The Nokia 9 Android flagship will feature an in-display fingerprint reader, according to recent reports out of China. There’s still no consensus among industry insiders on whether the upcoming high-end mobile device from HMD Global will actually be launched as the Nokia 9, with some sources previously suggesting the product will be advertised at the Nokia 8 Pro, thus being the third addition to the handset family that already includes the 2017 Nokia 8 and the Nokia 8 Sirocco which the Finnish phone company announced earlier this month at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain.
The Nokia 9 is expected to be the last premium Nokia smartphone released over the course of this year, with HMD most likely targeting a late summer launch. IFA 2018 may hence end up being the trade show that sees the official unveiling of the next Nokia flagship which should begin retailing before the next holiday season, as suggested by recent reports. Much like other 2018 smartphones from HMD, the Nokia 9 is widely expected to launch as part of Google’s Android One program, running a stock version of Android Oreo out of the box. The Nokia 6 (2018), Nokia 7 Plus, and the Nokia 8 Sirocco are all being released under the same initiative that’s meant to serve as the spiritual successor to the Nexus program, albeit without any major design input on Google’s part. The Nokia 9 may also have a curved display panel similar to the one found on the Nokia 8 Sirocco which is in turn reminiscent of Samsung’s Edge Display panels.
It’s presently unclear which company may end up supplying the fingerprint sensor modules to HMD for the Nokia 9 but if the firm is truly adamant to commercialize an in-screen authentication solution, it may end up collaborating with Synaptics. The San Jose-based company is presently offering one of the most versatile and accessible such technologies in the industry and already had its optical scanner implemented into the Vivo X20 UD, the world’s first smartphone with an in-display fingerprint reader.