Marques Brownlee, better known as MKBHD, spent more than a week with the iPhone Duo before telling viewers that most people, existing iPhone owners included, should not spend $1,999 on it, describing Apple’s first foldable as “very polished around the edges, but kind of rough in the middle,” according to Dexerto. In the same week, Tim Pan, the Chinese creator behind the MediaStorm channel, put a Duo through 10,000 machine folds at room temperature and 1,000 more at -20°C, and although his verdict was kinder, the weak point he found sits exactly where MKBHD pointed, in the centre of the inner display, where the crease deepened while the hinge kept working smoothly.
That overlap matters for anyone deciding whether to buy the Duo now that it is on sale, or to keep a preorder whose delivery date slipped to late January within minutes of opening, according to Business Today. Read together, the two reviews split the phone cleanly, since the parts Apple controls end to end, including the titanium frame, the hinge and the animations between screens, win praise from both, while the parts that depend on a flexible panel or on outside developers still behave like a first generation.
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Why MKBHD Thinks Most People Should Skip the iPhone Duo
MKBHD’s case against the iPhone Duo rests on four drawbacks, starting with bulk, since the Duo weighs 254g and MKBHD found the Galaxy Z Fold8 noticeably thinner and about 20% lighter, which makes the Apple phone harder to use with one hand, according to Trending Topics. Apple also replaced Face ID with Touch ID in the side button, where MKBHD ran into a built-in delay he could not switch off, and the two 48MP rear cameras come without a dedicated telephoto, ProRes or Log, so the Duo trails the $1,299 iPhone 18 Pro Max on the features video creators pay for, while he called the under-display selfie camera simply bad.
The drawback he weighted most heavily is software, because many apps still run as stretched iPhone layouts on the 7.6-inch inner screen, although he expects most major apps to adapt within about six months. He still praised the hinge’s variable resistance, said the Duo holds a half-open position more steadily than any other foldable, and concluded that it makes the most sense for people who specifically want a tablet-sized screen in their pocket.
What 11,000 Folds Did to the iPhone Duo’s Hinge and Crease
Tim Pan’s test of the iPhone Duo began by setting a new unit beside one folded around 500 times by hand, and even at that count the used phone’s crease was easier to see. The main run then put a single Duo through 10,000 folds at room temperature and 1,000 more in a freezer at -20°C, after which Pan said the hinge still opened smoothly and called the phone structurally “very strong”, while the crease had deepened enough to be obvious to both eye and fingertip, according to Android Authority. Pan published no depth measurement, so this is a visual comparison on one unit, not a lab figure.
The hinge result matches Joanna Stern’s custom rig, which put 32,640 partial folds on a Duo over four nights and left the hinge as firm as it had been on day one. Pan also found that hair and sand can work into the hinge at certain angles, a reminder that the Duo’s IP68 rating covers the sealed electronics rather than every gap in the hinge, and his video turned up smaller problems that owners are likely to notice before any crease:
The near-field communication (NFC) antenna sits on one half of the phone, so tapping to pay is awkward while the Duo is open.The inner display has no earpiece, so unfolding the phone during a call switches the audio to speakerphone.Surface temperature rose by about 2°C (3.6°F) under heavy load with the phone open, and more so on the side holding the chip.Opening or closing the hinge slowly can confuse the orientation sensors, which briefly flips or blanks parts of the interface.The Only Measured iPhone Duo Crease Comes From a Third Test 
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The one hard figure on the iPhone Duo’s crease comes from HTX Studio, which scanned a new Duo at a peak-to-valley depth of 48 microns and measured 167 microns after 3,000 machine folds and a period left closed, roughly level with one unnamed rival foldable and deeper than another, according to iThinkDiff. Memeburn’s arithmetic puts that at about 3.5 times the out-of-box depth, but the pace matters more than the multiple, and neither Apple nor any reviewer has published how often a typical owner opens the phone.
Memeburn therefore converted each test into months of ownership at 25, 50 and 100 folds a day. A widely shared reaction on X treated Pan’s 10,000 folds as a year at 27 a day, yet at 100 a day the same count lasts just over three months, so the daily habit decides what these tests mean for each buyer.
TestFoldsAt 25 a dayAt 50 a dayAt 100 a dayHTX Studio3,0003.9 months2.0 months1.0 monthTim Pan (MediaStorm)11,00014.5 months7.2 months3.6 monthsJoanna Stern32,640 (partial folds)42.9 months21.4 months10.7 months
At 50 folds a day, the HTX run that more than tripled the crease depth covers about two months of ownership and Pan’s full sequence a little over seven, so a first owner would meet the change within the first year rather than in year three, although machines fold evenly and skip pocket heat, drops and grit, which makes these rough equivalents rather than predictions.
Apple Has Put a Price on the Crease Instead of a Fold Rating
Memeburn’s advice to anyone buying the iPhone Duo mainly for its inner screen is to treat AppleCare+ as part of the price and to expect at least one $19 cover-layer swap within the first year, because HTX saw the crease more than triple within about two months of moderate use while both long hinge tests came back clean. Apple lists no fold-cycle rating for the Duo, while Samsung rates the Galaxy Z Fold8 at 500,000 folds, according to MacRumors, and Apple’s answer to a deepening crease is a removable nano-texture layer that Kate Bergeron, its vice president of hardware engineering, said owners can replace if the crease becomes more visible, according to iPhone in Canada. Replacing that layer costs $49, or $19 with AppleCare+, against $999 or $99 for a full inner display, according to Notebookcheck, so Memeburn calculated that one inner-screen repair under the $399 one-time plan totals $498, about half the uninsured bill. The call rests on something nobody has checked yet, namely whether a new layer restores day-one flatness when part of the crease sits in the panel beneath it, because if it does not, the $49 layer only buys time.
Should You Keep an iPhone Duo Preorder Until January?
The iPhone Duo is worth keeping on order for buyers who match the left column below and worth cancelling for those who match the right, and the January wait carries one upside, since HTX says it will buy a retail Duo and fold it until it breaks, which may settle the durability question before many delayed orders arrive. Buyers still weighing Samsung, Google and HONOR can compare the field in Memeburn’s best foldable phone guide.
Keep the order if…Skip or cancel if…You want a 7.6-inch screen that folds to pocket sizeYou use your phone one-handed and 254g feels heavyA long-lived hinge matters more than a flawless screenA crease you can see and feel would bother youYou will add AppleCare+, given the $999 inner-display feeYou would rather self-insure a $1,999 phoneYour daily apps already fill the inner screen properlyYou need telephoto, ProRes, Log or Face ID
FAQsWhy does MKBHD say most people should skip the iPhone Duo?
MKBHD said the iPhone Duo’s weight, Touch ID in place of Face ID, missing telephoto camera, ProRes and Log, and poorly optimised apps make it a poor buy for most people at $1,999, although he said it suits buyers who want a tablet-sized screen in their pocket.
How many folds is the iPhone Duo rated for?
Apple has not published a fold-cycle rating for the iPhone Duo, while Samsung rates the Galaxy Z Fold8 at 500,000 folds, so figures such as 250,000 folds that circulate online for the Duo do not come from Apple.
How much does it cost to fix the iPhone Duo’s crease?
Apple replaces the iPhone Duo’s removable nano-texture cover layer for $49, or $19 with AppleCare+, while a full inner display replacement costs $999, or $99 with AppleCare+, and Apple has not said whether a new layer fully removes a crease that has formed in the panel underneath.