Approaching December, there is more news about the Xiaomi Mi 13. According to Onleaks' latest leaked renderings, the Xiaomi Mi 13 Standard Edition will adopt a straight screen + centered cutout + right-angle middle frame design.
Xiaomi Mi 13, Figure/@Onleaks
Four years later, Xiaomi's digital flagship series finally has a straight screen again?
After the Xiaomi Mi 9, the entire digital flagship series has been designed with curved screens. Not only Xiaomi, in fact, since 2019, the curved screen has almost become the standard for every flagship machine in the past three years. But at the end of last year, things started to change a little. More and more flagship machines began to put down the curved screen and embrace the straight screen, and Sanyi life statistics found that in the intensive new machine release at the end of last year, only 3 of the 15 models adopted the curved screen design.
On the contrary, this year there is even a "strange phenomenon" of thousands of yuan machines using curved screens. The Honor X40 released in mid-September obviously starts at 1499 yuan, but it adopts an OLED curved screen, at the cost of replacing it with a Snapdragon 695 and a "scan code" lens set; The upcoming realme 10 official also confirmed the use of curved screen design, with reference to the pricing of the same model on the realme domestic official website and the Malaysian official website, the positioning of the realme digital series is also a thousand-yuan machine.
It is not difficult to understand that major manufacturers revolve around the screen, and looking back at the development history of smartphones today, almost all breakthroughs in hardware and software interaction have converged on the screen. From multi-touch to full-screen design starting with the original iPhone, to better, higher-refresh screens, and so on.
Xiaomi Mi MIX Fold2, photo/Xiaomi
Even one of the most concerned categories today, folding screen mobile phones, is also the result of manufacturers' hollowing out around the screen.
And the short history of curved and straight screens is more like a curve of return than a cycle.
Curves belong to God
Antoni Gaudí, born in 1852, is known as the most avant-garde and craziest architect in the history of Barcelona architecture, who said: "Straight lines belong to man, curves belong to God."
But at least since the first time Samsung Galaxy Note Edge used a curved screen, the curve has belonged to the phone screen.
The advantage of curved screens is that they can be seen at a glance - just like literally, curved screens make mobile phones look thinner, more delicate, and have a higher screen-to-body ratio, just like cutting off the left and right borders of mobile phones, summarized in two words:
Pretty.
The narrowing of the waistline does look better, Figure/Samsung
From the perspective of publicity, the high appearance of curved screen mobile phones itself can become a major selling point, and even consumers can understand at a glance, unlike chips, screen materials, sensor sizes, etc., it takes half a day to explain the publicity, most consumers may still be confused.
In terms of products, the curved screen also differentiates the Android flagship from the iPhone, and manufacturers are also raising the product premium by binding the "curved screen" and "high-end" to strengthen the high-end sense of the brand image.
There are even manufacturers who have evolved a waterfall screen on the basis of a curved screen, wrapping the middle frame area with more "curved" screens, and putting the front lens into the fuselage, thus creating a visual effect closer to a piece of glass, and also bringing a better grip.
Waterfall screen design vivo NEX 3, photo/vivo
However, the contradiction was there from the beginning. Although "don't use curved screens for stock trading" is more just ridicule, manufacturers always like to promote the borderless vision brought by curved screens, but never mention the "troubles" caused by overly curved screens.
A typical problem is that the bright lines caused by the light projection can always be seen on both sides of the curved screen phone, which will change according to different angles, and on the waterfall screen (greater curvature), the two sides are green and dark.
The problem is that it is too conspicuous. Whether it is bright lines or darkening, it will affect the presentation of screen content and the user's attention, breaking the sense of immersion, which is especially prominent in video viewing. The color cast and brightness attenuation problem of the edge of this curved screen, as long as the physical laws of the human eye and light remain unchanged, is doomed to be completely solved by technology alone.
In terms of hardware structure, compared with the straight screen, the curved screen is inherently less resistant to falling, especially when the middle frame on both sides lands on the ground, and the subsequent maintenance cost and difficulty are much higher. In addition, the curved screen also has adaptation problems in terms of film and mobile phone case, although the tempered film can provide protection on the front, but it cannot cover the screen, the gesture operation experience plummets, and the soft film can only play a role in scratch resistance.
In terms of software, Samsung also hopes to make the edge interaction into a curved "business card", from the very early on the curved part of the screen into the "application shortcut bar", "toolbox", "news", etc., but it has not been recognized, but may have inspired the sidebar on tablets and folding screen phones to some extent.
Sidebar for vivo OriginOS 3, photo/vivo
The key is that although the curved screen makes the "back" gesture operation smoother, mistouch is also one of the most criticized problems in the early days of the curved screen, especially in the game scene, which is also the problem that the game mobile phone has insisted on not using the curved screen design in the past.
Of course, manufacturers have also seen overwhelming consumer complaints.
Samsung is the first mobile phone brand to adopt curved screens, and it is also the first to take a step back from the wave of large curvature screens. On the Galaxy S20, the curved part of the mobile phone screen is greatly reduced, and there is only some curvature near the border area, which directly improves the problems of mistouch, reflection, and drop resistance, and even the same as the straight screen, at the cost of only a little regression in the visual "borderless" effect and holding.
Xiaomi Mi 11 conference, photo/Xiaomi
Even coupled with the optimization of the manufacturer's software and hardware for "anti-false touch" and the improvement of the resistance of the mobile phone screen glass, these make the "micro-curved" have more visual advantages at the same time, but also reduce a large number of defects on the curved screen in the past.
Other manufacturers also seem to have tasted it, including Huawei, vivo, etc., have abandoned the previous waterfall screen and large curvature screen design, and actively embraced the "micro-curved" on the flagship series.
At this point, the problem of curved screens seems to have solved most of the problems, but why are there more straight screen flagships?
Straight lines belong to humans
As mentioned earlier, mobile phone manufacturers have been committed to the curved screen of flagship machines in the past few years, and only game phones such as iPhone, Black Shark and Lenovo Savior are still adhering to the straight screen design. On the latest flagship machine, the situation has changed, and Samsung, which led the curved screen, has even returned to the straight screen design on the S22 and S22+, and other manufacturers are gradually transforming to the straight screen.
At present, the latest flagship machines of major mobile phone manufacturers:
Xiaomi Mi 12S/Pro, curved screen
Samsung S22/S22+, straight screen
OPPO Find X5/Pro, straight/curved screen
OnePlus Ace Pro (10T), straight screen
Huawei P50/Pro, straight/curved screen
Huawei Mate 50/Pro, straight/curved screen
vivo X80/Pro, curved screen
Honor Magic 4, curved screen
iQOO 10/Pro, straight/curved screen
redmi K50/Pro, straight screen
realme GT 2 Pro, straight screen
Considering the accuracy of Onleaks' past revelations, the Xiaomi 13 standard version is basically certain to use a straight screen design, so in addition to the vivo X90 that will also be released in the near future and next year's Honor Magic 5 is not known, the flagship series standard version of mainstream manufacturers has all returned to the straight screen design.
Samsung S22 with straight screen, photo/Samsung
In the end, the curved screen has reached the development stage of micro-curved, and compared with the straight screen, there are only some visual advantages left in the narrowing of the waistline of the fuselage. Flexible OLED panels can also be used in straight screen design, in addition to the COP package used from the iPhone X, the use of flexible OLED in straight screen mobile phones can further thin the body or make room for other components (such as batteries), as well as better display quality.
The same flexible OLED panel, the yield rate of making a curved screen is still much lower than that of a straight screen, and the cost is naturally higher. In terms of interactive experience, curved screens not only have no more characteristics than straight screens, but there is always a greater possibility of mistouch, in addition to higher risk and cost of broken screens.
Therefore, integrating user experience, production costs and market, it is not difficult to understand that the flagship machine is gradually "returning" to the straight screen. And with the emergence of curved screens in the thousand-yuan machine market, the "high-end" attribute will be stripped away, and "curved screens" as a differentiated selling point can no longer convince high-end flagship consumers, and the Pro version of the flagship series must finally put down the design of curved screens.
It's just that manufacturers still need to take it step by step, once the "high-end feeling" created on the curved screen in the past is categorically abandoned, it may not only cause dissatisfaction among past flagship users, but also a big question mark for new users.