Apple is expected to unveil its first-ever foldable iPhone on September 9. The company is entering this market much later than its competitors: Samsung has been selling foldable smartphones since 2019, and Google, Motorola, Huawei and Xiaomi already have their own models. At the same time, the presentation will be the first since John Ternus took over as head of Apple.
Apple has officially announced a presentation called Surprise and Shine for September 9th. The event will begin at 10:00 am PT (1:00 pm ET) at the company's headquarters in Cupertino, California. Apple itself has not yet disclosed which devices it will show at the presentation.
However, according to The Verge, the main event will be the first foldable iPhone. It is assumed that when folded, the device will resemble a passport in shape and size, and after opening it will turn into a small tablet. According to the Financial Times, the development of a folding smartphone took Apple about eight years, although the company received the first patents related to this technology even earlier.
The new product may become the most expensive iPhone in history. Bloomberg writes that its price will exceed $2 thousand, and some analysts assume a cost of more than $2.5 thousand.
Apple is entering an already mature market. Samsung introduced the first Galaxy Fold back in 2019 and is now in its eighth generation of foldable smartphones. Google, Motorola and Chinese Huawei and Xiaomi offer their devices. The latter, literally on the eve of the Apple presentation, showed the Xiaomi 18 Fold with an external 5.38-inch diagonal screen and an internal 7.58-inch display. In China, its cost starts from about $1.6 thousand.
The upcoming presentation will be Apple's first major presentation under new CEO John Ternus, who took over from Tim Cook on September 1. Ternus led Apple hardware development before becoming CEO. Leading analyst of Mobile Research Group Eldar Murtazin, interviewed by RTVI, suggested that under the new leader the company can again rely on technological experiments and products that can independently set trends in the market.
