One iPhone 17 major upgrade might be a scratch-resistant display،
Smartphone makers have all reached a general plateau when it comes to smartphone hardware, meaning the paths to progress are significantly fewer than they were a decade, or even half a decade, ago. However, one area where there is still a lot of room for improvement is sustainability!
On that note, an online article from the leaker Instant digital on Chinese social media platform Weibo, hints that Apple is preparing to make its future iPhone screens more scratch-resistant (via iPlus).
The company already made some progress in iPhone screen durability when it introduced the so-called “Ceramic Shield” alongside the iPhone 12 launch in 2020. This upgrade improved the screen resistance to scratches, but the most important advantage was a higher resistance to drops, thus reducing the dreaded network of glass cracks that iPhones were known for.
According to Instant Digital, this next screen durability upgrade will focus more on scratch resistance, but it's still unclear how well the glass would be able to resist scratches. That said, the tech giant is reportedly investing “billions in coating equipment in Japan, which has been handed over to the Chinese supply chain.” If this is true, it can be assumed that we will see the results of these investments in the future. .
Speaking of the future, the Weibo post indicates that the increased scratch resistance likely won't be present on the upcoming iPhone 16 this year. Instead, scratch-resistant displays will likely come with the iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max, which are expected to arrive in 2025.
As for what will make this upgrade possible, the leaker mentions that “the exterior glass of the iPhone 17 series will be made into an ultra-hard AR layer.” AR, in this case we assume it is the anti-reflective layer, which leads us to think that Apple could try to implement something similar to the reflection-free screen of the Galaxy S24 Ultra, which we we tested alongside that of the latest iPhone. and Pixel models.
