New iPhone Duo gives the internet a new reason to make memes

Apple may have unveiled what it called one of the biggest changes in iPhone history, but the internet had already found a more important use for the new device: making fun of it. With the iPhone Duo set to hit stores on October 23, social media wasted little time reviving an annual tradition that arrived almost as reliably as the new iPhone itself: memes about our old phones suddenly becoming ancient, questionable spending decisions and the eternal question of whether we actually needed the upgrade in the first place. This time, however, Apple had given the internet something new to work with after launching the $1,999 passport-shaped foldable phone, called Duo. The iPhone Duo was the company’s first iPhone designed to open in half, marking a major departure from the familiar smartphone design. Apple called it “the biggest change in iPhone history since the original model”. And while Apple was busy presenting the device as the future, social media was asking some slightly less futuristic questions. One of the internet’s favourite responses to the iPhone Duo was wonderfully low-tech: take two phones, put them together and, apparently, you had yourself a foldable iPhone. Other posts took aim at the phone’s price, with memes comparing the cost of the iPhone Duo to a Royal Enfield Super Meteor motorcycle. At that price, the upgrade suddenly came with a very serious philosophical question: Do you want a new phone, or do you want to make a more worthy purchase?         View this post on Instagram                       Then came the annual debate over our supposedly “old” phones. Every time a new iPhone arrived, social media filled with jokes about older models slowing down, batteries giving up and perfectly functional devices suddenly feeling like relics. But some users also turned the joke back on themselves, questioning whether their phones really needed replacing or whether the arrival of a newer model simply made the old one feel obsolete. After all, the phone that was perfectly good yesterday did not suddenly become terrible overnight. The marketing cycle just moved on.         View this post on Instagram                       One post took the classic promise of futuristic technology and gave it a very 2026 twist. “In the future, we'll have flying cars,” it read. The reality? We’re watching TikTok and Instagram Reels at the same time on two separate halves of a phone. The memes also did not ignore one of the most practical problems with a phone that opened into a larger screen. One post featured Freddie from the Nickelodeon show iCarly struggling to pull a massive phone out of his pocket — an increasingly relatable scenario in a world where smartphones seemed determined to become everything except pocket-sized. Did they photoshop this person's hands to be extra long alien hands in order to hold this phone one handed? pic.twitter.com/p1RCWDSLoG — Autism Capital 🧩 (@AutismCapital) September 9, 2026 But perhaps one of the strangest details to catch social media’s attention was Apple’s use of an unusually large hand model while showcasing the phone. The internet, being the internet, called them “alien hands”. What was presumably just a creative choice in a product video quickly became another meme, with users joking that Apple had recruited extraterrestrials to help introduce the next generation of smartphones. For Apple, the iPhone Duo may represent the next big chapter in smartphone design. For the internet, however, it had already become something else: the latest canvas for jokes, comparisons and a little healthy scepticism. Perhaps that was the real tradition of every iPhone launch.