It seems like a flood gate has opened as the leaks and rumors around the upcoming iPhone 13 started pouring in quite often! We’ve recently learned that the iPhone 13 series might include an always-on display and 120 Hz refresh rate support. Now, according to the recent report, iPhone 13 series might launch without a notch. The notch design has been around for over three years. iPhone X is the first device to boast a notch. The Cupertino giant has included a notch in order to increase the screen-to-body ratio of the device by removing the home button and making the Face ID a standard.
But, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, wearing masks has become a new normal. So, the inclusion of a fingerprint sensor very obvious on the upcoming iPhones as the Face ID does not work. And there is no reason for Apple to continue the notch. Not just that, many users do not want a notch design anymore! Android manufacturers on the other hand used the notch design for almost a year and have shifted to waterdrop, teardrop, punch-hole notches. A few manufacturers like Asus, OnePlus, and Samsung also released their devices without any notch with the addition of a pop-up camera mechanism and rotating camera mechanism.
According to a report from My Drivers (in Chinese), Apple is testing a notch-less iPhone 13 prototype internally and if it succeeds the testing process, the iPhone 13 and at least the next three generations of Apple devices will not use a notch. This report adds to the previous reports of including an in-display fingerprint and makes a lot of sense. Not only that, the notch-less design does require a few changes with iOS too. At this time, we are not sure of the implementation here. I mean, where does the front-facing camera rest? Would there be a smaller notch or punch-hole? Can we expect a pop-up mechanism? We do not have any possible answers to these questions. But, we can confirm that iPhone 13 series will not use the in-display camera for sure and there are many reasons for that. For starters, the technology is in its initial stages and it is not anyone’s pleasure spending a fortune on half-baked technology.
Also, there are a lot of questions about the naming of the upcoming iPhone series — will it be iPhone 13 or iPhone 12S? Analysts believe that Apple will skip the iPhone 13 as the number “13” is spooky in western cultures. Also, skipping a number is not new to Apple as they have done it in the past with iPhone 9. There are many reports claiming Apple with settle for iPhone 12S for this year.
But we think Apple will name it iPhone 14. Also, we haven’t seen any ‘S’ series device since the launch of the iPhone XS and Apple has been launching the Max variants ever since. Consider this with a grain of salt as Apple’s decision around naming can change anytime and we will have to wait for a while to get the exact details around the naming of this year’s iPhones.
