A new Android app copies the iPhone Duo's tent mode and adds more

Just as Apple's iPhone Duo reaches its first customers, an Android app already copies one of its best-known tricks. The app is called Foldy. It turns a foldable phone, stood up partly open like a small tent, into a desk display. Foldy is free, with a premium unlock for 90 cents a month or $9 for life.

What Foldy does

The iPhone Duo has a mode called StandBy that shows information while the phone sits in this tent position. Few Android foldables offer it. The Motorola Razr Fold has it as part of its always-on display. Pixel has something similar, but only while charging.

On a Galaxy Z Fold 8, Foldy showed the date and time or calendar data across two panes. It can also turn any Android widget into a pane, such as Google Home or music controls. Users can also train the app to know when to start. In testing, it switched on once the phone was partly open and on its side.

• Free to use, but the most useful features need the premium unlock
• Premium costs 90 cents a month or $9 once
• Works with widgets, so panes can show smart home or music controls

Another copycat

A second app, Foldman, turns a foldable into a Walkman-style cassette player. It resembles a widely discussed Duo app but adds YouTube Music support. The article does not say which phones each app supports beyond the Fold 8, or exactly which features sit behind the paywall.