The seventy-two hours of September 2026 are destined to be etched into the industrial annals of foldable screens.

Huawei's Mate XT 2 Ultimate Master took the lead with its triple-fold design and a starting price of 19,999 yuan, followed swiftly by Xiaomi's debut of the 'mid-fold' model, the Xiaomi 18 Fold. Apple's first foldable iPhone Duo also made its controversial and highly anticipated grand entrance.

This marked the first true 'full house' moment in the seven-year history of foldable screens. Samsung, Huawei, Xiaomi, Honor, OPPO, and vivo had already been battling it out for years, but Apple's late entry—like a chess piece dropped at the center of the board—sparked immense attention.

Yet, in stark contrast to the hubbub surrounding their launches, the global penetration rate of foldable screens hovers around 2%, with shipments even declining by 21.6% year-on-year in the first half of 2026.

Foldable panel shipments fell by 13% year-on-year in the first half of 2026. While some institutions view Apple's entry as a turning point for the category, before that inflection point (inflection point), lies a tunnel far longer and more treacherous than imagined.

What, exactly, is this white-hot competition all about? Why has seven years of technological iteration and the combined efforts of six Android manufacturers failed to transform foldable screens from niche gadgets into mainstream staples?

With Apple finally stepping into the ring, perhaps it's time to re-examine this question, which has been repeatedly asked yet remains unanswered.

Let's first take a look at Apple's new foldable product.

The iPhone Duo is a horizontally clamshell-folding smartphone. When folded, its external screen measures 5.4 inches—roughly the size and shape of a passport. Unfolded, the internal screen expands to 7.6 inches, Apple's largest display to date. It features a titanium frame and hinge cover, an A20 Pro chip, and an integrated 'Apple Intelligence' platform.

Priced starting at $1,999 (15,999 yuan domestically), it offers four storage tiers from 256GB to 2TB, making it Apple's most expensive phone ever.

Following Apple's event, public opinion split in a bizarre fashion. On one side, Wall Street remained optimistic: Gene Munster of Deepwater Asset Management suggested the iPhone Duo could become 'the first truly widely demanded new product since AirPods,' potentially contributing 8% to 12% of iPhone revenue. Counterpoint predicted Apple would capture 25% of the global foldable market in its debut year.

On the other side, social media erupted with criticism: 'A 15,999-yuan foldable iPhone that ditches the telephoto lens for a side fingerprint sensor? The trade-offs feel too steep.' Luo Yonghao even used the word 'copied' seven times to describe the iPhone Duo's design, citing its foldable form, under-display camera, widescreen ratio, side Dock bar, multi-angle suspension, and titanium hinge cover.

So, did Apple truly engage in copying? And why did this spark such controversy?

First is the saturation of existing innovation space. After seven years of iteration, the hardware form of foldable screens has converged into a relatively mature 'standard answer.' Clamshell inward folds, external auxiliary screens, and multitasking split-screen designs—once experimental—have now become industry consensus. As a latecomer, Apple's hardware breakthroughs within this established framework were inherently limited. Yet the public doesn't lower its expectations for Apple just because 'the industry has matured.' On the contrary, latecomers are expected to deliver something truly distinct.

Second is the weight of public expectation. Apple's two-decade history is nearly synonymous with 'redefining categories.' The iPod redefined music players, the iPhone redefined smartphones, and AirPods redefined wireless earbuds. This Inertial expectation (inertial expectation) transferred seamlessly to foldable screens: people weren't waiting for a 'foldable iPhone' but for 'a foldable screen only Apple could make.' When the iPhone Duo ultimately presented a product restrained in hardware innovation and focused primarily on interaction design, the sense of disappointment magnified exponentially. The higher the expectations, the greater the letdown.

Third is the tension between pricing and trade-offs. At 15,999 yuan domestically, it's Apple's most expensive phone ever. Yet this premium device ditches the telephoto lens and reverts to a side fingerprint sensor. For consumers, this means paying a hefty premium for the 'foldable' form factor while accepting downgrades in core experiences.

So, where does Apple's breakthrough lie? The iPhone Duo's hinge interaction design drew some praise. Screen transitions rely on progressive blur animations rather than simple jumps—the external display fades out gradually while the internal screen emerges with a gradient effect. A customized iOS 27 supports dual-app split-screen, cross-window dragging, and seamless continuity between internal and external displays. Both screens maintain a consistent 4:3 aspect ratio, ensuring content scales proportionally without visual fragmentation.

Specifically, Apple's entry strategy carries a classic 'late-mover advantage' flavor, while market controversy underscores how emerging frontier technologies like foldable screens are far from resolved by mere big-tech endorsements.

So, what are the current mainstream technological routes for foldable screens? Which major players are involved?

Seven years on, foldable screens no longer need to repeatedly prove whether screens can fold.

Hinge durability, crease control, and device thickness—once core concerns—now receive passing grades across the board. Large-fold panel shipments surged 35% year-on-year in the first half of 2026, with their market share soaring from 50% to 78%.

But as the novelty fades, market competition for foldable screens intensifies, forcing every player to confront a tougher question: What value do they truly offer users?

Apple is playing the ecosystem card. The iPhone Duo's real barrier isn't hardware but software. iOS 27 introduces foldable-specific interactions like standby displays, tent mode, and upright FaceTime, with Apple Pencil support. Critically, the long-standing 'app drought' plaguing foldable screens barely affects Apple—over 1.8 million iPad apps can seamlessly migrate to the internal display. While Android rivals struggle with basic app scaling for national-level apps like WeChat, Apple users gain instant access to a fully adapted software ecosystem.

Huawei took a starkly different path: redefining foldable boundaries through morphological innovation. From the 2019 Mate X's outward fold to the Mate X2's inward shift, the Mate XT's triple-fold breakthrough, and the Pura X series' wide-fold niche, Huawei's density of foldable form exploration dwarfs any Android competitor.

The Mate XT 2 Ultimate Master is Huawei's second triple-fold product, switching from a Z-shaped fold to a G-shaped dual-inward fold that fully encases the main screen, eliminating Flexible screen (flexible screen) exposure risks. It debuts the Kirin 9050 Pro chip with wafer-level vertical stacking logic fold technology, cramming more transistors into limited space. The folded thickness is controlled at 12.3mm, with a single-side unfold thickness of just 3.5mm. Huawei also introduced IP58/59 dust/water resistance and a LingDun hardware-grade privacy screen that blackens side views without affecting frontal perception. With over 60% market share in China's foldable segment, triple-folds represent Huawei's moat in the high-end niche.

Xiaomi is playing the differentiation card. The Xiaomi 18 Fold defines a new 'mid-fold' category, positioned between large and small folds. Closed, it resembles a passport; unfolded, it approaches mini-tablet size. Weighing just 219g (lighter than many flagship slabs), it packs a 6000mAh battery. Both screens share a √2:1 ratio, with the internal display exactly twice the external one, ensuring consistent content logic when opened/closed. Powered by the self-developed Xuanjie O3 chip and priced starting at 10,999 yuan, it's the most affordable of the three. With only ~4% market share, the mid-fold represents Xiaomi's flanking maneuver to avoid direct clashes with Huawei and Apple.

In essence, major players employ distinct strategies in the foldable chessboard, yet their technological rivalry hasn't fully unlocked the mainstream market. An awkward statistic: foldable phone users unfold their internal screens just 3.1 times daily, with 76% never using the suspension feature. Most 'large screens' purchased for over 10,000 yuan remain folded most of the time.

Given such usage rates, is this 'full house' moment about capturing a growing market or dividing a stagnant pie?

Foldable screens were once seen as the smartphone industry's lifeline to break free from stagnant competition, achieve high-end positioning, and boost profits, luring numerous manufacturers (especially mid-range players) to rush in and seize the premium market. But as more players joined, competition intensified, with high technical barriers, massive R&D costs, and persistent pain points like screen creases, cold-weather screen cracks, and high repair rates trapping some vendors in a cycle of heavy investment and slow returns.

IDC data shows global foldable shipments reached ~20 million units in 2025, accounting for ~1.5% of total smartphones. TrendForce estimates 2026 global shipments at ~20.2 million units, a mere 0.5% YoY increase. Alarmingly, H1 2026 saw a 21.6% YoY decline in global foldable shipments, with small-fold categories plummeting 47%.

Manufacturers remain enthusiastic, but consumers hesitate. Samsung, Huawei, Xiaomi, OPPO, and vivo have all taken their turns, yet none have lifted penetration beyond the 2% quagmire. As leading players (Huawei, Xiaomi, etc.) stabilize through technological iteration, the market consolidates, leaving smaller or late entrants trapped in a brutal elimination race—'wanting in but unable to hold'—ushering the industry into a 'besieged city' era.

The root cause of foldable screens' failure to crack the mainstream lies in several unbroken barriers:

The first barrier is creases. Eliminating creases entirely defies physics—the PET support film inside flexible screens undergoes irreversible plastic deformation from repeated bending. Even with waterdrop hinges to disperse stress and dual-layer UTG glass for rigidity, creases can only be mitigated, not eradicated. Hinge technologies iterate constantly: OPPO's titanium alloy canopy hinge reduced surface undulation from 0.18mm to 0.1mm, while vivo's sixth-gen aerospace floating-wing hinge claims a crease depth of just 0.018mm—still the industry ceiling for 'visibly acceptable.'

The second barrier is the dilemma of weight, thickness, battery life, and heat dissipation. Foldable bodies, squeezed by hinge mechanisms and dual screens, leave far less space for batteries and cooling than slab phones. The iPhone Duo weighs 254g with an 11.3mm folded thickness, compared to Samsung's Galaxy Z Fold 8 at 201g/9.7mm and Xiaomi's 18 Fold at 219g. The added weight stems from dual batteries and complex hinges, yet battery life still lags behind same-priced slab flagships. Heat dissipation is structurally harder—folded screens severely partition internal space, preventing concentrated heat dredge , making high-performance chip thermal issues even trickier than in slab phones.

The third barrier is software adaptation. Foldables' core selling points—split-screen and multitasking—rely heavily on deep third-party app adaptation. Yet even national-level apps like WeChat remain stuck at simple scaling on foldables, with chat windows stretching across screens, oversized input fields, and distorted Moments images. Android vendors lack unified adaptation standards and sufficient developer incentive. Apple's iPad ecosystem advantage shines here, but even so, developers truly optimizing for foldable forms need time to cultivate.

The fourth barrier is pricing and repair costs. Mainstream foldables still cost ~10,000 yuan, with Huawei's Mate XT 2 starting at 19,999 yuan and Apple's iPhone Duo at 15,999 yuan. Repair costs remain exorbitant: Huawei's Mate XT 2 internal screen replacement costs 5,499 yuan, while Honor's Magic V6 demands 4,479 yuan. When screen repairs near the price of a mid-range slab flagship, consumer hesitation becomes perfectly rational.

In summary: low yields keep costs high; high costs prevent price cuts; unaffordable prices limit penetration. This deadlock runs from supply chains to consumers.

For foldable screens to truly go mainstream, they must overcome all four barriers simultaneously. Calling Apple's entry a 'turning point' is more narrative hope than industrial reality. From a Industry perspective (industry perspective), its true significance lies not in a single product's sales explosion but in the entire supply chain starting to invest long-term for foldables. Will panel makers expand capacity? Will developers re-evaluate large-screen adaptation economics? Will suppliers open dedicated foldable production lines? These factors may truly determine the next phase of foldable screens.