Review: Microsoft Surface Duo 2

The Microsoft Surface Duo 2 is great for reading Dune. At least, that’s what I spent the majority of my time doing while I used it.

I also browsed TikTok more than a person my age probably should. The addictive app spanned the Duo 2’s dual screens in a way that almost—almost—made those dual screens worth it. One night at dinner, I scanned a menu QR code with half of the Duo 2 while using the second display to look up a bottle of wine. (Our server, intrigued, paused to ask what this thing was. I told him it was a new Microsoft foldable phone. Then I mentioned that it cost $1,500, and he lost interest.)

The Duo 2 is no doubt a conversation starter. It’s a glimpse into the folding-phone future. But doing all the usual phone stuff on the Duo 2—browsing the web, taking photos, texting, Slacking, Zooming—was awkward on this two-screens-with-a-hinge phone. The Duo 2 felt most natural to use was when I was kicking back and reading, holding it like a small book, which it so much resembles. So yes, it makes a really nice, really expensive, Kindle replacement. It's just not great for much else.

Photograph: Microsoft

The Duo 2 is a booklet phone, two screens conjoined by a pair of 360-degree hinges. It’s the sequel to the first Duo, which shipped in 2020 and was a bust. Since then, Microsoft has had time to fix all the things. Well. Some of them. For one, the Duo is now undoubtedly a phone, a term Microsoft tried not to use when referring to the thing back when it first launched, since the company was trying to position it as a new category of device. This Duo 2 has support for 5G wireless service. It has a rear camera, something the original Duo lacked. You can almost, sometimes, mostly, fit it in your pocket.

Other foldable phones, like those made by Samsung, bend the laws of display physics: Their polymer layers stretch over the hinges, creating one continuous (albeit indented) display when the phone unfurls into something more like a tablet.

Photograph: Microsoft

On the Duo 2, the separation of the displays is so overt that Microsoft at least deserves credit for committing to this design. The phone runs on Android 11 (last year’s Android release), which means it comes preinstalled with key Google apps and you can download any app you’d find in the Google Play Store, although Microsoft promotes its own Office productivity apps above all else. Some apps span both screens, sure, but for the most part you’re being urged to live in two states at once. Your calendar on one side, your Slack on the other. Your email inbox over here, your email compose window over there. Twitter sitting opposite the news article you should probably read before you tweet it. Google Docs, where you’ve jotted down your test notes about this befuddling phone, and Microsoft Teams, which you’ll use to ask Microsoft execs seven different versions of “Why?” Work and play. Work and life.

In the world that exists outside of phone apps, where we explore the edges of finite, physical space and where most of us just lead terribly messy lives, the lines between work and life have become uncomfortably blurred. The Microsoft Surface Duo 2 promises clarity, a flow state, the opportunity to gaze from app to app without that persnickety app-switching swipe from the bottom of your phone. A trance. If only the sometimes-unresponsive touchscreen didn’t raise my cortisol levels.

When Microsoft first pitched the Surface Duo two years ago, the company emphasized productivity. This made sense for so many reasons. Microsoft sells its cloud services to businesses, makes operating systems for workhouse machines, and has spent decades courting customers who fetishize PowerPoints and Excel spreadsheets. It had also completely missed the mobile phone boat, so the mere existence of the Duo—and a partnership with Google to power a not-quite-a-phone mobile thing—was exciting. It was pretty. It was a fresh start.

Photograph: Microsoft

It was also littered with bugs, as WIRED’s Julian Chokkattu found. (He also read Dune on the original Duo, which I hadn’t realized when I began reading the science fiction fan favorite on the Duo 2). These weren’t just a few flaws, some carry-on baggage you might find tolerable at the start of a new-phone relationship. This was deal-breaking stuff. Microsoft was determined, though, to make it better. To try, at least.

So the Duo 2 was built with a much snappier processor (Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 888) and a slightly thicker but more robust body than the last model. The new design sports a triple-lens camera module on the back—a 12-megapixel wide camera, a 16-megapixel ultrawide camera, and a 12-megapixel telephoto lens—a solid upgrade from the original Duo’s 11-megapixel camera, which doubled as both the selfie camera and the rear camera (once you flipped the device around). Like the previous Duo, the Duo 2 is eye-catching. Its front cover has a shiny Microsoft logo on it, coated in glass, which I’ve already scratched. The two 5.8-inch, high-resolution display panels have respectable 90-Hz refresh rates. Also, it works with Surface stylus pens, which start at around $65.

It exhibits flashes of brilliance, like a literal flash of a notification that appears on the spine of the device when it’s closed. Users of the first Duo, those brave beta testers, didn’t like that there wasn’t any way to see incoming notifications when the Duo was folded shut. So Microsoft built a “glance bar” on the spine, where you can see the phone’s charging status or an incoming call or text. This was oddly delightful. I asked WIRED’s new global editorial director to send me a text as he stood nearby so we could watch the Duo 2’s glance bar light up. I think I dug it more than he did.

The camera is decent, but for a $1,500 phone, it underperformed. I carried Apple’s iPhone 13 ($799) and Google’s Pixel 6 ($599) with me as I tested the Duo 2 and was often underwhelmed by the Duo’s comparative lack of camera prowess. Photos of people in standard lighting settings looked dull. In a series of sunset photos taken on the beach, colors bled together and the edges of sand dunes were less crisp than in the same images captured on a new iPhone. When I snapped shots of colleagues in our office with the Duo 2, office light rays dispersed behind them.

Maybe more notable, just taking photos is a painstaking process, as it involves opening up the booklet first. Capturing a screenshot requires pressing the power button and volume down button simultaneously—also awkward. On the upside, when you take a selfie, you can easily prop the phone up and time a photo, no phone stand required.

Photograph: Microsoft

One of the more critical elements of a folding phone is how the software runs. And any time a new form factor is introduced, it’s tempting to fall back on limiting beliefs, especially when it comes to the glass slabs that occupy so much of our lives. (Surely, a device that displays apps differently must be bad because of the discomfort that comes with changing our own behavior … right?) I don’t believe the way the Duo 2 displays apps is inherently bad. The apps that are optimized for it, that span both sides of the phone, are fun to use. The Duo 2’s problem isn’t necessarily a UI problem. It’s an execution problem.

Apps crashed regularly during my weeks of testing—most notably some of Google’s apps, like Gmail and Google Maps, which are supposed to be optimized for the Duo 2. Others just lagged. Adding to that were the Duo 2’s overall lack of responsiveness and the total absence of a tap-to-wake function. Microsoft has something of an explanation for this: Because the phone folds 360 degrees, with the display sides facing outward, and because some people will hold the phone that way when making a call, the company disabled tap-to-wake to avoid errant wakes. But I’m willing to bet most phone users tap their phone to wake it up and check the time or check for notifications more frequently than they would hold a book-phone up to their ear.

You can raise the Duo 2 to wake it. But then you’ll have to unlock it. And good luck with that because the touchscreen isn’t wholly responsive. It stuttered as I scrolled through my app drawer. It was not uncommon, during the time I tested the Duo 2, for me to swipe at the lock icon a dozen times before it prompted me to enter a PIN code. You can also use fingerprint unlock on the power button, which is a fine option, but let’s not overlook the fact that a $1,500 smartphone is sometimes completely unresponsive to your typically reliable, isopropyl-alcohol-sanitized fingers.

After spending less than a week with the Microsoft Surface Duo 2, channeling phone-testing energy and something that resembled hope into this glitchy two-screened albatross, I started to think it might feel good to throw the Duo 2 into the ocean, except that would be bad for the ocean. I began to carry other phones with me—not for camera testing, but because I just wanted a real phone—all the while staying acutely aware that this is not how most people do phones. Most people just have one phone, and they need it to be as fantastic as possible for as much money as they are able to spend on it.

Photograph: Microsoft

I’m still reading Dune on the Duo 2. Every so often a Slack notification comes through, or an email I should really respond to. I could reply: open it on the next-door-display, temporarily cast the book off to one side, convince myself I’m staying in the flow of things. Or I could spare myself the aggravation.