Apple (AAPL.US) ushered in the “folding screen era”! The $1999 iPhone Duo debuted, and AI fully penetrated the hardware ecosystem

The Zhitong Finance App learned that Apple (AAPL.US) held an annual fall product launch conference on Wednesday to officially launch the company's first folding screen phone, the iPhone Duo, and also release new products such as the iPhone 18 Pro series, Apple Watch Series 12, Apple Watch Ultra 4, and AirPods 5. This press conference was also the first time since Turners took over as CEO of Apple to host a large-scale product event. At the same time as the hardware has been completely updated, Apple has further strengthened its Apple Intelligence strategy, positioned the next-generation iPhone and Apple Watch as personal AI entrances, and continued to use end-side AI and privacy protection as the core of differentiation from competitors.

Among them, the iPhone Duo received the most attention in the market. This product is called Apple's most transformative upgrade since the first iPhone. It is also the most notable change in the shape of Apple's flagship phones since the iPhone X abolished the physical Home button in 2017.

The iPhone Duo uses a passport-like folding shape and rounded corner design. When folded, the front is equipped with a small independent screen, and when unfolded, it forms a wide horizontal screen, and supports vertical use. Apple said that when fully deployed, the Duo will be the company's thinnest iPhone to date.

Through Duo, Apple hopes to solve the experience problems of existing folding screen phones in everyday usage scenarios such as scrolling through browsing and watching videos. With custom hinges, a dual display with coordinated proportions, and a new titanium body, the new device aims to provide an iPad-like user experience in a pocket-sized device.

However, this new model is also accompanied by Apple's unprecedented high pricing. The iPhone Duo starts at $1999, making it Apple's most expensive iPhone to date. Pre-orders will begin on October 17, and it will be officially launched on October 23.

How to persuade consumers to pay for a folding screen phone of about $2,000 will also be the first major market test after the new CEO Turners takes office. The iPhone is still Apple's core business, contributing about US$209.6 billion in revenue in the most recent fiscal year, accounting for slightly more than half of Apple's total sales.

In addition to the new folding screen, Apple also released the traditional straight flagship iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max. The two phones are equipped with the new A20 Pro chip, and the AI computing capabilities on the end side are further enhanced. The A20 Pro uses a 2nm process and is equipped with a 6-core CPU and 7-core GPU. Two of the high-performance cores are up to 20% faster and GPU performance is increased by up to 40%.

The A20 Pro is also equipped with a new Neural Engine. Apple says it is basically equivalent to integrating two neural network engines in a single chip, thereby further improving the local operation capabilities of machine learning and AI models.

The imaging system is also the focus of this iPhone 18 Pro upgrade. For the first time, the 48 megapixel main camera added a variable aperture, which can be automatically adjusted according to different ambient lighting. At the same time, Apple gives users more manual control, including adjusting aperture and shutter speed by themselves.

At the same time, Apple has further strengthened the image authenticity function in the AI-generated content era. The company launched a new standard called Apple Reference Image to verify the authenticity of photos taken by the iPhone 18 Pro, while supporting the SynthID standard for identifying images generated or edited by AI. However, Apple Reference Image will not be launched in the EU and China markets for the time being.

AI, on the other hand, continued throughout the press conference. Turners positioned the iPhone as a “personal AI center” that emphasizes privacy protection, stressing that Apple Intelligence will operate directly on the device as much as possible when conditions permit, rather than uploading large amounts of personal information to the cloud.

Apple also showed off the upgraded Siri. When released, the new version of Siri is expected to work with approximately 300,000 apps, and can use users' personal information such as SMS, emails, calendars, and photos to answer questions. Related Siri AI features are expected to be launched in October.

In addition to the iPhone, Apple is also trying to further build the Apple Watch as an AI wearable device.

The newly released Apple Watch Series 12 and Ultra 4 have added “smart audio” features. Among them, Siri Recap can generate a summary of the user's conversations during the day through ambient audio processing, while Live Recap can display a text record of the last 15 seconds of conversation content. The device can also recognize important sounds such as baby cries, doorbells, and alarms.

Faced with privacy concerns that may be caused by continuous audio monitoring, Apple emphasized that users can choose whether to enable these features, and that the system will not create or save recordings. The original audio cannot be accessed by Apple or other apps, and will be deleted as soon as processing is complete.

Health features are also the focus of the next generation Apple Watch upgrade. The two devices are equipped with a new “health sensing system”. Apple claims that it has the “most accurate heart rate tracking” capability among wearable devices, and has also added daily physical readiness scores similar to Whoop and Fitbit to determine the user's physical condition for the day based on how well they have recovered and rested.

The Apple Watch Series 12 starts at $399; the Ultra 4 starts at $799, which has a battery life of up to 50 hours and supports faster charging. Both products will be officially launched on September 18th.

Apple also released AirPods 5. The new earphones have further enhanced active noise cancellation capabilities. Among them, the $129 version has 50% better noise cancellation performance than the previous generation, and supports hands-free Siri AI interaction and real-time translation; the $149 premium version adds headphone volume control, longer battery life, and wireless charging.