June 5, 2020

Rumor: In-display cameras will finally be real on Snapdragon 875 phones

A prominent leaker says there are several Snapdragon 875 phones with in-display selfie cameras.
In-display selfie cameras are a major challenge for the industry right now.

Qualcomm unveils its flagship smartphone processor in December each year, and we’re expecting December 2020 to be no different.

Now, serial tipster Digital Chat Station alleges that there are several phones in the works packing both the upcoming Snapdragon 875 processor and an in-display selfie camera.

We’re expecting the Snapdragon 875 processor to be revealed in December, and it could offer Arm’s new Cortex-X1 CPU core/cores and the new Cortex-A78 CPU cores as well. So it’s not really surprising that Snapdragon 875 phones would be in the works.

Digital Chat Station/Weibo

But it’s the claim of in-display selfie cameras that has us intrigued, as the technology has been in the works for a while now. Oppo and Xiaomi both demonstrated the technology on prototype phones before, but there are significant hurdles for the tech.

Would you buy a phone with an under-display selfie camera?

Yes, for sure.
Maybe, I'll wait for second generation phones
No, I'm not interested in the technology

Earlier this year, Redmi general manager Lu Weibing said that high resolution screens resulted in only a small amount of light being able to reach the in-display selfie camera sensor. This could therefore result in darker images and poor image quality in general. The Xiaomi executive added that opting for lower resolution screens wasn’t a straightforward solution either, as this could result in color patches in the “display area.”

Nevertheless, rumors persist that HMD Global is bringing the feature to the Nokia 9.2/9.3 PureView flagship, tipped for launch later this year. And if HMD is able to get in-display selfie camera tech working well enough, then there’s no reason why we wouldn’t see the tech in 2021.