Apple to replace iPhone Duo handsets with screen faults days after foldable launch

Justin Lokos posted two photos of his iPhone Duo. In the first, lines ran across the right side of the inner display. In the second, taken later, a replacement handset sat beside the faulty one, along with a thank-you to an Apple store in New York for sorting it out. His posts are among the clearest examples of a problem that surfaced within days of Apple's first foldable going on sale.

Apple has now acknowledged it. The company said it is aware of "an issue impacting the inner display on a small number" of the phones, and it asked affected owners to get in touch for a replacement. The Duo starts at £1,999 ($2,668) in the UK and rises to £3,199 for the best-equipped models, which makes it the most expensive iPhone Apple has ever sold.

The complaints go beyond lines on the screen. Some owners have shared photos of cracks running along the central crease where the display folds. Others say the device makes a crunching noise when it is opened.

How widespread any of this is remains unclear. Apple has not said how many devices are affected, and its wording, "a small number", offers no figure. The picture is further clouded by the fact that some of the images showing faulty devices may have been made using artificial intelligence, so not everything circulating online can be taken as evidence of a real fault.

The timing is awkward. The Duo went on sale last week, drawing crowds to Apple stores around the world. It is Apple's first major iPhone redesign in almost two decades, and it arrives as the company tries to reinvigorate its range and take on the foldable phones already made by rivals. Android users have a broad choice of such devices, a category Apple spent years developing its own entry for.

The Duo was unveiled by John Ternus, the new chief executive who took over from Tim Cook in September. Closed, it looks like a wider iPhone; opened, it resembles a small tablet, with a 7.6-inch (19.3cm) inner display held together by a central hinge. Speaking at Apple's California headquarters last month, Ternus said other companies had made foldables that "just feel like two phones awkwardly stuck together" and that the Duo would "redefine the experience of using a foldable phone".

That hinge is the complicated part. It is a delicate piece of engineering, and similar flaws have turned up in folding devices from some of Apple's competitors. Samsung's first foldable, the Galaxy Fold, had its own early setback in 2019 when reviewers reported broken screens.

For now, the practical answer for owners is the replacement offer. What to watch is whether Apple gives a clearer count of affected phones, and whether it says anything about a fix for the hinge or the display itself.