Instead of pouring millions into AI, maybe fix the one thing users have been complaining about for years

Xiaomi tried it out with its experimental series Mi Mix phones. The Mi Mix 4 from 2021 did UDC, then dropped it.

The only one that keeps the torch going is Nubia. An ex-subsidiary of ZTE, the company has spun off into its own entity and has its own sub-brand — RedMagic. The latter is obsessed with creating nearly bezel-less screens, with no interruption.

It’s not an easy task, but is it impossible?

To be completely fair — it is a very challenging task to make a proper under-screen selfie camera.

To take a photo, a camera sensor needs light. To display an image, a screen needs to be opaque enough to reflect or emit light. An under-display camera (UDC) needs a single area of the screen to do both at the same time.

In a standard OLED panel, the pixels are packed so tightly that the display is essentially a solid wall. To let light through to a camera sensor, manufacturers have to physically "thin out" or water down the pixel density in that specific spot.

But here’s the simple fact: in an OLED panel, every pixel needs a transistor and metal traces to receive power and data. These components are usually made of copper or other opaque materials.

So, no matter how much you try to give way for the camera to do its thing, there are still physical particles standing in the way of the light. Thus, you do end up with lower-quality, smudgy selfies.


Smudgy selfies, taken with Nubia Z60 Ultra, 2024

On the other end, that area of the display also becomes clearly distorted — noticeably pixelated or with a different color tint to it.



However, Nubia and RedMagic are proving that the latter issue is very much solvable. I don’t know what kind of dark magic it is, but their screens look pretty much uninterrupted over the area of the selfie camera.

How are Nubia’s under-screen cameras so well-hidden?

A quick nod where one is due: in order to improve its UDC tech to the point where it’s nearly invisible, Nubia (and, by extension, RedMagic) uses transparent conducting materials and "snakes" the wiring around the camera hole as much as possible, which is pretty cool. Remember smartphone innovation? Yeah, I ‘member…

Nubia Z80 Ultra and RedMagic 11 Pro

But make no mistake — even if the pixels are tiny and the wires transparent, the display still acts as a diffraction grating. When light passes through the tiny gaps between pixels, it scatters, and your selfie ends up looking like you haven’t cleaned your finger smudge off the phone for a while.

Are low-quality selfies a price we are willing to pay?

OK, let’s presume that the big, impossible hurdle that turned manufacturers away from UDC is the selfie camera quality. What do you think users would value more — crisp and pristine selfies or a full, edge-to-edge, uninterrupted display?

Well, you and I both know it will be the selfies. The big companies certainly think so, as they gave up on the quest.

But, speaking of foldables, I do believe they shouldn’t give up on the tech. At least the selfie camera that’s under their main internal screen should be “hidden”, even if its image quality ends up suffering.

You already have a bajillion ways of taking a selfie on a foldable — use the external selfie camera, or flip it open and use the main camera for a selfie whilst watching the cover screen as a viewfinder. The internal camera is mostly used for video calls, and we all know these end up being low-quality due to the streaming limitations anyway.

Apple may be picking up the torch

According to rumors, Apple is looking to hide the Face ID sensors under the screen for the iPhone 18, while still leaving a hole for the actual selfie camera. Then, the iPhone 20 would upgrade that to a full UDC cover.

Also according to rumors, Cupertino has been looking into UDC tech for the supposed upcoming iPhone Fold, which should launch in September of this year.

I am raising one eyebrow pretty high here, as this sounds a bit suspicious. I am pretty sure that Apple wouldn’t produce under-screen cameras unless the tech is absolutely pristine on both ends — nearly invisible camera cutout, pretty much the same selfie quality as before. Plus, it would delete that “recognizable” iPhone look with the pill or notch at the top.

But hey, I am up for being surprised in late 2026/2027.

The slew of reports that Apple has requested LG Innotek to supply them with UDC screen panels kind of kicked the beehive into overdrive. Now, we have rumors that Android phone manufacturers are looking to make their 2027 flagships punch-hole-less, too.

After flopping hard on its AI promises for 2025, Apple really turned around and redeemed itself with meaningful hardware improvements in the iPhone 17 series. Better heat dissipation, better display panels for the base models, and the iPhone Air, which may be a redundant addition but still an awe-inspiring piece of tech. Are we heading into an era where phones will be innovating on the hardware level again?