Apple announced a new feature in the App Store: a badge that will identify applications and games developed specifically for the iPhone Duo, the company's first foldable smartphone. Programs that meet the requirements will receive the 'Made for iPhone Duo' mark.
This new feature takes effect this Friday, October 23rd, coinciding with the start of sales and deliveries of the new device. The measure comes amid initial hardware reviews, which point to a lack of applications suitable for the elongated screen format.
The badge aims to make it easier for users to identify software that has been prepared to take advantage of the iPhone Duo's format, differentiating them from those that use adapted interfaces from previous iOS versions.
Currently, many popular applications display dark bars on the sides of the screen or have limited adaptations, such as button and interactive area stretching. Journalist Mark Gurman from Bloomberg commented that this adjustment period is common, recalling launches like the iPhone X, and assured that optimization issues are not serious and will be corrected in a few weeks.
The iPhone Duo began its pre-sale last week and will have deliveries and availability in physical stores starting tomorrow (October 23rd). In the Brazilian market, the device will launch starting at R$ 21,999.
For developers who wish to adapt their applications to the new iPhone and obtain the badge, they need to use the latest kit provided by the company. Susan Prescott, Apple's Vice President of Global Developer Relations, stated that companies are already making the necessary adjustments, allowing these applications to potentially appear in recommendation lists on the App Store in the future.
Some developers have already created versions dedicated to the foldable format, such as Netflix and Prime Video. In the case of Prime Video, the user can keep the phone partially open, viewing controls and information on one screen while the video content continues to be displayed on another.
Furthermore, the iPhone Duo introduces the ability to display two applications simultaneously. Programs like Microsoft Word and Outlook should receive multi-column interfaces, and Zoom, Slack, and Salesforce are also among the applications prepared to accommodate the larger screen.