The trend is always turning, just like the return of the slider phone, only the curved screen that Samsung has insisted on has suddenly fired recently.
Editor’s note: This article is from WeChat public account “爱范儿” (ID: Ifanr), author Chen Wenjun.
In order to make the face of the mobile phone look like only one screen, the way mobile phone manufacturers have increased the proportion of screens in recent years can be described as endless. If you want to divide the martial arts novels, I can say four Factions.
The camera of the Xiaomi MIX is upside down. The curved screen of the Samsung Galaxy series is a school. The iPhone’s special-shaped screen is a school. There is also a lifting lens design led by OPPO and vivo last year. This year, even Redmi and Jiajia use it. Got it, so from the perspective of shipments, we can also count them as a new one.
But the trend is always turning, just like the return of the slider phone, only the curved screen that Samsung has insisted on has suddenly fired recently.
In late July, Huawei Mate 30 was exposed, and the machine will continue to use the curved screen design; the Nubian Z20, which was just connected to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, also uses a curved screen design, and is also a front and rear hyperboloid glass body.
This week, OPPO Vice President Shen Yiren announced a new waterfall screen with nearly 100% screen share, and claimed that the glass curvature reached an astonishing 88 degrees.
▲ Image from: OPPO Vice President Shen Yiren
In the second half of 2019, various news about the curved screen mobile phone came one after another. Why did the manufacturer suddenly develop a comprehensive screen at this time? What substantive experience does the current curved screen bring to us?
Samsung and BlackBerry have been used, but it has never been mainstream
When you mention “the first curved-screen mobile phone on the Chinese market,” who would you think of?
Samsung’s Galaxy S6, Huawei’s Mate 9 Pro or Lei Jun and Tony Leung’s endorsement of Xiaomi Note 2?
It is undeniable that these products are all popular in the industry, but the first show of the curved screen on the mobile phone is actually the Samsung Galaxy Note Edge.
▲ Galaxy Note Edge. Image from: Hardwarezone
I always miss the previous electronic exhibition, because at that time manufacturers will always bring surprises at these exhibitions, which is different from the one-year speech exhibition in the current year. In 2014, Samsung unveiled the Galaxy Note Edge at the Berlin International Broadcasting Exhibition (IFA).
My impression is still profound. Although this phone is not much different from the Galaxy Note 4 configuration in the same period except for the curved screen, it is because Note Edge is a single-curve screen that makes Note 4 instantly eclipse. .
However, the Galaxy Note Edge is not a mass-produced curved screen phone.
Limited by the technical and practical considerations at the time, flexible screens have not yet reached the point where they can be used in mobile phones in large quantities. Even Samsung, one of the few companies that have a flexible screen technology, is only a single for Galaxy Note Edge. The surface screen is shipped in small quantities, and the main force is still placed on the relatively mature technology of Note 4.
Although, on the Galaxy Note Edge, we can still see the shape of the future (today) mobile phone and the role of the curved screen.
The first is the hardware form. Although using a curved screen on the phone does not affect all humans. The big thing, but the appearance of the curved screen has indeed changed the straight shape of the mobile phone, and also brought a lot of brand value and attention to Samsung after the show, just like this year’s folding screen mobile phone Galaxy Fold.
Second is the change in the perception experience. When we first came into contact with the curved screen mobile phone, we can clearly feel that the visual impact of the curved screen is stronger than the straight screen, and this feeling still exists even today.
According to Samsung’s introduction at the time, the meaning of the curved screen design is to give the user a feeling of flipping the book. The reason why the side screen is set to the right is because the habit of most people turning the book is to turn the page from right to left.
In order to let users use this side screen, Samsung has also designed a new interactive way, such as adding the app’s shortcut switch, AOD display time, SMS notification…
▲ Image from: Business Insider
With the placement of the Galaxy Note Edge, the hyperbolic screen Galaxy S6 Edge officially debuted in 2015, Samsung officially entered the curved screen The era of mobile phones. Then other mobile phone manufacturers began to use curved screens, trying to find breakthroughs in screen innovation.
For example, the BlackBerry Priv, which is the most profound of my impressions.
Blackberry Priv is the only curved screen mobile phone of the BlackBerry. This mobile phone not only forgets to combine the physical keyboard of the BlackBerry signboard, but also uses the slider design, which is also the BlackBerry. The phone has a rare structure.
If we are still using a physical keyboard today, the Priv design will definitely not make people feel outdated.
▲ Image from: The Verge
But whether it is Samsung or BlackBerry, they still have to face several problems brought by the curved screen. One is how to make the user like and use the curved screen, and the other is the common problem of the curved screen.
The sidebar can be said to be the standard function of the curved screen mobile phone. The function of this function is to give the side screen more practical value, so that the side screen does not become a vase display, and Samsung adds it to the sidebar. A variety of shortcut operations, such as BlackBerry, vivo and other curved screen mobile phone manufacturers.
However, this feature is not as popular as it is, at least as a 4-year curved screen mobile phone user. In the past, I used the Galaxy S7 Edge to today’s Galaxy S10, even if Samsung added the shortcut function of domestic software in the sidebar in recent years. Even if I am obsessive-compulsive, I fill up the vacancies in the sidebar every time. I am still not used to using the sidebar to open an app or applet, let alone use it to check the weather and watch the news.
However, for the wrong touch of the curved screen, Samsung is constantly improving and optimizing. Taking the Galaxy S as an example, the maximum radius of curvature of the Galaxy S6 / S7 Edge is 12R. Under this curvature, the thumb muscles are very easy to touch the edge of the screen, causing misuse of normal use.
▲ Galaxy S6 Edge
In the later S8, S9 and today’s S10, Samsung gradually reduced the curvature of the screen, and also increased the anti-missing measures at the system level, but these supplements do not seem to completely solve the suspicion of being criticized. Changing the surface of the product is not the fate of the mainstream, after all, in today’s screen-screening, cost-effective today, manufacturers are more inclined to choose a special-shaped screen with lower cost and more obvious selling point.
The curved screen is undoubtedly changing the development of mobile phones, but the niche market cannot completely change the user’s usage habits. Although the manufacturer has been giving the side screen more features, the user will eventually be “corrected” by the mainstream straight screen.
Even today, four years after the introduction of the curved screen, the curved screen is in addition to the “good-looking” attribute in most users’ minds. There is almost no advantage to be able to compete with the shaped screen.
Looking at the movie surface screen will not help, and there will be no bonus to playing the game. The only thing left is the function of the post-meal coffee – soothing the aesthetic fatigue after the design.
The 2.0 era of curved screens: replace physical buttons with screens to change the shape of mobile phones
Since the curved screen is so small, why do manufacturers have to raise this trend?
In fact, it is not difficult to notice that after two years of development, the shape of the special-shaped screen has evolved from the bangs of iPhone X to the current drop shape, and the evolution of screen sensors has accelerated the popularity of special-shaped screens in smartphones. speed.
However, the emergence of a large number of special-shaped screen players has indirectly accelerated the aesthetic fatigue of the market. The market is not interested in the special-shaped screen. Everyone hopes that the entire front of the mobile phone is a screen.
Therefore, the slider and the lifting structure are the derivatives that humans want to achieve the goal of “the front is all screen”. The lift design avoids the cutting step, which not only reduces costs, but also increases the overall machine value.
However, after returning to the mechanical mechanism, the weight and thickness of the mobile phone will increase in addition to the discount. Obviously, mechanical design is not a design that is in line with future trends. You can say that it is a good design in 2019, but it is only a good design in 2019.
After the special-shaped screen and the lifting design, the niche curved screen becomes a design that combines screen ratio and future concepts. What kind of design is the shape of the future mobile phone?
First of all, from the current trend, the screen ratio is inevitable, and the sensor of the fuselage will be hidden under the screen, and the fuselage opening will be less and less, wireless charging, wireless transmission. Become the main transmission method for mobile phones.
Although Huawei is still not publicMate 30 information, but there are already a lot of new developments on this phone. The most eye-catching thing is that the machine will probably adopt a buttonless design, that is, cancel the buttons on both sides of the phone, and replace the virtual buttons on the side of the screen. From the news, the screen arc is close to 90 degrees, in other words, the side screen is close to vertical.
Compared with Huawei’s insiders, OPPO is more aggressively announced by the company’s top management. Moreover, in addition to the four-episode OPPO new machine map, Shen Yiren also gave the surface a quite artistic name:
Waterfall Screen
The reason why Shen Yiren called this screen “waterfall screen” is because the curvature of this screen is 88 degrees like the previous exposure of Mate 30, and the degree of curvature is larger and more obvious than the previous Find X.
At the same time, we can also see from several real machine diagrams that there are no physical buttons on the left and right sides of this “waterfall screen” mobile phone. Although we can’t judge whether the mobile phone is designed without holes, from the appearance, Replacing physical buttons with side screens should be the next design trend.
So from the development direction of the two big factories, the reason why the curved screen (waterfall screen) will re-emerge is not difficult to guess. After the ratio of the screen, the manufacturer needs to find a breakthrough point in the design to stir up Volkswagen’s desire to buy, that is, no buttons or more radical design without holes. Under these requirements, the curved screen achieves the screen ratio that the manufacturer has been pursuing, and also has the conditions for realizing the no-key interaction and the habit of using the human phone. 
Even now we all know that the biggest effect of the curved screen is just “good looking”, but as long as it contrasts with the traditional straight screen, many people will pay for the curved screen mobile phone.
The shipment of 11.8 million Galaxy S7s and 13.3 million Galaxy S7 Edges in the first half of 2016 is a good example.
The success of the surface screen depends on the vendor optimization
The curved screen is undoubtedly one of the development trends in the second half of this year, but with Samsung’s previous experience, it is obvious that the curvature of the curved screen should not be too large, otherwise it will be easy to accidentally touch when the user is operating in vertical screen.
For example, when playing the keyboard, the thumb muscles of both hands will inevitably touch the keys on the side of the screen, which will seriously affect the typing speed and efficiency. Moreover, in daily operations, the buttons on the edges of the two sides are also easily touched by the palm muscles.
When you haven’t watched a vibrato video yet, the picture is slipped away and slipped away.
So, before the mobile phone manufacturer gives more functions to this almost vertical screen, it must solve the problem of the screen being touched. This is one of the keys that affect whether the curved screen can be accepted by users in the future. .
▲ Samsung’s anti-missing mechanism “Edge Touch”
Samsung’s approach to misuse is soft and hard. While reducing the curvature of the screen, it also adds an anti-missing mechanism. Users can customize the sensitivity of the side screen to “block” specific areas. As a solution to the mistake.
Similarly, since the border of the iPad has been gradually narrowed, Apple has also added anti-touch mechanism to the iPad. When one-half of the user’s thumb touches the edge of the screen, the system will determine the grip position, so the touch operation will not be triggered. This feature may not be noticed on a large iPad, but on a small iPad. The mini is quite practical.
The wrong touch is the primary problem that mobile phone manufacturers have to solve, and the other is to let users know the music.The benefits of the face screen.
As seen from Samsung and other curved screen phones, the curved screen provides the function of the side screen toolbar for the mobile phone, and this function can even be linked to the WeChat and Sohu News apps commonly used in China today.
But in fact, for users who often stay in the WeChat program, it is a faster way to operate directly in the app, and even other function switches, contacts, you can also pull down the notification Resolved in the bar and phone program.
So how to let users abandon the traditional screen interaction to get used to the curved screen, in the end, it is very important that manufacturers need to guide and add more innovative side screen function. Otherwise, the curved screen will only be a short-lived one this year, and it will become a display for the manufacturers to earn a drink and “concept for concept”.
The curved screen is a new trend, but the app is more than just on the phone
The curved screen phone is not necessarily the final form of the phone, but the technology behind the curved screen is likely to be part of the future phone. Starting from the OPPO and Huawei plans to replace some key functions with the screen, we can see that the flexible screen behind the curved screen has opened a new prelude for the mobile phone form.
▲ Flexible Screen “Reel” Phone
Of course, the advantages of a flexible screen don’t just apply to mobile phones. From the past to today’s mobile phone design, the mobile phone screen has changed from a small screen in the past to a touch, from a touch to a big screen, and from a large screen to a full screen with a high screen.
And now the biggest hardware in the phone – the screen, it can also be bent, then the final form of the phone has also begun to change from the traditional straight shape to the watch worn on the wrist, can be expanded into a small tablet “Reel”, a “book” that can be folded up…
Nubia exhibited a flexible screen wearable device “Nubia alpha” at this year’s MWC. The device is equipped with a 4-inch flexible screen with health detection, mobile payment, navigation, phone and video calls.
In the eyes of industry people, wearable devices are likely to be the next design form of mobile phones.
▲ Image from: Letsgo Digital
Samsung has also improved the role of the flexible screen to “rewind” the screen form. According to Samsung’s patent draft submitted in June this year, it can be seen that Samsung is designing a retractable device with a reel, similar to a folding screen phone, which can be switched between the phone and tablet mode. 
▲ The reel flexible screen exhibited by BOE
In addition, flexible screens also play an important role in the field of intelligent vehicles. At this year’s SID show, BOE exhibited a smart cockpit solution for the future car.
Provides drivers with real-time driving conditions, navigation and entertainment controls through a 12.3-inch flexible screen and smart sensors in the cabin.
▲ Panoramic Smart Cockpit consisting of a flexible screen and a regular screen
However, although flexible screens already have quite a number of application concepts today, the use of real-world scenarios requires consideration and breakthrough of other technologies. The Samsung Galaxy Fold, which was suddenly stopped on the eve of the listing, is a good example, which also reflects the flexible screen.The key to the screen is the design of other components.
Reloading to the waterfall screen mobile phone we see today, manufacturers have to give consumers different designs and different experiences. In addition to the screen, we must also consider the experience and user habits of new technologies. From the design point of view, the no-button design is indeed a breakthrough in smart phone styling, which makes the phone have better integration, higher screen ratio, and stronger visual impact.
But what if you look at it from a practical perspective? I think that I still have to touch the real machine before I can give an evaluation.