Follow us
Add us as a preferred source on Google
There is a lot of excitement surrounding the launch of the iPhone Duo, as it is the first foldable device that Apple has produced. That means a significant change from the single-screen design of iOS to an adaptive display that can switch between the smaller portrait front display and the large landscape format central display, as well as the folding nature and ability to offer multi-screen.
This created an opportunity for app developers not seen since the launch of the iPad. While developers of legacy apps are racing to provide fixes to use the new features and properties, new apps are emerging even faster.
While some of these offer genuinely useful features that stem from the design of the iPhone Duo, others are just about having fun. It reminds me of the classics iBeer app for the iPhone, which uses the phone’s sensors to make it look like you’re drinking a glass of beer when you raise your phone, or the augmented reality Star Walk app for the iPad, allows you to identify stars and planets.
Below are seven new apps that make the most of the new Duo screen that are worth trying. Plus some that haven’t made it to the App Store yet.
In the App Store
(Image credit: Battlefleet Duo)
1. Battlefleet duo
The classic game of Battleships is brought to life in this fun app that uses the folding display in an almost laptop-like position. The top half of the screen becomes your enemy’s water, showing where you are aiming, while the bottom half shows your own fleet. You can also play it fully open, or on the external screen, but that’s not quite as fun.
Download Battlefleet Duo from the Apple App Store for free.
(Image credit: Vision First)
2. Pianofold
This tap-the-tiles-in-order game has hints of Guitar Hero and Beat Saber, but it’s designed specifically for the iPhone Duo. With your Duo folded into a laptop-like position on a desk or surface, the top half magnifies the notes coming at you in a highway arrangement. The bottom half becomes your piano keys, with four large colored keys that must be pressed in time to match the upcoming notes.
Download PianoFold from the Apple App Store for free.
(Image credit: Ali Çorak)
3. Fold
This app takes the virtual wallet to a new level by recreating a real leather bi-fake wallet. It is interactive in the fact that you can select any card to remove from the wallet and turn it around to see the back. You can also extract the receipt and bill. By clicking on the pen, you can change the cards to match your real accounts and save your details (just the last four numbers). It’s a shame you can’t use the cards here instead of Apple Wallet, but that would require a lot more security. After all, this is just a bit of fun.
Download Foldhide from the Apple App Store for free.
(Image credit: Squircle Apps)
4. Deck-man
Perhaps the best new app we’ve seen yet, Deck-Man (originally Duo-Man) turns your iPhone Duo into an 80s-style portable cassette player, like the Sony Walkman. The great part about this app is that you can choose music from your Apple Music library to play or from local files. You can use the pause, fast-forward and rewind buttons to skip through your tracks, all with mechanical clicks. On the central screen you can play the cassette, while the outer screen shows the closed player, with a selection of designs. Sometimes ribbons will get tangled and need to be pulled back, just like the real thing. This is a must for your duo.
Download Deck-Man from the Apple App Store for $4.99 / £4.99.
(Image credit: Nathan Lamb)
5. Fold accordion
This clever little app turns your iPhone Duo into a playable accordion. As with an accordion, your right hand plays the melody on the keyboard and the left hand plays the bass notes with the buttons. To make the sound, instead of pushing, you fold and unfold the device to force air through the bellows. Choose a song from the list, and it will also guide you through the sheet music.
Download Fold Accordion from the Apple App Store for $2.99/£2.99.
(Image credit: Tiny Computers)
6. Small computers
This is certainly one of those novelty apps that showcase the features of the new iPhone Duo. Tiny Computers turns the duo into one of 10 computers, including the original Macintosh, Commodore 64, Amiga 500, Window 95 machine, iBook G3 and more. You can do some basic things on any screen – the Windows model even crashes to a Blue Screen of Death – but there’s no practical use here. Just fun.
Download Tiny Computers from the Apple App Store for $3.99 / £3.99 / download
7. Tesla
Although not specifically for the iPhone Duo, Tesla’s updated app has native support for the larger screen, giving you almost a split-screen effect with the functions on the left and a large image on the right. It looks a lot more like the screen you see in the car and will look excellent on either iPad or iPhone Duo.
Download the updated Tesla app from the Apple App Store as of October 23.
Coming soon (maybe)
(Image credit: CalibReader)
8. CalibReader
One of the nice things about the NanoTexture display used for the center screen on the iPhone Duo is that it’s nicer to read, and this app does just that. The CalibReader app is coming soon to both Apple’s App Store and the Google Play Store. It works for iPhone and iPad, but it’s on the iPhone Duo where it really excels. It gives your phone a real book feel, with a clean full-screen layout, dark and light backgrounds and animated page scrolls as you turn a page. The outer screen gives you the book cover when it’s closed, and when you open it again, it takes you right to your page. You can import your own library or link to your cloud storage, with prices starting at $9.99 for lifetime use, or the first three books for free.
See more about CalibReader on its website.
(Image credit: Steven Zhang)
9. Chest
Another musical app hoping to make it to the App Store, Crate is an AI-powered music sampler. It uses a split-screen layout to divide the sample pads from the sequencer window, and uses the hinge to add special effects to the sounds. You can also use a text input to find the right samples and sounds to use.
(Image credit: Vasanth)
10. TranslateCat
Another clever use of the dual display, TranslateCat is a two-sided interpreter that gives you the ability to type in a language at the bottom and see your translation at the top. Then, on the outer screen, your translated text will be shown to whoever you are talking to. Designed to work with eight languages, including English, French, Spanish, German, Japanese, Chinese, Korean and Portuguese, it’s a neat idea. No indication of when or if it’s going live now, though.
11. Monster ink
Although this appears to be an 8-bit city-building game, it’s actually a smart tool to stop you using your phone too much. The idea with Monster, Ink is that when your phone is closed, the helper cats build the city for you, but open your phone and the kaiju cats start tearing up. You get a warning when you look at the inner screen, but look too long and things go down for the city. A really clever idea that I would like to see in the App Store.