Apple Is Still Obsessed With the Idea of an All-Glass iPhone

If you deliberation the rumored glassy redesign of iOS 19 could beryllium a game-changer, cheque retired Apple's latest granted U.S. patent detailing all-glass enclosures for aboriginal devices including the iPhone, Apple Watch, and adjacent Mac Pro.


The patent envisions devices wherever each outer surfaces (front, back, and sides) are made of glass, creating a seamless, transparent quality with a roving interface that tin beryllium utilized from immoderate angle.

Beyond aesthetics, the solid enclosures would present caller interactive capabilities, according to the patent. Apple describes touch- and force-sensitive areas extending to the sides and backmost of devices, fundamentally creating multi-sided interfaces that could accommodate based connected however the idiosyncratic holds oregon orients the device. The embodiments besides see mechanisms to instrumentality isolated the devices for repairs.


For iPhones, the patent illustrates a six-sided solid plan wherever displays could look connected immoderate surface, with accommodations for components specified arsenic speakers and microphones. The idiosyncratic interface would dynamically displacement depending connected the device's orientation, allowing for contextual interactions careless of which broadside faces the user.

The filing besides includes concepts for different Apple products, including a solid Mac Pro operation with an octagonal prism shape, and an Apple Watch constructed astir wholly from transparent solid (a conception that we resurfaced past week).


Some designs diagnostic deformable sides, enabling users to trigger actions by applying pressure, specified arsenic squeezing the sides of an iPhone to power media playback oregon set volume. Certain ideas besides person echoes of Apple's erstwhile experimentation with force-sensitive inputs similar 3D Touch.

Apple's exploration of solid enclosures isn't precisely new. The institution has been investigating this exertion for implicit a decennary – and erstwhile plan main Jony Ive famously wanted to make an iPhone retired of a azygous seamless slab of glass.


Of course, patents don't warrant we volition really spot the products arsenic user devices, but they bash connection an penetration into Apple's imaginable semipermanent imaginativeness for much immersive, interactive instrumentality designs crossed its merchandise lines.

(Via Patently Apple.)
This article, "Apple Is Still Obsessed With the Idea of an All-Glass iPhone" archetypal appeared connected MacRumors.com

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