Apple is reportedly considering new design options for its popular smartwatch, and this patent filing points to the future.
The Apple Watch’s design is as iconic as any that the Cupertino-based manufacturer’s has put out. That rounded square face has been imitated but never equalled by rivals, and it is as synonymous with the brand’s style as the iPod’s click wheel or the first iMac.
But according to a new patent filing, Apple may rip up the rulebook and reveal an all-new design with a wraparound screen.
Image Credit: MacRumors
This incredible, innovative new look would offer a screen that seems to extend all the way around the wrist, rather than just a watch face. The patent filing does on to explain how it works:
the display area of the smartwatch is not limited to a rigid watch face area. In an embodiment, a smartwatch includes a flexible display panel that is integrated into a flexible watch band. Accordingly, curvature of the flexible display panel in both the watch face area and band may be adjusted to conform to the wrist size of the user.
Evidently we’ll have to wait a couple of years until foldable/rollable screen technology catches up with the ambitions of Apple’s designers, but the implications could reinvent the functionality of wearables for multi-tasking like you’ve never seen before.
Read more: Samsung’s double-foldable concept is twice as gimmicky and half as useful
This would be a big change for the series of wearables that’s hardly changed at all ever since its first launch in 2016 – even more so considering that to date, Apple has not released any folding-screen devices, while the likes of Samsung and Huawei have each released a small clutch of foldable phones. We’ll have to keep our eyes on this one, especially as Apple tends to set the pace for the rest of the industry in such matters.
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