Ever since Apple introduced the notched display with the iPhone X, almost every other smartphone manufacturer are all too eager to jump on the bandwagon. I personally prefer a sleek all-screen design over an ugly notch any day and it’s great to see Samsung is bucking the trend with its upcoming Galaxy A8s — if these pictures are anything go by.
The yet to be released Galaxy A8s was briefly teased during the launch of the Galaxy A9 and Galaxy A6s in China last week. Not much is known about the device but apparently, regular leakster @UniverseIce has revealed what the person claim is a virtually bezel-less Galaxy A8s. The front of the purported Galaxy A8s is devoid of a notch instead, in its place is a dot which we assume house the front-facing camera. If this is indeed the actual Galaxy A8s, how did Samsung manage to wrap the display so neatly around?
The display open hole camera technology will become the mainstream technology in 2019, then you think, where is the camera position better? pic.twitter.com/4mh5G7CbeT
— Ice universe (@UniverseIce) October 18, 2018
Typically, the front optics of a modern smartphone would consist of at least two things, a camera and an ambient light sensor. The more sophisticated phones may have more components including an infra-red sensor and an infra-red dot projector. All this require space and generally, these cameras and sensors are “concealed” inside a black bar or notch on the front of the display. Granted notches have been shrinking, now “waterdrop” style notches like the ones you see on the vivo V11 and the OPPO F9 are the in thing. But the tiny hole on the top of the display of the purported Galaxy A8s is diminutive. One that is so tiny that it looks like it can only house a small camera with no room for a light sensor let alone any of the other sensors.
Also interesting is how there is almost no margin between the camera hole and the display. On smartphones we’ve seen so far, because of manufacturing processes, a margin between the camera and display is a must to make room for the required componentry but on this leaked Galaxy A8s, it appears that Samsung might have figured out a way to eliminate the margin altogether making this small camera hole possible. I wouldn’t be surprised if Samsung can indeed make this possible considering that they are the leader in display technology.
What is going to be a surprise is where the hole will be located on the final product. Based on the tweet, it looks like Samsung is still considering the final placement of the camera hole. It could be located on either the top left, top right or dead top center of the top of the display. Where would you prefer the camera to be?
Innovation has always been at the core of Samsung. It was only earlier this month when the company has introduced two interesting devices from the Galaxy A family — the Galaxy A7 (2018) with a triple-rear camera and the Galaxy A9 (2018) with four rear cameras – which, to my memory, is a world’s first.
Since there are no official details on the device just yet, but we could expect this device to be launched on the first half of 2019.
