Every year there is a new must-have technology trend in smartphones. Last year, it was all about the foldable smartphones and curved display that was extended all the way back. Xiaomi even released a phone, the Mi Mix Alpha, which had wrapped around the display. This year the must-have smartphone tech could be the in-display front camera. Now, in-display or under-display selfie camera is being teased by companies for the past few years. New patents discovered by LetsGoDigital suggest that Huawei is working on making phones with in-display cameras into a reality.
The current selfie-camera trend in smartphones requires cutting a hole in the display panel, which could cause polarizing and could feel distracting while watching content or gaming. According to reports by the LetsGoDigital, Huawei has applied for two patents at the China National Intellectual Property Office. The patent filing includes 7 images for unidentified Huawei smartphones. The phone looks very futuristic with a screen extending far to both sides, further than the current waterfall display, which Huawei has been implementing since the Mate 30 series. The images from patent filing show no physical buttons on either side of the device, with only the on/off button on the top. Huawei has been long teasing that volume control could be done virtually via the sidebar. However, a display extending all the way further to the sides could result in accidental touches. So, we will have to wait to see how Huawei addresses this issue.
In that patent filling, there is no front camera visible. There is also no punch-hole camera cut out or any pop-up camera system visible in the patent filing. This left us wondering if Huawei is planning to use a camera under the screen on the patented unidentified smartphone. Several manufacturers are being reported to be working on an in-display camera. Even companies like Oppo and Xiaomi have shown off their version of the under-display selfie camera smartphone prototype. Analysts have been prophesizing about the technology to be developed enough by this year and could start making its way to the flagship smartphones by the end of this year or in phones of the early next year. And there is no doubt that the innovative Huawei will have something of their own in this upcoming smartphone trend.
Both patents show lots of similarities except for the rear camera system. One of the patents shows a smartphone with a vertically placed camera system, similar to what we see in the high-end P-series phones. There seem to be three camera lenses with the lower one being rectangular in shape, which is most likely a telephoto lens with zoom functionality. There is a flash placed between the second and third lens and the camera system looks more discreet and narrower than the P40 series. In fact, the camera system looks more similar to one-year-old P30 series without the periscopic zoom. Meanwhile, the second model shows a round camera system with four camera lenses similar to the Mate series. From the images in the patent filing the camera lenses are not identifiable. Anyways, that’s all we know for now on Huawei’s alleged in-display camera phones. The fact that Huawei has filed two different patents shows that they have plans to implement the under-display selfie camera in several of their future smartphones.
