A Samsung patent discovered within the past week shows a device with a wrap-around screen, more specifically a display that has edges which curve around the sides of the device’s frame and end on the backside of the device, instead of having a curved edge that stops on the front side of the device like the currently available crop of high-end Samsung smartphones such as the Galaxy Note 8, Galaxy S8, and Galaxy S8+. One interesting point worth mentioning is that based on the drawings Samsung may have been playing with the idea of a screen that wraps around the edges of the phone and stops on the back for a little while, as the drawings showcase a device with a micro USB port for charging instead of USB Type-C. It could also just mean that Samsung wants to implement this idea on a lower-end device, being that it has moved to USB Type-C for its main devices now.
That said there is no way to know Samsung’s intentions for this design yet or if it even plans to use the design in the first place. The publication date of the patent is also from November 30th so no matter how long Samsung had been toying with this idea the request for a patent approval is fairly new since it was just submitted recently.
In addition to showing off the device with a “rounded” display that curves around to the backside of the phone, there are also diagrams of the manufacturing process, depicting Samsung’s methods for getting the glass to arch around in a sort of “u” shape, hence the term rounded as the edges are rounded in the shape of the letter u. The process for manufacturing the display will likely be more time consuming than the process for heating and curving the glass for the curved edge screens seeing as how Samsung has to curve the glass further and wrap it around the back of the frame. With this patent having just recently been filed for it’s not likely that devices from the company with this type of display design will be available on the market for consumers any time soon.
