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The story
YouTuber Seto Koji (1.68 million subscribers) revealed in a review video that he spent ¥570,000 of his own money on the top-tier model of Apple’s first foldable smartphone, the “iPhone Duo,” and after three days of use, he’s “at a loss.” The news that this longtime self-proclaimed “Apple devotee” and veteran gadget YouTuber is considering returning an Apple product for the first time sparked a flurry of reactions on 5ch. Threads buzzed with shock at the ¥570,000 price tag itself, frustration over the near-total absence of dedicated cases, criticism that “returning it just because you don’t like it, when nothing’s actually wrong with it, seems unreasonable,” and counterarguments that some things you simply can’t know until you’ve used the device yourself.
October 29, 2026
On October 28, “Seto Koji” (1.68 million subscribers) published a video titled “[A Shocking ¥570,000!] Unboxing Review of Apple’s First Foldable Smartphone, the ‘iPhone Duo’! Is It Actually Useful?” After using the top-tier model he bought with his own money for three days, he confesses, “I’m at a loss.”
Seto Koji is a veteran YouTuber who started reviewing gadgets back with the iPad’s 2010 release, and he’s also known for calling himself an “Apple devotee.”
Source: yutura.net / Original article here
What people said
The toolbar-like thing on the side is way too big and gets in the way — the actual display area is seriously like an old iPhone mini. And yet it's way heavier than the mini. Pure suffering.
Prices lately are way too high
That's ¥3,000,000 for a family of five.
You can, if you bought it directly from Apple.
Just because you didn't like it?
Actually, I don't know about Japan, but in the US you get two weeks. Even on Apple's official forums, Apple itself never comments, but veteran users jump in right away with "if you've got complaints, just return it."
Though that's from a different time period than this.
But reviewing it and then just returning it is the worst thing you can do.
That's basically the lecture.
As a high-ranking slave myself, I'm apparently great at reading what the master wants.
It's not even funny — the Apple devotees who used to bash Japanese flip phones and trash the GALAXY ended up landing right back at… a flip phone.
And they trashed Osaifu Keitai (Japan's mobile wallet/NFC payment system) endlessly too.
Even the few that do exist barely protect it, because of the odd shape.
And given the price, you can't exactly run around with it bare either.
It's absurdly expensive and there's no case for it?
Can't even use it outside, lol
Seto Koji posted on X that it seemed like a defective unit.
That's the one thing you really can't know until you buy it.
Background and Key Points of This Discussion
The “iPhone Duo” is Apple’s first foldable iPhone, and its top-tier configuration comes in at ¥570,000 — a price range with no precedent among previous iPhones. As for the return-policy question that became a hot topic in the thread: if purchased directly from the Apple Store, Japan also has a standard policy allowing no-questions-asked returns within 14 days, so this isn’t a US-only perk. The comment in reply #20 claiming “I don’t know about Japan, but in the US you get two weeks” is close to a misunderstanding, since the same policy applies in Japan too. Opinions split over whether it’s reasonable to return a device not because it’s defective, but simply because “I tried it and didn’t like it” — some argued that, as a reviewer, he should have researched this before buying, while others countered that there are things you simply can’t know without using the real device. Notably, concrete practical complaints came up relative to the price — like the scarcity of dedicated cases and the cramped display area — meaning the main point of contention wasn’t the foldable form factor itself, but the gap between the price and real-world usability.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Entertainment/Sports News+) thread “YouTuber Seto Koji baffled by the ¥570,000 iPhone Duo he bought, reveals he’s considering returning an Apple product for the first time.”
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