ZTE has already announced that it plans to launch the first mass-produced 5G-enabled smartphone with an under-display camera in China next month, and now the company has shared new images that give us a better understanding of what that phone’s screen might actually look like (via Dutch website Tweakers).
In the render at the top of this post, you can see that the phone, which will be called the ZTE Axon 20 5G, has no visible camera up top — no hole punch, no notch. The render was shared by ZTE’s president of mobile devices Ni Fei on Chinese social media network Weibo.
And in this next render, also shared by Fei on Weibo, you can get an idea of what that no-camera screen might look like while it’s powered on. It looks pretty clean, if you ask me, even with that hint of bottom bezel. (There’s always the chance that one of the black dots representing other types of cameras could be an actual visible camera on the Axon 20 5G, but that seems unlikely given what ZTE has already claimed about the upcoming phone.)
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ZTE isn’t the first to talk about an under-display camera — a number of phone manufacturers have been pursuing the technology, including Oppo and Xiaomi. But it’s still unclear if these cameras will work as well as what you might be used to on your iPhone or Pixel. Engadget said the under-screen selfie camera in an Oppo prototype had “room for improvement in terms of clarity and color accuracy” back in June 2019, and we don’t know yet if ZTE’s new camera will have similar issues.
ZTE also hasn’t said if the Axon 20 5G will launch anywhere outside China, so if an under-screen selfie camera is something you’ve been waiting for and you don’t live there, you might have to wait a bit longer to try one out.
