Apple Finally Unveils First Foldable iPhone Duo, iPhone 18 Pro Max And A20 Pro
Not only does Apple have an exciting new iPhone form factor in the iPhone Duo, price increases across the rest of the iPhone lineup have mostly been limited to $200 or less. There are exceptions, of course, especially with higher-end storage configurations, but for the most part consumers won't be hit with drastic price changes this iPhone generation, despite early rumors to the contrary. There's now also an official Apple Upgrade program that allows for leasing a device over 12-24 months, and an up to $1200 discount offered for iPhone 14 or newer trade-ins.
The iPhone Duo Is Apple's First Foldable Phone
The iPhone Duo, which starts at $1,999 USD (or $83.29 USD per month with Apple Upgrade's 24-month lease option), opens for pre-order on Friday, October 16th. Broad availability comes on Friday, October 23rd, and the phone will launch in "star white" and "night sky" colorways. The iPhone Duo will be available with up to 2TB of storage, but expect to pay a hefty $3,199 USD for the privilege. The $1,999 base model comes with 256GB of storage, for reference, which makes it only marginally more expensive than the recently released Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8, which is currently discounted down to $1,649 for the 256GB model.
iPhone 18 Pro And Pro Max Have Deeper AI Integration
The new iPhone line-up has received numerous updates, including a handful of AI-enhanced computational photography features. The company is so confident in its new iPhone 18 Pro camera that many of the video segments used in today's presentations were actually recorded with it.
Improved vapor chamber cooling hardware and the new Apple A20 chip also enable sustained performance gains of up to 40% or more versus previous iPhones, according to the Apple.
The 6.3-inch iPhone 18 Pro starts at $1,199 USD or $49.95/mo via a 24-month Apple Upgrade plan for the 256GB model. The larger, 6.9-inch iPhone 18 Pro Max starts at $1,299 USD, or $54.12/mo via the same Apple Upgrade plan. After rumors of massive price hikes in the lead-up to today's big reveal, it's good to see only $100 separating the Pro and Pro Max, and pricing that's highly competitive with other mobile flagships.
The A20 Pro Is Apple's Most Powerful Silicon Yet
Apple also went into some detail regarding its all-new silicon, the Apple A20 Pro. The Apple A20 Pro is a 2nm architecture SoC that includes a six-core CPU, dual 8-core Neural Engines, and a 7-core GPU. The CPU uses a 2P+4E configuration with two "super" performance cores that are reportedly 20% faster than the A19 Pro's, and four efficiency cores. The 7-core GPU is also estimated to be 40% faster than the A19 Pro's GPU, which is a massive generational uplift.
All that onboard compute is being put to use by iOS 27, which integrates Siri AI and Apple Intelligence features into nearly every layer of the OS and included software. Detailed health tracking with support for importing your real-world medical records is available, along with AI-enhanced camera features that gives users the ability to expand images and even reframe shots. There's even onboard AI image generation.
iOS 27 has also been optimized for the iPhone Duo's larger multi-display form factor, and Health data can be synchronized across devices, including the new Apple Watches.
For more on Apple's announcements today, consider watching the presentation embedded above.
Apple also debuted some new peripherals like the AirPods 5 ($129 USD) with 50% improved active noise cancellation, according to the company. The new Apple Watch Series 12 ($399 USD) and Apple Watch Ultra 4 ($799 USD) were also revealed, which feature numerous AI-enhanced features and fresh Apple Silicon too. The new watches both leverage Apple's new Health Sensing System and S11 chip, which supposedly provide the most accurate heart rate sensing of any wearable released to date.
