Show HN: iPhone Duo simulator in the browser (no waitlist, agents CLI)

VibeView launched a browser-based iPhone Duo simulator that streams Apple's iOS 27.1 beta simulator from its own Macs, letting developers test apps on the foldable without an Apple silicon Mac running macOS 26.6 or later or the Xcode 27.1 beta. The service offers three hinge presets (Closed, Partial, Open) plus a 0-to-180-degree angle slider, quarter-turn rotation in any posture, and a VibeView CLI and MCP server that give coding agents the same fold, posture and rotation controls. VibeView notes the simulator's inner screen reports 2007 × 2853 pixels versus the 1878 × 2670 Apple lists for the hardware, and advises testing layout in points and size classes rather than pixel-matching screenshots.

Apple’s own iPhone Duo simulator, online and streamed from our Macs. Test your app on it in a browser tab: fold it to a preset or an exact hinge angle, rotate it in any posture, and let your coding agent do the same. The iPhone Duo simulator, folding in a browser tab. Apple announced the iPhone Duo on September 9: a 5.4-inch cover screen outside and a 7.6-inch folding screen inside, shipping on iOS 27.1. To build for it today you need Xcode 27.1 beta, which runs only on an Apple silicon Mac with macOS 26.6 or later. VibeView runs that simulator for you. Pick iPhone Duo iOS 27.1 in the device picker, where it carries a Foldable badge, and your app starts on the cover screen in a browser tab. There is no Xcode download, no runtime to update and no Mac on your desk. Test your app on iPhone Duo, not a viewport mock-up Search for an iPhone Duo simulator online, or an iPhone Duo emulator, and most results are web pages that resize a website to the Duo’s two screen sizes. That is useful for a responsive site. It cannot install a native app, run iOS or fold anything. Here your app runs on Apple’s iPhone Duo simulator itself: the iOS 27.1 beta runtime, a hinge angle the system reacts to, and two screens that hand over to each other as the device folds. If your app reads the hinge, switches layouts when the device opens or rotates on the inner screen, this is where those code paths actually run. Fold to a preset or an angle Closed, Partial and Open are one click each. Turn on Set by angle to drag to any whole angle from 0 to 180 degrees. Rotate in any posture Each press turns the device a quarter clockwise, closed, half-open or flat. Apps that support the new orientation turn their layout. Both screens, live Where your browser supports it, the Duo is drawn as a 3D model that folds with the hinge, with each screen showing what it is displaying. An agent can fold it too The VibeView CLI and MCP server give your coding agent the same controls: start on the Duo, set a posture or an angle, rotate. Posture · Hinge angle Fold it the way a person would. Starts closed, on the cover screenThe device’s normal at-rest state. Add ?posture=open or ?posture=partial to the sandbox URL to start unfolded instead. Three presets and a sliderPartial opens it partway and hands over to the inner screen; Open lays it flat, inner screen in landscape. The hinge moves smoothly, so the screens change over within about a second, as they do on the device. The device decides which screen is litJust like the hardware, it can keep the inner screen on until the hinge is nearly shut, so the same angle can land differently depending on the direction you came from. Taps always go to the screen in use. The Rotate button beside the device, and the Orientation control in the Device tab, turn the Duo a quarter turn clockwise each press: portrait, landscape, upside down, landscape the other way, then back. It works closed, half-open and open. The 3D model turns with it, and the screen shows what your app does with the new orientation: an app that supports it turns its layout to stay upright, while the Home screen and portrait-only apps turn with the device. Both screens, live In a browser that can draw it, the session is a 3D model of the Duo that folds along with the posture you set, and you tap and drag directly on whichever screen is open. Both screens stay live on the model: your app on the screen in use, the device’s own fold animation on the other while the hinge moves, and black once it settles off. Where the 3D model is not available, a flat view shows the screen the device is using, live and tappable at any angle. One thing worth knowing about sizes: the simulator’s inner screen reports 2007 × 2853 pixels, larger than the 1878 × 2670 Apple lists for the hardware. The cover matches at 1398 × 2034. Test layout in points and size classes, not by pixel-matching screenshots against the device. Share a folding demo A share link is an ordinary URL: pick the iPhone Duo as its device and the person you send it to opens your app on the Duo in their browser, with no install and no account. To put it in your own page, an embed key can include the Duo as well, and ?posture=open on the iframe starts it already unfolded. Embedding needs Starter or above. Drive it from an agent Apple ships no command to set the hinge angle; simctl has nothing for it, and Device Hub’s slider is a mouse control. VibeView’s CLI 0.23.0 and later and its MCP server expose the fold as commands your coding agent or CI job can call: vibeview list-devices --models the Duo is marked "foldable" vibeview dev --detach --json --model "iPhone Duo" vibeview set-posture partial --session <id vibeview set-posture --angle 75 --session <id vibeview rotate --degrees 270 --session <id Each response says where the device ended up: the posture it settled in, the hinge angle and the size of the screen now showing with an angle, also which screen is lit , or the new orientation. Folding changes the screen, so earlier element references are stale and the response carries the new one. Over MCP the same controls are list device models, dev start with a model, set posture and rotate. Agent Control lists every command, and this guide walks through a fold test from a script. In VibeView’s own AI tests, the agent can fold the Duo to Closed, Partial or Open as a test step. AI testing is in beta. What this does not do A beta runtime. The Duo runs on the iOS 27.1 beta runtime from Xcode 27.1 beta, so expect the rough edges of a beta: behaviour can change as Apple ships new builds. A simulator, not an iPhone Duo. There is no physical Duo here. Camera, real hinge feel, sensors, performance, battery and thermal behaviour are not simulated, and the inner screen’s pixel size differs from the hardware’s. Keep a pass on the device before release; simulator vs real device testing covers where the line falls. One screen in use at a time. Part-way through a fold the device can keep the cover in use while the inner screen faces you. Taps on the screen that is not in use are ignored until the device switches, which it normally does as the fold settles. It runs simulator builds. An .ipa is a device build and is rejected at upload. React Native and Expo projects can skip the local toolchain: cloud builds beta compile the simulator build from Windows or Linux and drop it straight into your app, ready to open on the Duo. For other projects, preparing your build has the command. The full inner screen needs the iOS 27.1 SDK. An app built with an earlier SDK runs on the inner screen in compatibility mode, in a phone-sized window with black on either side, as iOS shows it on the device. Cloud builds use a stable Xcode, so for now that is how a cloud-built app opens there. To test the two-pane layout, build with Xcode 27.1 beta and add the build with vibeview upload-app; cloud builds will do the same once that Xcode is out of beta. What it costs The Duo is priced like any other device. Pricing is per organization rather than per seat, and streaming minutes are metered on every plan. The free tier is two concurrent sessions, 30 streaming minutes a month, $1 of usage credit refilling monthly, up to 3 people and no card, with each free session ending after 5 minutes. Frequently asked questions Is this the real iPhone Duo simulator or a mock-up? It is Apple’s own iPhone Duo simulator on the iOS 27.1 beta runtime from Xcode 27.1 beta, running on our Macs and streamed to your browser. It is the same simulator Device Hub runs on a Mac, not a resized viewport or a picture of a phone frame. Do I need a Mac or Xcode 27.1 to use it? No. Running the Duo locally needs Xcode 27.1 beta on an Apple silicon Mac with macOS 26.6 or later. Here the browser is enough, on Windows or Linux included. A React Native or Expo app can be built in the cloud and run on the Duo today; cloud builds use a stable Xcode, so for now the app opens in a phone-sized window on the inner screen. To fill the inner screen it needs the iOS 27.1 SDK: build it with Xcode 27.1 beta and add it with vibeview upload-app. Cloud builds will fill it too once that Xcode is out of beta. Is there an iPhone Duo emulator? Not as such. Apple ships a simulator for the iPhone Duo, not an emulator: it runs iOS on the Mac rather than imitating the phone’s hardware, which is what most people mean when they search for an iPhone Duo emulator. VibeView streams that simulator online, so you can test your app on the iPhone Duo in a browser without installing Xcode. Can I set an exact hinge angle? Yes. Pick Closed, Partial or Open, or turn on Set by angle and drag to any whole angle from 0 to 180 degrees. From the command line it is vibeview set-posture --angle 75, and an agent calls the set posture tool with an angle. Which screen do my taps go to? The one the device is using. Closed, that is the cover screen; opened, the inner screen takes over and taps follow it. Part-way through a fold the device can keep the cover in use for a moment while the inner screen faces you, and taps on the unused screen are ignored until it switches. Is the simulator pixel-identical to the hardware? No, and it should not be read that way. It runs the same iOS 27.1 beta build of your app on Apple’s simulator profile of the device, which is what layout, posture and orientation testing needs. Camera, sensors, real hinge feel, performance and battery are not simulated. Keep a pass on hardware before release. Can someone without an account try my app on the Duo? Yes. Choose the iPhone Duo as a share link’s device and the recipient opens your app on it in their browser. An embed key can include the Duo too, and adding ?posture=open to the iframe starts it unfolded.