Apple introduced the iPhone Duo in early September, and the iPhone 18 Pro duo iPhone starts at $1,999. That puts it well above the starting price of every iPad model Apple compared it with, so this is not a cheap larger-screen option for buyers weighing one device against two.
Apple and the iPhone Duo price
The base iPhone Duo costs $1,999, while the iPad Pro starts at $1,199, the iPad Air starts at $699, the iPad Mini starts at $599, and a standard iPad starts at $449. The gap is large enough to change the buying math before anyone even looks at storage, because Apple’s first foldable sits in a different price class from every iPad model named in the comparison.
Apple also said the iPhone Duo can be configured with up to 2TB of storage. That top tier costs $3,199. The 2TB iPad Pro costs $2,299, so the foldable remains the pricier device even at the high end.
iPadOS and iOS 27
The iPhone Duo has two displays, a 5.4-inch cover display and a 7.6-inch inner display, and it runs on iOS 27. Apple said the device’s user experience took a lot of cues from iPadOS. That matters because the phones and tablets do not use the same operating system, and the similarity stops at the experience rather than the software itself.
The practical read is simple for anyone choosing between Apple touchscreen devices: the iPhone Duo is built for foldable-phone behavior, not as a direct substitute for an iPad. Mashable’s account of the early September event treated it as the standout product, but the pricing shows Apple is positioning it as a premium device first.
Two displays, one premium device
The iPhone Duo weighs 254g and has two 48MP camera lenses on the back. Every modern iPad has a lone 12MP lens. That difference points to a phone that carries more hardware into a thinner foldable format, while the tablet line still keeps a simpler rear camera setup.
For buyers, the unanswered question is not whether Apple built a foldable. It is how much of the iPad-style multitasking Apple borrowed into iOS 27 actually carries over in daily use, and whether that software overlap is enough to justify paying more than any iPad model mentioned here.
