Apple tops 100,000 iPhone Duo-optimized apps as supply delays stretch into next year

Apple says the software situation around its first foldable is improving quickly. The company announced on Friday that more than 100,000 apps built for the iPhone Duo are now live on the App Store, with thousands more being added every day, according to TechCrunch.

The milestone is a direct answer to the device's earliest critics. When the Duo launched, reviews faulted it for shipping with a thin selection of apps adapted to its folding screen — a familiar problem for new form factors, but a painful one at a premium price.

New arrivals this week

The announcement was timed with the release of more than a dozen high-profile Duo-ready apps, TechCrunch reports, including Microsoft Word and Outlook, Zoom, NBA and NHL sports apps, shopping apps Etsy and LTK, note-taking app Goodnotes, productivity app Extra, and the Halide Mark III camera app. They join titles that were already optimized, such as Netflix, YouTube, Instagram, and WhatsApp.

Apple also published a lengthy list of apps it says have been updated for iOS 27 and optimized for the Duo. It spans streaming (Spotify, CBS, Tubi, BBC iPlayer), messaging (Facebook Messenger, Google Chat), AI assistants (ChatGPT, Grok Bot, Microsoft Copilot), productivity (Excel, PowerPoint, SAP Concur, monday.com, PDF Expert, iA Writer), news (The Washington Post, Yahoo News, FOX News, Substack), design and audio (Canva, Suno), fitness and health (Strava, MyFitnessPal, Withings), and everyday services ranging from Tesla Robotaxi, Transit and Citi Bike to Tinder, Kroger, Domino's and Taco Bell.

Why unoptimized apps hurt

Apps that have not been adapted show a black bar along one side of the Duo's unfolded display, eating into the extra screen space that is the device's core selling point. Some also bury important functions in an overflow menu. That degraded experience was a running theme in early reviews, which makes the pace of new optimizations the single biggest factor in how the Duo feels day to day.

Apple's developer outreach

Apple's own figures suggest many iOS developers needed extra runway to reach the new form factor. According to TechCrunch, more than 2,000 developers attended over 50 in-person workshops Apple hosted across 19 cities worldwide, where they could test their apps on the Duo hardware with Apple's support.

"It's been wonderful to see how quickly developers have embraced iPhone Duo, and we're grateful for their creativity and innovation," Susan Prescott, Apple's vice president of Worldwide Developer Relations, said in a statement, adding that Apple is "excited to see the pace of updates continue to accelerate."

Demand is the other constraint

Hardware may be the tougher problem. Despite a starting price of $1,999 for the 256GB model, the Duo sold out within hours of orders opening, and ship times have since slipped into next year. On its earnings call this week, Apple said it is "hard to predict" when the supply constraints behind those delays will improve, TechCrunch reports.

Some updates are still pending

One caveat: the long app list reflects Apple's plans rather than what every user will see today. TechCrunch notes that Spotify, for instance, still showed the black bar on its Duo review unit, and the App Store had not yet flagged an available update. Because the list came directly from Apple, the publication expects those updates to land soon.

Why it matters

A foldable succeeds or fails on software. The 100,000-app milestone defuses the strongest criticism of the Duo's launch and signals to developers that the platform has real momentum, which in turn makes it safer for others to invest in Duo-specific interfaces. But the story has flipped: the binding constraint on Apple is no longer the app catalog but supply, with shipments pushed into next year. How quickly Apple can build Duos will now shape the platform's first year as much as the apps running on it.