These clever apps show off the iPhone Duo’s potential

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It’s been a long time since I’ve been genuinely excited about a new iPhone.
For years, a new iPhone meant a device that was thinner, faster, and had a camera that came with incredible upgrades. At some point (and Apple devotees can debate which year’s model this was!), a new iPhone became an incremental upgrade. Slightly better, slightly faster. Maybe there was a new button to learn, a new charging cable, or a new notch on the screen, but the iPhone itself remained the same rectangular glass and metal handheld it always was.
The iPhone Duo changes this, allowing Apple to enter the market for foldable phones with a phone that, while imperfect, is whimsical, fun, and, yes, actually exciting.
It’s hard to say when the urge to acquire the iPhone Duo first kicked in. I’ll admit that it wasn’t during the official announcement, which left me feeling puzzled about the device’s potential. Do I actually want a phone that folds, I wondered? Was propping up the phone as a little tent to watch Netflix worth all that extra money? (The Duo starts at $2,000).
As it turned out, the desire for the Duo grew on me as I saw developers embracing the new foldable design to create Duo-optimized apps. Apple’s software development community, after all, is what keeps me locked into the iPhone. Apple developers are active, creative, engaged, and still often build for iOS first – a must if you like trying things early.
Of course, the initial Duo reviews have pointed out how many mainstream iOS apps have not yet been made ready for the Duo, which is true. Many of the apps you use every day were not optimized by launch day, meaning they’re surrounded by black bars, have their controls in odd places, or have to be enlarged with a tap, similar to the early days of running iPhone apps on iPad.
But the developers who have specifically built for the Duo sparked my interest. Soon, my inbox was filled with pitches for clever apps I couldn’t yet try unless I got my hands on a Duo. Hello, FOMO.
The best of these don’t just adapt their apps to display correctly on the foldable form factor, but make use of the fact that there are different displays of different sizes – and they incorporate that into the design of the apps themselves.
Below are some of my early favorites, tested on a review unit provided by Apple.
Netflix
Let’s start with the basics. Netflix is one of Apple’s hand-picked partners for the Duo launch, and had its streaming app Duo-optimized by the time the device shipped, alongside others like the MLB app, NYT Cooking, Slack, my preferred calendar app Fantastical, and others. But Netflix is the perfect showcase for what I expect will be a regular Duo use case: watching movies and TV.
The streaming app hasn’t just been expanded to fill the screen; it takes advantage of the fact that there are two different screen sizes to build for. On the outer screen (the display you see when the device is folded), you can scroll through Netflix’s short-form, TikTok-like “Clips,” then open up the device to continue watching videos on the larger matte-screen inner display. The transition between the two experiences feels as seamless as unfolding the Duo itself, as the content automatically adapts to the new screen size.
As I personally find myself watching most TV on my phone these days, as opposed to big screen in the living room, I appreciate having the option to shift from a phone to a larger screen with one device. This is going to be one of my most-used apps, I think.
Deck-Man (Formerly Duo-Man)
Look, I called it back in September. I have to credit Deck-Man, which was previously known as Duo-Man, as being the first app that made me want to get a Duo. Designed by indie developer Vidit Bhargava at a hackathon, the music player takes clever advantage of the Duo’s two screens to imitate how Walkman cassette players used to function.
The playful app reimagines the cassette player as a digital experience with retro vibes, allowing you to browse through your favorite albums as cassettes, then load them into the player. You can then control the playback with play, pause, fast-forward, and rewind controls, as you would on a hardware device, complete with authentic-sounding clicks and cassette sounds that were recorded from a real portable cassette player.
With the Duo open, the cassette appears to play on the right side of the screen, next to album imagery on the right. When closed, Deck-Man’s interface looks like the front of a Walkman.
The app has appeal not only because it built something that could only exist on a hinged, foldable device like the Duo, but also because it taps into the growing demand for retro tech, which is partly a cultural response to the speed at which the AI industry is shipping out products. Retro tech, like dumbphones, digital cameras, vinyl, CDs, and landlines, recalls an older time when tech use was intentional, not just baked into every aspect of our lives.
Honestly, if you buy a Duo and don’t install Deck-Man, I’m convinced you just don’t know how to have fun.
TypeDraw
The TypeDraw app is designed to be a personal notebook, something that looks like a virtual Moleskine of sorts — it even has an elastic closure band. But there’s a certain charm to using this app specifically on the Duo, whose form factor makes it look a lot like a little notebook when closed.
Inside TypeDraw, you can type using a font that’s your own handwriting or pick from one of a dozen fonts designed by its creator, Phil Traut.
You can also choose which kind of paper you want to write on, like lined, grid, or dotted pages, and pick your ink color. You can also draw and sketch to create colorful images that accompany your handwritten text, which makes it feel a lot more like using a real-life notebook as your journal or diary, and not some boring to-do app.
The pages curl as you flip through them, and you can even pull on the elastic band to produce a twang animation that’s just silly and fun.
Wakeout
Wakeout, the workout app that’s a former Apple App of the Year winner, has also approached its Duo optimization thoughtfully by designing different user interfaces for each postion the phone can be in. The app, which offers a series of mini movement breaks that feel more like games than exercise, works when the Duo is closed, open, in tent mode, or sitting open like a laptop computer.
For instance, when the Duo is open like a book, the view is split across the hinge with the movement game videos on the left, but when it’s open like a laptop, the videos shift to the vertical screen. You can also put it into tent mode, which is great for watching the videos with the Duo propped up on your desk. (Most people use Wakeout at work, when they take quick stretch breaks after sitting at a desk for too long.)
If the app is running on a closed Duo, its row of navigation tabs becomes a slim side menu in the column beside the camera, allowing the phone’s small screen to use the full display.
Flighty
Already my favorite travel app, Apple Design Award-winning Flighty tells you everything you need to know about your upcoming flight, from gate updates to delays to airport conditions and even the type of aircraft you’re flying.
But on the iPhone Duo, when open, the app takes advantage of the expanded screen space to spread its map to the edges, letting you see more of your flight’s path on a globe that spins under your fingertips.
When the Duo is open, your flight details move over to the left side of the screen, but it doesn’t fill that side of the screen. Instead, most of the display is taken up by the image of the globe, allowing you room to zoom in on different flight paths more closely as you plan your travels.
The app also works in split screen, which means you can keep track of your flight while also doing something else — like watching your favorite TV show.
Plus, Flighty added a new feature called En Route Mode just for the Duo. In this mode, the Duo is folded into the tent shape and then placed on a flat surface — like your airplane’s tray table. That way you can watch your flight’s progress via Wi-Fi while you do something else, like listen to music, read a book, or watch a movie from the in-flight entertainment’s seat-back screen.
Tiny Computers
Designed specifically for the Duo (and for tech enthusiasts, who are also the Duo’s first customers), Tiny Computers is a playful way to reconnect with older technology. The app ships with 10 retro computers that you can play with, including the Macintosh, Commodore 64, IBM PC, Amiga 500, Windows 95, ThinkPad, iMac G3, iBook G3, PowerBook G4, and Windows XP.
You’re meant to set up the Duo in its open “laptop” mode to toy around with these old-fashioned devices, which feature clicking keyboards, working command lines, paint programs, floppy disks, and even some desktop games. But it’s not just an old computer exhibit – there’s a game element too, as you can look for hidden files and secret commands to earn a medal.
There are no ads, subscriptions, or in-app purchases, either – just a $3.99 one-time fee.
Sky Guide
Sky Guide is that classic stargazing app that I still open from time to time when I’m outdoors enjoying nature, wondering whether that bright light up there is a star or a planet or what the constellation right next to Orion is called.
The company is another of those that Apple gave a shoutout to in its press release about all the new Duo-optimized apps, and it’s easy to see why. It’s just so much easier to track the night sky when you have the larger display on the Duo unfolded, offering a more immersive, edge-to-edge map that moves as your position and orientation change. This one will be broken out on the next camping trip or nighttime walk, for sure.
MD Vinyl
Maybe I’m just a sucker for retro music apps, but MD Vinyl did not disappoint with its Duo-optimized music player.
This app’s widget already has a permanent place on my regular iPhone’s Home Screen purely for the aesthetics, which includes a tiny, spinning record and a display that shows you the song title and artist you’re streaming, alongside the player controls.
Now for the iPhone Duo, the virtual vinyl record gets to use more of the screen. Plus, you can even pick up the record player’s arm and place it on the spinning disk to start the music or remove it to stop it.
Pico Cam
Before the Duo, Pico Cam offered a tiny, playful camera app for taking virtual Polaroid-style pictures, which eject from the phone’s Dynamic Island (the pill-shaped cutout at the top of the screen). You can also shake the picture to get it to develop faster, then decorate with little stickers and share with friends.
Now optimized for the iPhone Duo, Pico Cam can be used when the phone is both open and closed, with the latter giving you more screen space to see your photo gallery after pictures are taken.
Honorable Mention, sorta: Toastie
Remember when the iPhone first came out, and there was that app that would make it look like you were drinking a beer when you tilted the phone to your mouth? Toastie is the iPhone Duo version of that same type of ridiculous experience.
I wouldn’t call Toastie a “killer” app, of course; it’s far too silly for that. But it’s a pretty fun toy to play with — if you ever dare to hand over this expensive device to a kid.
The app, cheekily described as the “world’s most expensive toaster” (a reference to the Duo’s exorbitant price), lets you follow a recipe to create a piece of toast with butter, cheese, or any of the other numerous toppings, then close the Duo to let the toast cook.
Open the phone too soon, and your toast will be undercooked, losing you the 5-star review you’re after.
You definitely don’t need this app, but what’s another $2.99 when you’ve already dropped a bundle on the phone itself?
We expect more interesting apps to come as developers get their hands on the iPhone Duo in the weeks ahead.

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