I Won’t Buy
the iPhone Duo

After fifty foldables, I quit, and became happier

For eight years I dated more than fifty foldable smartphones. And finally, we broke up. I am not going back, not even for the much-talked-about iPhone Duo. And I became happier.

Shinya Takei, Managing Partner, GASPARD & CO.4 November 2026

A tri-fold smartphone displayed in a glass case, like a jewel. I bought this one too. Photo: メイド理世, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Graduating from foldables

In Japanese, “graduating” from something also means letting go of something you loved, gracefully. You graduate from an idol group. You graduate from staying up late.

I have graduated from foldable smartphones. Time enrolled: about eight years. Models dated: over fifty. More than half were never sold in Japan. Not one of them could have been introduced to my parents.

Fifty exes

My first love, in 2018, was the world’s first foldable to go on sale. Unlike today’s, it folded with the screen on the outside. Even closed, its face was bare: a bold type. The company that made it later went bankrupt without ceremony. First loves rarely last.

For eight years after that, I dated every new model. Open it and the screen doubles. Show it to anyone and they go “ooh”. I collected about fifty “ooh”s.

A foldable smartphone opened in the palm of a hand — An open foldable. I kept up with this little ritual of opening, dozens of times a day, for eight years. Photo: Vasonesiku, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Right up to graduation, I was dating three: the OPPO Find N6, the Galaxy Z Fold8 and the Xiaomi 18 Fold. Each was the best foldable of its year. Breakups, it turns out, often come at the best of times.

A line-up of the latest foldable smartphones on display — The latest foldables of 2026. Every new release added another ex. Photo: Dinkun Chen, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Reasons for the breakup

Breaking up taught me a few things.

First, no more opening. Freed from dozens of open-and-shut cycles a day, my fingers now look astonishingly idle.

Next, it is lighter. No more carrying two screens and a hinge. My pocket feels a notch higher.

And the battery lasts. Gone is that little evening drift from café to café in search of a socket.

The clincher: almost every app and website is designed for a tall, narrow screen. Open them on a nearly square big screen and you get gaping margins on both sides. For eight years, I had been living against the grain of the world’s blueprint.

The man with three phones

As a photographer, I had another complaint. To stay thin, foldables keep their cameras modest. So for photos I also carried a phone with a large one-inch sensor. For a while, three phones in my pockets: a small mobile shop.

Then one day it struck me: it is neither medium format nor full frame, so why was I so attached to one inch? It was the little ones comparing heights. With that thought, my shoulders relaxed.

The new favourite

Enter the OPPO Find X9 Ultra. What drew me was not the sensor size but the Hasselblad colour: the colour of the great medium-format name, in a single phone in my pocket.

The back of a smartphone with a large circular camera module — The back of the OPPO Find X9 Ultra. The camera sits squarely in the middle, a face that knows no modesty. Photo: 茅野ふたば, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

A white OPPO Find X10 Pro Max and a white cylindrical lens with an orange line — This one is the OPPO Find X10 Pro Max, now on limited pre-order in Malaysia; I am evaluating a global unit sent to reviewers. Hasselblad on its back, and the white cylinder beside it is a clip-on telephoto lens. I have barely started with my new favourite and the next candidate is already at home. In love, a scandal; with smartphones, part of the job.

A cylindrical telephoto lens and hood in a black box — And this is a 300mm-equivalent super-telephoto unit. In its box it looks like a proper camera lens. It does not fit in a pocket, so this is where the bag comes in.

As a photographer, this matters. Not long ago, smartphone photos were notes; real work was shot on a camera. Now a shot from my pocket can go straight into the running. The photos of ASAI HOTEL in No. 7 were, in fact, all taken with this phone. The camera stayed home.

A hotel guest seen from behind on a terrace, looking at a lake and greenery — From No. 7: a guest looking out at the lake from the terrace. Also taken with the phone in my pocket.

Coffee on a lounge table with soft background blur — From No. 7: from the coffee in front to the back, everything melts softly. This is the phone in my pocket at work.

A hotel lounge with light from the lake glowing beyond the window — Also from No. 7: the lake’s light glows beyond the window.

Videos and books go on a Huawei tablet; serious work goes on a MacBook. Once I stopped making one device carry everything, each tool cheered up. Cooking with a Swiss Army knife is harder than with a proper knife and board.

The iPhone Air holds only banking apps and stays at home or in the hotel: a safe as light as air, true to its name. I carry just one phone. The mobile shop in my pocket has closed.

The back of a black iPhone Air standing on a display — iPhone Air. These days it is our featherweight safe, and it hardly ever goes out. Photo: Ahmad Ali Karim, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

iPhone Duo and the Galápagos

Meanwhile, Apple finally released a foldable: the iPhone Duo. I borrowed a friend’s and opened it. Then I promptly closed it. I no longer need one.

The iPhone Duo on display at the Apple Store in Kuala Lumpur on launch day. Even the weather shows Kuala Lumpur. Well made. Still, my fingers did not want to go back to the ritual of opening. Photo: Ahmad Ali Karim, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

I should say: I am an Apple fan to the core. Before SoftBank launched the iPhone in Japan in 2008, I was already using the original iPhone, not as a phone but as a device to carry my schedule and contacts. I have bought every model since, up to the iPhone 17 Pro Max.

The original iPhone standing in its dock — The original iPhone. Back when it could not yet be used as a phone in Japan, for me it was a slightly futuristic tool for carrying my schedule and contacts. Photo: Andrew from London, UK, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

And yet I plan to buy neither the iPhone Duo nor the iPhone 18 Pro Max. The iPhone used to be a technological challenger. Now it seems to walk, safely, down a road Chinese brands took about four years earlier. At least, that is how it looks to me. Much of what Apple proudly announces as “all new” sounds to me like old news. Exaggerating a little, about a century old. The clock of a man who dated fifty foldables apparently runs a bit fast.

In Japan, many say ¥360,000 is too expensive. Yet compared across 40 countries, Japan is the fifth cheapest. And many of the high-end phones selling in China never come to Japan at all, because they are too expensive for the market. Japan’s “too expensive” is a little Galápagos. Then again, after buying tri-folds costing over ¥500,000 more than once, my own yardstick bent long ago.

Still, as one of the people who has opened and closed more foldables than almost anyone in the world (probably), I cheer them on wholeheartedly. No irony. Wishing your ex well is the proper way to end a breakup story.

The Graduate, Gaspard edition

At the end of The Graduate, the couple who fled the wedding jump onto a bus. They start out laughing, but as it pulls away, their faces gradually ask: was this the right thing?

My graduation is still smiling. A phone you do not have to open turned out to be far more relaxing than I expected.

I will probably still pick up each new foldable once. You cannot help being curious about your ex’s latest. I will only pick it up. Probably...