It may have been hot last year, but 2019 has seen a few novel ideas for avoiding the use of a “notch” in phone displays. Huawei’s not drawing on any of them for its upcoming Mate 30 phones.
According to images of the protective film for the phones leaked by Ice Universe, the notch is as present as ever, looking like it’s about a third of the device’s width.
That’s actually a little better than 2018’s Mate 20, which drew criticism for being unable to show more than a couple of notification icons in the adjacent area.
https://mobile.twitter.com/UniverseIce/status/1154212061389266944
Before we grab our notched pitchforks though, it’s worth remembering that notches exist for a reason. As phone bezels have gotten smaller, there’s been a need to put all the front-facing equipment in a phone somewhere.
GizChina points out that the Mate 30’s notch appears to house a proximity sensor, front facing camera, a speaker, and some form of facial recognition hardware – an IR projector/sensor combo, a Time Of Flight sensor, or even both. It’s also suggesting that ToF may be used for an AR/Animoji feature.
There’s not much to go on for Mate 30 launch window speculation. A lot of it will hang on whether or not Google’s allowed to keep working with Huawei, as we work through the effects of the US/China trade war.
