As its main competition moves towards foldable smartphones and beyond, Apple is reportedly working on its own 9-inch foldable iPhone that could launch by 2025 or later.
The report comes from TF International Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo who on his Twitter account says Apple is ‘actively testing foldable OLED’ of about 9-inch size. Currently it is in testing phase.
In a follow up tweet Kuo says while he first expected Apple to launch the foldable iPhone as early as 2024, now he believes the product could get released by 2025 or later.
The so-called foldable iPhone may be a foldable iPad or a “hybrid of iPad & iPhone” according to the analyst.
A separate recent report from Korean website The Elec has stated that Apple is collaborating with LG in order to develop foldable OLED displays for its future iPads and MacBooks. The panel Apple is developing with LG will use an ultra-thin cover glass rather than using polyimide. This would make it different from most other foldable displays that are available right now.
Back in February reliable display analyst Ross Young also reported about Apple’s plans of releasing foldable products around 2026. He reported about a MacBook and iPad hybrid that will have a foldable device and a overall screen size of 20.x-inches.
All of these reports from various reliable sources seem to confirm that we might see Apple jumping into the foldable market after the year 2025. However it remains to be seen whether it’s the iPhone, iPad or MacBook that we see as its first foldable product.
Ming-Chi Kuo in a tweet did mention that according to him Apple’s priority order for foldable devices is medium, large and small. Could this mean we will first see a foldable iPad/iPhone hybrid followed by a MacBook/iPad hybrid before Apple releases a smaller foldable iPhone/tablet? Only time will tell.
