Mike Wuerthele
A questionable report from South Korean sources suggests that Apple is preparing a new display without a notch — for phones 18 months down the road.
ETNews declared on Wednesday that "according to industries" Apple is examining new possibilities for OLED technology to deal with the notch. Ideas floated by the publication including drilling holes into OLED panels, or using so-called "Black Matrix" areas within the displays themselves.
Other than the vague "industries," ETNews didn't name sources, or particular manufacturers that were working on the notch-free 2019 iPhone. As such, and given the timetable between now and the fall 2019 releases, it seems probable that the publication, or its sources, are making an educated guess at Apple's future intentions regarding a true all-screen iPhone.
At present, the technology does not seem to exist to eradicate the notch entirely, and have an edge-to-edge screen. Current VCSEL technologies aren't small enough to fit in the very small area between the screen and the bezel, nor are other camera or speaker technologies advanced enough to go in that gap either.
While ETNews does fairly well with general supply chain reports, the publication has a poor track record at predicting Apple's future moves.
The 2018 iPhone lineup is expected to retain the notch. Apple is said to be doling out display orders for its next-generation iPhone lineup, which is rumored to include two OLED versions — 5.8 and 6.5 inches — and a 6.1-inch LCD variant.
A wide variety of Android device manufacturers debuted phones with a notch to hold sensors at the 2018 Mobile World Congress.
AppleInsider Staff
Chip Loder
Christine McKee
Malcolm Owen
William Gallagher
Andrew Orr
30 Comments
Apple should keep two iPhone categories, OLED and LCD. Gives option and price differentiation for every one. This means while 3 new iPhones with FaceID and sizes coming out in September; Not going to happen but hope Apple keeps iPhone 8S and 8S Plus with top/bottom area shrinked(more screen,edge-to-edge) and possibly TouchID on back. To hide camera/sensors; every phone will have either top Notch or Top long bar. If Apple wants to shrink or getting rid of Notch in 2019 than more power to them.
As a new owner of an iPhone X I barely notice the notch. Well-written apps that have been updated for the iPhone X that use the entire display to it's advantage make it even better. Unfortunately there are lots of apps that haven't undated their apps to format for the iPhone X. They're just annoying because they don't take advantage of the entire height of the display. Apple isn't going to do away with the notch until the technology allows them to do it without compromise. If that's possible in 2019 then cool. As the article says, ETNews stretched their imagination out to thinking that the tech will be ready by then. A year and a half is probably pretty safe since Apple is already working on that iPhone right now and they want would probably want to get rid of the notch too. The other players in the market obviously haven't figured out how to do it since the notch is becoming a standard feature.