In a market that is increasingly saturated with smartphones and companies that copy each other without the slightest blush, it seems Apple continues to work to differentiate its flagship product from the rest. And in this sense, Cupertino’s people would already be working on a new feature that would allow them to use the iPhone “by moving their finger close to the screen without touching it”.
“Non-contact gesture control”, the next thing on the iPhone
According to information published yesterday by Mark Gurman on Bloomberg, Apple is working on future iPhone models that will incorporate “non-contact gesture control” and curved design screens.
As they would have reportedly filtered out “people with knowledge of Apple’s plans”, the non-contact control feature is described as a gesture system that would allow future iPhone owners to navigate iOS “by moving their finger close to the screen without touching it”. In this sense, this new technology would be advanced enough to take into account how close a finger is to the screen. However, if these plans are confirmed, we would still have to wait, as Gurman himself points out that Apple is still a couple of years away from achieving it.
Unlike Samsung’s Air Gestures technology on Android smartphones, the technology Apple works with would be integrated into the iPhone’s display, rather than adding any sensor to the device’s chassis, says Mark Gurman.
On the other hand, Gurman also reports that Apple is working on a “screen that curves inwards gradually from top to bottom”, unlike Samsung smartphones that curl downwards and to the edges of the screen. Gurman’s sources say that this iPhone update is still “about two or three years away”.