The "full screen" operation of Android phones, Apple intends to copy again in 2026

How far is the iPhone from the "full screen"? The answer is: the distance of an island - "spirit island".

In 2017, when the iPhone X was released, Apple made a great wish to launch a real "full-screen" iPhone in the near future, and after 6 years, Liu Haiping or Lingdong Island, this "hole" in the brain door has hardly changed anything. However, the good news is that the true "full-screen" version of the iPhone is coming.

(Source: Twitter@patentlyapple)

Recently, the U.S. Trademark and Patent Office published a new patent filed by Apple, which mentions a technology called "short-wave infrared", which allows sensors to be embedded under glass to sense the user's fingerprint; At the same time, this technology also supports the detection of the user's heart rate, blood oxygen and other physical signs while identifying fingerprints, and generating data.

Industry analyst Ross Young also revealed the news: due to sensor problems, Face ID embedded under the screen will arrive in 2025 or later. This also exposed two important information, one Apple wants to do fingerprint recognition under the screen, and the other is that the iPhone finally has the opportunity to hide the big hole in the brain.

Although the topic of iPhones using fingerprints under the screen has been discussed for many years, even earlier than the exposure of Face ID, the addition of new technologies in the "health" field adds some credibility to this revelation. But the "fingerprint under the screen" has been thoroughly played by the Android camp, can Apple still rely on this change to attract more consumers?

With fire fingerprint recognition, Apple itself ran first

The concept of "Touch ID" comes from the iPhone 5S released in 2013, starting with this generation of iPhones, Apple has experienced a long era of fingerprint recognition. This simple, fast and highly secure biometric technology, in the mobile smart device market rapid development, according to statistics, by 2015, Android camp priced more than 1500 yuan of models, at least 80% of the equipped capacitive fingerprint recognition sensor, and positioning flagship level models, the installation rate is even as high as 100%. It has to be said that Apple did bring fingerprint recognition.

(Source: Apple's official website)

However, 5 years after the launch of "Touch ID", Apple quickly targeted another biometric technology - face recognition, which belongs to the era of "Face ID" officially opened from the iPhone X. Although many manufacturers have tried to replicate the same face recognition function, due to cost, patents and other issues, only a few models have been equipped with payment-level face recognition technology so far, and the development is not smooth.

Before the iPhone X, perhaps most Android camp manufacturers are following Apple's development footsteps, but in the "post-smartphone era", mainstream brands also have their own ideas. In 2018, vivo launched the world's first under-screen optical fingerprint recognition model X20 Plus UD, and Xiaomi, OPPO, Huawei and other manufacturers have also joined the camp of under-screen fingerprint recognition technology, and Apple has gone to a completely different development path.

(Source: Twitter@appleinsider)

In terms of hardware, Apple wants to make a real "full-screen" mobile phone, not only to "kill" the front camera, but also to "kill" the face recognition module, which is not an easy thing; On the other hand, the Android camp adopts the under-screen fingerprint scheme, and only needs to spend some effort to "hide" the front camera. It can also be said that choosing face recognition is that Apple has dug a big hole for itself.

Apple is not a fool, the "Face ID" huge component module can do more than just unlock and pay for such functions, the dot matrix laser emitter can capture the user's facial information to help better "portrait mode". Although so many years have passed, the front portrait mode blur effect of the iPhone is still relatively ordinary, but it is also a typical case for the industry, telling friends: this thing is expensive and not easy to use.

But unexpectedly, Apple, which "defected" to the fingerprint recognition camp, planned to quietly add it back.

Repeatedly jumping sideways, is Apple really nothing new?

There is no novelty, and it has become the core evaluation of the recent two generations of iPhones by mass consumers.

The sandwich structure of the classic iPhone 4's double-sided glass + metal middle frame has been widely praised by the industry, and even Luo Yonghao has approved this model as a generation of divine machines, which shows its status in the minds of the public. At the beginning of the iPhone 5, Apple gradually moved towards metalization, but changed back to the double-sided glass design in the iPhone 8 series. Such repeated jumps make people wonder if Apple will only design and repair and modify according to the past hot-selling models, and cannot play tricks.

The official narrative is that these materials have continued to improve in the process of development, using metal backplates in the past because of durability and beauty, and the return of glass is the practicality of new materials has been improved. Despite all the rhetoric, it's hard to eliminate the public's visual evaluation of the appearance of these iPhones: set in stone.

(Source: Twitter@pedrocreal)

The emergence of biometric technology has made designers more headaches, after all, to consider the practicality of these components, but also good enough, this work is really not simple. It is foreseeable that the under-screen version of "Touch ID" can save iPhone designers a lot of trouble, and there is no need to go to a whole bunch of concepts such as "spirit island" to cover up the "incomplete beauty" of the display panel. But I have to say that fortunately, the manufacturers of the Android camp did not follow Apple in face recognition to the end, otherwise Apple's "defection" again will hit the smartphone market hard.

The new version of "Touch ID" has been differentiated by Apple, such as the "health" function. Technology media The Elec also mentioned in previous reports that the under-screen fingerprint recognition on the iPhone 16 Pro will increase functions such as heart rate detection and blood oxygen persistence, further enhancing Apple's position in the smart health market. However, Meizu released the ultrasonic fingerprint recognition scheme equipped on Meizu 18 as early as 2021, which has provided the function of heart rate detection, and subsequent Xiaomi 11 Ultra, Red Magic 6S Pro and other models have similar solutions.

Isn't Apple one step behind?

Of course, for "fruit fans", if Apple uses an under-screen fingerprint recognition scheme, the "full screen" iPhone should naturally take shape, which is indeed a good thing. But, is that really the case?

The iPhone needs to use the fingerprint under the screen, and these problems have to be solved

First of all, the combination of "Face ID" + "Touch ID" under the screen and whether the iPhone can come true is not necessarily related.

From the perspective of security, fingerprint recognition and face recognition can actually be said to be on the same echelon, until today, Apple still has many devices using Touch ID, which shows that Apple still recognizes the security of fingerprint recognition. However, the two popular optical screen fingerprints and ultrasonic screen fingerprints on the market have the same problem: they cannot be detected in vivo.

(Source: Twitter@iPhoneMania)

In layman's terms, none of these schemes can confirm that the information entered is human, which can understand why so many pets entering fingerprints can also unlock short videos of mobile phones. The content is indeed interesting, but the security aspect is something that consumers should ponder. In this way, Apple may not remove Face ID for the purpose of Touch ID under the screen, and the possibility of coexistence between the two is greater.

On the other hand, the key to doing "full screen" is how to deal with the former camera. The fourth-generation under-screen camera technology on the Nubia Z50 Ultra performs very well, at least in the normal viewing angle, brightness and usage scenarios, there are no obvious traces of the camera module, but the biggest problem is the picture quality.

Apple's attitude towards the front camera is very clear, it wants the front camera to have almost the same strength as the rear image system, so 4K picture quality, 60fps, ProRes and Dolby Vision these features, the front can be enjoyed. Using the under-screen camera is undoubtedly forcing Apple to "self-abolition of martial arts".

In fact, the core reason is still this: Tim Cook can't "punch in the face". Since the birth of Face ID, Apple CEO Tim Cook has often engaged in a "war of words" with Mark Zuckerberg, the head of Facebook, on the Internet, accusing each other of not doing a good enough job in security and privacy. Tim Cook also solemnly promised that the design of the iPhone will pay more attention to security than aesthetics, and as we have seen, even if it is forced to make a "smart island", Apple is not willing to give up this big black hole.

iPhone, already doing subtraction

At the end of last year, Apple's head of industrial design, Evans Hankey, announced her departure, during her tenure, she led the design of a total of 8 models from the iPhone 12 to the iPhone 14, and her departure means that the future iPhone may change a lot. It's uncertain whether the new iPhone design team will still have "security" as a core requirement when sales are at stake.

(Source: MacRumors)

For the iPhone 15 Ultra, the biggest change is to cancel the physical volume button, change to a new scheme of pressure touch, from this slight upgrade can be seen that Apple does want to "reduce the burden" for the iPhone, but the time is not ripe.

In fact, Bloomberg technology reporter Mark Gruman has repeatedly mentioned the arrival of the Face ID module under the screen in his communication notes, which may be implemented on the iPhone 16 Pro at the earliest. Assuming that there is no problem with the recognition of the screen under the screen, then Touch ID under the screen is even less a problem. There is a question mark over whether the two options will coexist.

It can only be said that in the smartphone market began to try to stuff all components under the screen trend, Apple is really very backward, perhaps Apple once also dismissed the "under the screen" program, but now it must also start to catch up. But how many more years does Apple have to catch up? This is left to time.