Intro

Apple started the dual camera trend, and others followed, they ditched the headphone jack, and others followed; now Apple has brought a notch. If you thought the Asus Zenfone 5 would be the only phone with an iPhone X-like notch, BOY YOU WERE WRONG.

The One plus 6, Ulefone T2 Pro, Leagoo S9, Huawei P20, Doogee V, Oppo R15, LG G7

Yes, these are just the devices I can think of from the top of my head that’s rumored to be released with the iPhone X-like notch. So yeah, like it or not, the notch is a trend now, but IS IT A TREND WORTH HAVING?

The iphone X, it was overpriced and the notch sucked, BUT, the iPhone X brought a new design for Apple. Even though it had a notch, it eliminated the bezels from every other sides of the display compared to its previous design and It gives it a futuristic look in some ways plus it a housed all of the fancy face id tech which while slow is definitely a lot more advanced, secured and consistent than anything else on a smartphone so far, but why do Android makers put a notch on their phones? Was it to add an over-the-top secure facial recognition kind of feature? Or was it to remove bezels and make the design look futuristic? Well let me break it down to you

ADVANCED FACE SCANNING?

Not really...

One of the only reasons I’m willing to accept for Apple putting a notch on the iphone X is that it brought along a very secure and advanced facial scanning feature.

There’s the dot projector and multiple sensors and cameras just to identify your face, map it, and track your facial expressions. It opens up so many possibilities for developers that the notch itself could be an individual section in how to develop iOS apps, but look at android phones now, the Zenfone 5 has a notch, but all it features is a front camera, a proximity sensor and maybe a couple of other sensors, surely nothing that can justify its notch, and a rather weird looking one at that.
But ASUS isn’t the only one, other companies like LG are doing the same thing. At the recent MWC, they displayed the LG G7 to a few selected people and guess what? It had a notch too.

[Lg G7]

Take a look at it yourself, I have no idea why the notch was added, but there was a report that the phone was rebuilt from scratch, and I believe they did that just to bring the notch.
The One plus 6 is also rumored to include the notch this time and judging by the Oppo R15, I’d say it’s a giveaway that One Plus 6 would be released with a notch too.

[OPPO R15]

And if you’re still not convinced, take a look at the latest Oxygen OS beta, there’s a space for the notch, look at the quick setting space, there’s notch space everywhere and it’s pretty much confirmed that the One Plus 6 will have a notch.

Though, I doubt it’ll have anything better than the face unlock on the One plus 5 though, but let’s move on.

COMPLETELY BEZEL-LESS DISPLAYS?

No...

I might have overlooked the idea of these companies of placing the notch on their devices if they at least brought a bezel-less design with it but I believe you know where I’m going with this. Look at the Zenfone 5, Huawei P20, Ulefone T2 Pro, Oukitel U18, all of these devices have a notch and a nice big bezel at the bottom as well. So what’s the use of the notch then? It’s offering nothing more than a medium for Android device makers to copy the iPhone X and sell it to people who wants something that looks like the iPhone X but at a much lower price. It’s just saddening to see Android companies selling out their originality to simply copy everything Apple is doing and I hate it. Even UI wise, these phones aren’t perfect, take a look at this image of the Ulefone T2 Pro.

They curved the corners and everything to make it look as close to the iPhone X as possible but they were in such a hurry to show this phone off to the world, they didn’t even adapt their own software to play well with it. The clock is obscured by the curved corners and it’s just bad.
Sure, Android P is coming out with notch support and that should fix a lot of things but still, the notch isn’t the device philosophy I would like to embrace. I mean, just imagine if the Pixel 3 comes out with the notch, I don’t think I’ll be buying it, I can’t spend much money on a great smartphone which is as far away from an iPhone as it can be, just to have people look at it and say, “oh, it’s an iphone X clone, ” The One plus 5 had a lot of similar comments.

Fortunately, there are some companies that are stubbornly defying Apple’s notch idea. Look at the Samsung Galaxy S9 and S9+, those devices are arguably the most beautiful looking devices out there, they’ll sell like hot cakes. They have Iris scanners and over-the-top features, and they don’t need a notch.

[Galaxy S9 and S9+]

Even HMD Global Nokia 8 Sirocco edition, that’s another device that looks beautiful and yet, doesn’t have a notch.

[Nokia 8 Sirocco]

There’s vivo also with its concept Apex smartphone and a great way to implement the front camera ina bezel-less phone (I love it so much). They also don’t need a notch.

[Vivo v20]

[Vivo v20 front face imbedded camera]

I get it, the notch makes for easy hype, but you’re loosing your originality in the process and your‘re loosing your innovation. You don’t need a notch, we don’t want fun, end of discussion. PLEASE, stop putting notches on phones.

I remain my humble self @mrcalxy.
Thanks