Apple just revealed how iPhone Fold apps will work

There have been so many iPhone Fold leaks now that I’m half expecting Tim Cook to start wearing the upcoming device as a hat. But what we didn’t know for sure was how iPhone Fold apps would work on the iPad-sized inner display.

There were hints earlier this year of what was possible. A tech geek showed that iOS and iPadOS are more related than many people realise. In fact, you can technically run iPad software on an iPhone. My hope was that Apple would run with this for the iPhone Ultra/Fold/Bend-o-phone. Alas, Apple has dashed my hopes, because its upcoming solution for iPhone Fold appears to be stretchy apps.

It hasn’t come out and said as much. But in the Platforms State of the Union video from its WWDC26 developer conference, Apple noted how iPhone apps now show up in more places than ever. (It’s at 25:30ish, timecode fans.) It added that when an iPhone app appears on larger displays, users want to take advantage of the extra space. So Apple is introducing iPhone app ‘resizability’. Hint hint, etc, devs. And so on.

Stretch to fit

Instead of designing for specific devices and orientations, app creators will design for a “dynamic range of sizes and aspect ratios”. Apps built with the current software development kit will be automatically opted in.

If this kind of thinking filters through Apple’s broader thinking, it can only be a good thing. It’s always been strange that when you buy an iPhone or an iPad with a fractionally different aspect ratio to what’s come before that a huge number of apps and games are bordered until a developer releases updates for the new device – assuming they ever do.

But with the fluid design that Android’s had for years – and that web designers cottoned on to over 20 years ago – iPhone apps will, by default, be responsive and able to dynamically resize. Which will make them optimal for, say, an iPhone Fold that needs apps to work with two weird new aspect ratios. (Those being the squat front one and the ‘essentially an iPad mini’ inner one.)

I’d have much preferred iPad apps on the iPhone Fold though. Maybe next year, eh?

• Apple’s iPhone Fold multitasking plans don’t go nearly far enough

Craig Grannell Contributor

About

I’m a regular contributor to Stuff magazine and Stuff.tv, covering apps, games, Apple kit, Android, Lego, retro gaming and other interesting oddities. I also pen opinion pieces when the editor lets me, getting all serious about accessibility and predicting when sentient AI smart cookware will take over the world, in a terrifying mix of Bake Off and Terminator.

Areas of expertise

Mobile apps and games, Macs, iOS and tvOS devices, Android, retro games, crowdfunding, design, how to fight off an enraged smart saucepan with a massive stick.