iPhone Flip clamshell rumoured for 2027: Would Steve Jobs approve?

It’s been nearly two decades since Steve Jobs famously panned Motorola’s iTunes phone – the candybar ROKR – calling the 2005 collaboration “the dumbest idea ever.”  While Steve Jobs is no more, Apple is rumoured to be dabbling in a flip-foldable clamshell iPhone – another idea that Jobs was famously against in the past.

Just to be clear, the so-called “iPhone Flip” isn’t arriving tomorrow. Current rumour mills suggest it’s a secondary act, trailing Apple’s first book-style foldable device that’s slated for a late-2026 reveal. 

If the flip-design, clamshell iPhone ever materializes, it’ll likely be 2027 or later. It will compete against Samsung’s Galaxy Z Flip lineup with a squarish form that folds open to familiar iPhone dimensions, according to reports.

If Apple does ship a clamshell-style flip iPhone, it’ll be a historical first. A culmination of concepts spanning across at least five decades.

Steve Jobs vs the clamshell iPhone Flip concept

There’s a reason why the original iPhone from 2007 was a candybar phone with a full capacitive multi-touch screen. Not only because it was so ridiculously bold at the time, but also because Steve Jobs had rejected a whole host of flip phone concepts in the lead up.

This fact is confirmed by industrial designer Brian Huppi who was working at Apple at the time, according to an Inverse report. “There were many models of flip phones of various sorts that Apple had been working on,” Huppi said, which “were basically various takes on cell phones with buttons.”

But even before the mid-2000s, as far back as the 1980s, Apple actually patented a flip phone that, when closed, would look like the Apple logo. I’m not even kidding!

According to the US patent granted in December 1985, Apple’s prototype design explored a flip phone concept that frankly would resemble a high-end toy today. It had a compact, foldable structure with a minimalist aesthetic. It was a flip phone that opened and closed, and resembled a crazy design statement that won’t be considered even remotely functional today. It was too much vanity, in my opinion. Of course, it didn’t go anywhere, because Steve Jobs wasn’t impressed.

You don’t need to be an Apple historian to know Jobs wasn’t fond of flip phones. Tony Fadell, regarded as the ‘father of the iPod,’ has gone on record saying Jobs rejected every single one of them, because of poor ergonomics and the friction of physical interfaces. In the end, multitouch won the day, and the original iPhone debuted with that now-iconic, minimalist slab design.

Also read: Steve Jobs’ boldest move: Why Apple killed the keyboard and changed smartphones

However, it would be a stretch to claim Jobs was allergic to clamshells entirely. Just look at the 1999 iBook, which was every bit a flip-top computer – and an iconic one at that. No latch, round edges, candy colours. Young me was mesmerised by it, begging my father to buy it as my first real laptop (it didn’t happen!). That design, under Jony Ive’s watchful eye, was beloved precisely because of its playful utility. So Jobs’ aversion wasn’t to the hinge – it was to the compromise to end user experience, ultimately.

Today, that compromise has almost disappeared, thanks to flexible OLED panels and hinge designs that don’t creak or crunch. What once seemed like clunky engineering during Steve Jobs’ time can feel near magical when done right today. 

Which is why I, for one, would love to see Apple join the flip-phone revival, even if it’s just for nostalgia’s sake. Because let’s be honest, all you flip phone fans out there: there’s something undeniably satisfying about snapping a phone shut, right?

Even if Jobs once hated the idea, times change. And a clamshell, flip-design iPhone won’t be a betrayal of Apple’s DNA, but an homage to the beautiful messiness of its early ambitions. It would be nice.

Also read: iPhone Fold tipped to get Apple’s biggest-ever battery: Expected launch window and price details