Apple’s first foldable drops Face ID for thinness — and it costs $2,000

Apple is making its first foldable phone tomorrow, and the defining specification is one number: 4.5 millimeters. When the iPhone Ultra is open and lying flat, it is thinner than any foldable phone commercially available — thinner than the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold line, thinner than any Huawei foldable, thinner than anything currently sold. That thinness required two departures from the flagship iPhone lineup buyers have known for years.

Face ID is not on this phone. The iPhone Ultra uses Touch ID instead — the fingerprint reader in the power button, a sensor that Apple has retained in the iPad and the SE line but that has not appeared in a premium iPhone since 2017. The reason is mechanical: the infrared sensor array and dot projector that Face ID requires need vertical space that a 4.5mm unfolded profile cannot accommodate. The telephoto camera is also gone. The device carries two lenses — a main sensor and an ultra-wide — rather than the three-lens arrangement that has defined the Pro line since the iPhone 11 Pro.

The rest of the hardware is current and competitive. An A20 Pro chip on a 2-nanometer process drives the device. The cover display measures 5.5 inches; the inner screen opens to 7.8 inches. Reports from display manufacturers who supplied components suggest the panel folds fully flat, without the visible crease that has been the persistent criticism of competing devices. The full accessory and app ecosystem transfers without change.

The starting price is $2,000. For comparison, the Huawei Mate XT 2 — a tri-fold that launched September 7 with a privacy screen that turns opaque on command — begins at approximately $2,980. Huawei’s device runs HarmonyOS and has no official carrier distribution outside China. For buyers who want a foldable that runs iOS on a supported global network, the iPhone Ultra is the only current answer. Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold 7 starts lower, around $1,800, but is 4.9mm closed — thicker by 0.4mm, which matters for this class of device.

Replacing Face ID with Touch ID is not a minor concession. For iPhone owners, Face ID is the default unlock mechanism, the authentication layer behind Apple Pay, and the feature Apple has not needed to redesign since 2017. The power-button Touch ID implementation is fast and reliable — it works well on the iPad — but it changes a habit that millions of users built over seven years. At a $2,000 price point, buyers are being asked to pay for the thinness achievement and accept the fingerprint reader as part of the package.

Apple’s September 9 event will confirm final pricing, storage options, and availability dates for international markets. Pre-orders are expected to open the same day.

Tags: Apple, smartphones, Face ID, foldable phone, iPhone Ultra, Touch ID