Samsung has reportedly abandoned its plans of developing a new type of fingerprint scanner that is located underneath the display panel. The design would have allowed the sensor to be placed at its natural position near the bottom of the phone, while still allowing for full display on the front.
The company has been working on the in-display fingerprint scanner for the past few years, but kept on running into technical difficulties. The development was supposed to solve the awkward placement of the fingerprint sensor on its latest Galaxy smartphones, where the sensor is at the back of the phone, beside the camera.
Before the release of the Galaxy S8, it was reported that Samsung was working on the integrated, in-display fingerprint sensor. However, that did not pan out, so the S8's sensor was placed at the back.
While the S8 and S8 Plus delivered superb performance and included the most modern hardware at the time of release, many users complained about the proximity of the fingerprint sensor to the camera which users kept on touching instead. This caused the camera to always have smudges.
Several months later, the integrated in-display fingerprint sensor was once again rumored to be included in the premium series Galaxy Note 8. Surprisingly, the premium phone featured a similar design as the S8 and S8 Plus, with the sensor at the rear of the phone. This signaled that the South Korean technology giant has still not perfected the in-display fingerprint sensor.
In recent years, the design of smartphones leaned toward smaller bezels to maximize the screen-to-body ratio, leaving the fingerprint sensor without any room on the front side of phones.
Apple, one of Samsung's biggest contenders, has given up on the fingerprint scanner altogether and has developed a more advanced security system that scans faces.
Samsung abandoning its in-display fingerprint scanner may be a sign that the company may be developing a face-scanning system of its own.
