Quick overview

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Apple’s upcoming foldable iPhone will receive iOS updates that enable iPad-like layouts and side-by-side apps for the first time, enhancing the device’s multitasking appeal. The product, Apple’s much-anticipated entry into the market, will have an interior foldable display roughly the size of an iPad mini, according to people with knowledge of the situation.

There will also be an external screen that looks like a tiny iPhone screen. The inside display will use a wide aspect ratio, in contrast to the more constrained formats of foldable phones that are currently on the market. That should be a key selling point, according to the people who asked to remain anonymous because the project is still in the early stages of development.

There is pressure on Apple to show that it can bring this format back to life. The foldable iPhone will be available this fall, seven years after Samsung Electronics Co., its primary rival. presented its first model.

Apple is creating new iOS app layouts and redesigning its core iPhone applications to include sidebars along the left edge of the screen. Additionally, developers will be able to modify their iPhone apps for the new interface, which will employ dimensions akin to those of an iPad in landscape mode.

The foldable iPhone will run standard iOS, not iPadOS, the company’s tablet operating system, even though it offers an iPad-like app experience.

This means that instead of implementing the more desktop-like interface found in iPadOS 26, it will continue to use a more basic multitasking system. Additionally, it cannot run pre-existing iPad apps. The foldable iPhone can display two apps side by side, but it cannot run multiple windows simultaneously like an iPad mini.

That aligns with a crucial aspect of Samsung and Alphabet Inc.’s foldable phones.