iPhone Duo Owners Report Cracked Screens Along the Hinge on Launch Day

Some owners of Apple's new iPhone Duo say the foldable's inner screen cracked along the hinge within hours of launch, according to MacRumors, the New York Post and Mashable. Photos of damaged devices have appeared on Reddit, the MacRumors forums and social media, but it is not known how many units are affected.

For buyers of the $1,999 phone, the practical question is what happens if a screen fails. In the one case that has been described in detail, an Apple Store swapped the device on the spot.

What owners are reporting

MacRumors said almost all of the display faults in the photos sit directly on the hinge, and most show a line of bright pixels across one side of the screen. Mashable described a crack running along the full length of the fold, along with a bright white line on the right side of the inner display.

The most detailed account comes from an Australian owner on Reddit. He said the phone was about six hours old and had been opened fewer than 20 times. While showing it to a friend, he felt something near the internal hinge, then heard an “audible crack.” He said he found no marks on the screen surface or the outer hinge that would suggest it had been caught or damaged. Mashable put the timeline at less than six hours.

The New York Post reported that another image of a cracked Duo carried a caption saying the poster had seen several damaged units in the same spot.

What Apple did in the reported case

Mashable reported that when the Australian owner called Apple, the company offered an express replacement but required a hold for the full cost of the phone. Apple also could not promise when the replacement would arrive. He went to an Apple Store instead, where, he said, staff apologized and gave him a new device on the spot. MacRumors and the Post also reported an immediate replacement.

MacRumors said Apple is likely collecting defective units to study where they fail, which could lead to manufacturing changes. That is the outlet's assessment, not an Apple statement.

What remains unclear

Scale: MacRumors and Mashable both said it is not known how widespread the problem is or whether complaints will increase.
Cause: Mashable said it is unclear exactly what is going wrong. Reports of cracks came from users in the U.S., Australia and China, so the issue does not appear limited to one market.
User damage: MacRumors noted that several images come from demo devices in China, where the phone launched hours before the U.S. The backstory of most of those images is unknown, and user damage could be a factor.
Early testing: MacRumors said some reviewers who folded the phone repeatedly in early testing saw no screen problems, though it called that a small sample.

MacRumors added that some failures are to be expected when so many people receive a new device on the same day.

Why it matters for buyers

The Duo is Apple's first foldable and its most expensive iPhone. The New York Post reported that reviewers at Engadget, Wired and Tom's Guide praised the engineering and the folding mechanism, though others raised concerns about price, weight and software. Against that backdrop, early reports of hardware failure feed directly into whether buyers trust the new design.

According to MacRumors, hinge failures that occur during normal use should be covered by Apple's one-year warranty. Customers who received a Duo at launch also have two weeks to return it. Whether a particular crack counts as normal use would presumably depend on the circumstances of each case, and Apple has not publicly addressed the reports in the coverage reviewed here.

Mashable noted that first-generation devices commonly have bugs, but called a crack through the middle of the inner display an extreme defect. It expected Apple to fix the problem for affected customers.

Around Prague, based on reporting by MacRumors, New York Post, Mashable

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