we're going to finish up. Be right back. Support for the show comes from Jira by Atlassian. AI is only as useful as the context it has to work from. But when that context is scattered across tools, threads, and DMs, that means your team and your AI agents end up flying blind. That's the problem Jira solves. What's the goal tied to your project? What got decided last week in Slack DMs? Atlassian's Teamwork pulls all the pieces together from Jira, Confluence, GitHub, Slack, and more. So nothing falls through the cracks. With Jira, you can actually share the context with agents you already use like Claude, Cursor, and GitHub Copilot. Assign them work directly or connect your agents through MCP. Spend less time digging through endless links and DMs, less time chasing down what got decided and by who, and more time actually shipping with Jira. Learn more at jira.com. That's jir.com. Support for the show comes from outshift, Cisco's incubation engine for frontier technology. You can find multi-agent AI in every enterprise roadmap right now. But here's the problem everyone's facing. Agents can pass messages but can't think together. 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I wish I could describe to both of you the FOMO that just happened when we went to rake and you both picked up your duos and started goofing around on them and I'm just sitting here like a loser with an iPhone 17. >> Yeah, your phone doesn't fold in half. >> This is awful. So, this is actually one of the things I think matters a lot about this phone is it looks different in a way that is sick. And have you both gotten reactions to this phone? You've been like out in the world using it. Uh it's a weird time being a reviewer because you're like sort of supposed to hide it, but also like our video is just both of you out in the world using this very obvious foldable phone that a lot of people are paying attention to. Have you have you gotten double takes and reactions from people? >> Um well, it's a like we've been a little careful. You know, there's uh we >> No one from Apple is listening. You can tell us you can tell us the truth. Oh yeah. Um, no. I >> Okay, so I did bring it like I was traveling with it as my primary phone. Um, I got to the airport and I was a little bit like, well, the iPhone 2. I got up to the to counter the counter to check my bag and I showed the lady my um boarding pass. She was like, what phone is that? I was like, "Oh my gosh, >> don't worry about it." >> Right off the bat. No, I think there is uh like people are aware of folding phones and they're aware there's now going to be an Apple folding phone and the the mix is intriguing. Um and I don't know, I was like, well, I got to I got to use this thing. I got to live my life. So, I put it on my tray table on the flight and watched TV on it and nobody uh put me on TikTok or anything. >> Let me just show you this, >> please. >> All the apps are going to get updated. Everything's going to be fine. >> Oh no. What just happened? So mad. >> I just like I promise you that there is just vibecoded slop happening in this app situation. I just tried to open a browser like a tech crunch link on threads and this is what it chose to do. >> Oh, that's not great. We have a we have an inapp browser on the left side >> that is truncated. >> Nothing's happening. >> It sort of opened up. Nothing happened. >> Emptiness on the right side. It's what I mean. I just I promise you like you you have to acknowledge the reality in which you live and we live in the reality of vibe coded slop and so all the apps will be updated and it's going to happen right away is true >> because we live in the time of AI vibcoded slop. >> Sure. >> And then there's going to be a lot of weird AI coded stuff. >> Okay. So the best case scenario for all this should be Apple's apps which presumably have been duoified properly. >> Are they shining examples of what you can do? Like, do you open up Apple's apps and it all suddenly sort of makes sense? >> When you go ahead, >> when you open the inner screen, you're like, "This is beautiful. I love this app." Um, oh no, I don't know what you just pulled up. >> So, it's just funny. Apple sent us they sent us Instagram edits, which is like a great app. >> Yeah. >> On this thing. Like, it's fun to edit video on this thing. Here's iMovie. >> Huh. >> It's Apple's forgotten app. Yep. >> Remember when Apple invented video editing and then the whole world became video and Apple's like, "Instagram edits is fine." That is pure >> first day of the iPad when they were like all the iPhone apps work and all they were was just black rectangles. >> They updated pages and sheets in Keynote. >> Okay. >> Um so they're good. They they are they fill the screen. They're not they're the iPad apps. >> You know I I I'm just going to keep coming back to this. >> There is a solution and it it looks like the iPad mini and so if you can get there you're fine. Instagram only just put out an iPad app. There's no one at Instagram that knows what to do. They just asked Claude, like in the most obvious way, they just asked Claude what to do and Claude was like, "Here's some garbage." >> My only assumption would be that there is some, and please commenters, if you know the answer to this better than I do, let me know. I I would assume that it is somewhere between hard and impossible to run an iPad version of an app and an iPhone version of an app on the same device because they are they are not the same app. They are versions of an app. the Apple has universal app bundles and you don't want to overload everyone's phone by sending the binaries of 10 different things and you I I get it. >> You were not loading the all all of the things every time you download. >> You for example built the most lucrative company in the history of the world on the back of total control of app distribution. >> Okay. So I'm Nvidia let's >> No, Apple leather jacket services revenue. The thing that made them the most rigid company in the world for a long time is total rockolid control of the app store. >> You have solutions to this problem. >> Sure. And at the very least you can bully developers into playing your games. I do think I'm fascinating >> bullying developers into supporting the home view by making sure they're CarPlay entitlements automatically. >> It's going to go great and then just telling them that they work. >> It's very funny that Apple was like we're going to be more of a bully about CarPlay on the home view than iPad apps on the duo. >> It is a little weird. Well, part of me wonders. I mean, and Apple has said that the the demand for this was bigger than they expected. And I think given how far out pre-orders have been, that's clearly the case. Like Apple is Apple is not a company that couldn't have made more of them if they wanted to. So, I think clearly demand has outstripped anybody's expectations, including Apples. And maybe that means a bunch of people who I think have been burned by spending a lot of time and energy updating to support every little Apple thing that they eventually stop caring about, which there have been a lot of recently. Maybe that is going to be impetus for more developers to get on board because actually this is a piece of hardware and thus a sort of screen size that is worth supporting. Like think of all the people who they were like, "Oh, do stuff with camera control." >> Sure. I think if you just asked 20 people on the street if their phone had camera control, most of them would be like, "What is that?" >> That's true. >> So, here's the other I mean, the other just concession to reality, >> the dynamic island. This is what I mean. There's just been a million things they've been asking developers to do kind of for nothing. And I've been hearing from developers who are like, I I spend every summer between April and September with my hair on fire waiting to see what they're going to announce and then trying to develop it and then no one uses it because nobody cares about the dynamic island. But maybe if the duo is a hit, and it seems like it is a hit, it will it will bring everybody along. >> But you haven't had the experience of 10,000 apps launching the thirstiest live activities in the world. >> Whenever an Arsenal game starts, I get four live. The hackers are playing. >> It's definitely time for the Google search app to launch a live activity. For some reason, >> all the micro dramas that were hacked on this phone have a have lots of live activities. >> Yeah, it's like there's some stuff that makes sense for developers and others. and you got to open the phone, it's a different experience and they're all going to want to look good. I'm just saying there's there are easy routes, >> there is vibecoded slap, there is just updating to 271 and then there's what will make the phone meaningfully different, which is a lot of thoughtful care and attention from developers. And that is going to take more time. >> Yes. And that's I think that's f like if you like me opened a link in threads and saw it break and sort of like felt the thrill of excitement that I just felt like you're gonna have the time of your life with this phone. Like I I really want to come back to that. Like if you were a huge gadget nerd and you're like I broke it. >> Amazing. I want to tell my friends you're going to you're going to have a good time. >> Yeah. >> And then if you're just try like this is why I keep saying it's a first generation device early adopter device. Can I tell you my story about someone seeing this phone? >> Sure. So, Bill Gates is on Decoder tomorrow. And he was like, "Do you have it?" And I was like, "I don't know, man." And he pulled out his trifold. >> Oh my gosh. >> Trifold us. Bill Gates, >> you brought a knife to a gunfight, baby. He's like, "Look at how big these weapons are." That's right. >> Um, >> wait. Bill Gates like earnestly has a trifold. >> Has a trifold. >> Oh my gosh, that rocks. Oh boy. Um, I should shout out to Mystery Box 85 in the comments who says, "Can I advocate for iOS and iPad OS becoming one OS again? >> There's a way to solve a bunch of problems all at once." I'm just saying 20th anniversary next year. Apple is not one to let things like this not be celebrated. Uh, we are expecting big iPhone fireworks next year. I would not be surprised to see a lot of these structural messes start to go away starting next year. This just a theory that I have. >> Yeah. >> Um, what do we do about the price? Like I I really we have to come back to the fact this thing costs $2,000. I think we we are we are resolute on if you are just a regular person who does not want to spend a lot of time thinking about their phone, don't buy this one. I think we're on a really exciting path towards like next year and the year after being plausible answers to like your next upgrade might be a Duo and that's cool and that's exciting. >> I don't think most people should buy this phone today. Does the does the existence of the $2,000 price dampen it even further or is that just the price of doing business for foldable phones right now? Allison, what do you think? >> I think it's the price of the the luxury, the being the first person out in your friend group or out on the street with a duo and being like, "Wow, that's the Duo." Um, it's you can buy everything that it does in multiple devices for a lot less. Yeah, you can buy an iPhone and an iPad for substantially less than a Duo. >> Great iPhones and iPads. Um, so that is I think I think it's expected, you know, like the price the price is shocking. If you just tell someone on the street like you want to buy a $2,000 phone, they would like laugh at you. But um but in this for what Apple's doing here um it it is the cost of of doing business of getting in early of watching threads break on the inner screen. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> And like I said there I I find all this to life. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> How can I break your product is a real home hallmark of the reverse review process. >> And it has been very hard for iPhones for a very long time. Like purely from a it's fun to do this job when products are weird perspective. It has been such a delight to see this thing come to life because like it gets harder and harder to review the iPhone every year because it's the same. >> Oh, there's a reason that every year we do like 45 minutes on the camera and the iPhone camera team literally opens like our conversations with we meet again. >> Yeah, exactly. >> And it's like okay, >> it's just the only thing like what new color is there? >> Yeah. >> And but this is like as you've both been saying this is full of new ideas. Some of them are very good, some of them are very bad. And that is just on its face exciting. the the story of this product is they did not lean on the iPad and I'm fascinating choice and there's there's no outcome other than two years from now this thing and the iPad will will look substantially the same. >> I tend to think so too. Uh did either of you buy one? >> Nope. >> It's telling. >> Did you buy one? >> No. I asked my wife I was like I knew I wasn't getting a review unit and I was like Anna be real with me. If I get an iPhone Duo are we going to have problems? She goes how much is it? And I was like, "It's $2,000." And she goes, "If you buy that phone, I'll kill you." And so then I have this role moment of being like, "Okay, well, I've hidden new gadgets from Anna before." >> Oh, no. I can just >> This one you can't. >> I've definitely played the like, "Oh, no. I have this one. I've had this for a long time. These new headphones that look brand new. I've had these before." Uh, but yeah, I was like, I can't I don't think I can hide that. I just now have a giant flip phone. >> That's what Handoff is for. Your secret phone. >> A year from now, we're all be handing off phones left and right. >> Looking forward to it. Uh, all right. Anything else on your mind before we get out of here? I think we've I think we've covered it. We've talked a lot about apps. I'm still mad about the right rail. Our commenters, once again, agree with me about the two cameras. We should get out of here. Thank you to everybody who has been watching and hanging out in the comments. Uh the AMA with the two of you on the website, I think, is still is still up and going. So, if you have more questions, go in there. We'll be in there answering questions. Thank you to our team for getting all this done. Thank you to our video team who has essentially worked every single second of the last week to get the video up. Go watch the video. It's like six and a half hours long. It's a terrific review. You guys did a great job. I hope everybody gets some sleep. Thank you all. That's it. That's the Vergecast. Rock and roll.