iPad Pro bezels could shrink more with OLED film changes

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AppleInsiderAppleInsider
Posted:
in iPad edited June 24

Apple's iPad Pro could get even thinner bezels in the future, thanks to a possible change to the way its OLED panels are manufactured.

Person using a stylus on a tablet, creating a vibrant digital cityscape scene with colorful buildings and street signs.
The OLED iPad Pro display is vivid and bright.



Apple has continuously pushed to create as thin a bezel as possible for its products. These efforts have resulted in very thin bezels for the iPhone and MacBook Pro, but a change could result in even thinner versions for the iPad lineup.

According to The Elec on Tuesday, Apple is preparing to approve or reject a display driver IC (DDI) from LX Semicon. The change could allow LG Innotek to supply its own chip-on-film (CoF) materials for use in iPad OLED panels.

The DDI uses thin film transistors (TFTs) to operate the display, attached to the panel using a CoF that is fixed in place via heat compression. The film then sends signals from the DDI to the panel itself.

At present, Apple uses just the DDI supplied by Samsung System LSI in its OLED iPad models. If the approval goes through for the LX Semicon DDI, then this will enable LG Display to use it for its own OLED panels made for the iPad supply chain.

There is no guarantee that this will occur, though. A bid by LX Semicon for Apple to approve the DDI was previously rejected in 2024.

More DDI, more competition



For Apple, approving a new DDI provides quite a few benefits. For a start, it grants LG a bit more freedom in how it produces its OLED iPad panels, as well as more revenue.

That freedom also means that LG can work to improve its future display panel offerings, without being bound to any limitations from the Samsung-supplied DDI. With LG and Samsung having their own differentiated processes, this can help increase competition, resulting in more display innovation.

For LG's panels, the combination of using its own CoF technology and DDI means it has more control over the integration of the panel's layers, especially around the edges of the display. This finer level of control can result in LG making thinner bezels for the iPad displays in the future.

Any decision made by Apple on the LX Semicon DDI will not impact any iPad models arriving in 2025, and probably won't affect any shipping in early 2026 either. What it would do is help improve models beyond one generation away.

Edge-to-edge impossibility



The prospect of thinner bezels may be appealing, but there is a limit to how far Apple and its suppliers can take the concept. The real problem is less manufacturing-related, more about usability.

The purpose of a bezel used to be to deal with the edges of the display when the screen itself couldn't spread that far across the front of the device, due to technological limitations. As those limits were altered and allowing for a close to edge-to-edge screen to be produced, the bezel became more of a grip-related feature.

The iPhone has an edge-to-edge display with a minimal bezel, because a person holds an iPhone by gripping the sides and base, wrapping their one hand around the back. A typical user can hold an iPhone very securely, without needing to touch the front of the display at all.

A larger held-in-hand screen, like an iPad, needs bezels because of how you grip it. Since the fingertips and edges of a thumb often grip around the edges, there needs to be a bezel so that there's an unused space that can be touched without interacting with the display.

The existing bezels could be made a little bit smaller by Apple, but at some point, it will affect how people grip their iPads.



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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 9
    robin huberrobin huber Posts: 4,079member
    They’re already to the point where I have to careful about holding it or picking it up to avoid invoking some touch screen command. I know, I’m “holding it wrong.” 😑 
    edited June 24
    grandact73mr moeRogue01beowulfschmidt
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  • Reply 2 of 9
    sloth77sloth77 Posts: 62member
    robin huber said:
    They’re already to the point where I have to careful about holding it or picking it up to avoid invoking some touch screen command. I know, I’m “holding it wrong.” 😑 

    charlesnwilliamlondonmr moe
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  • Reply 3 of 9
    charlesncharlesn Posts: 1,540member
    robin huber said:
    They’re already to the point where I have to careful about holding it or picking it up to avoid invoking some touch screen command. I know, I’m “holding it wrong.” 😑 
    Exactly why the thinnest bezels possible make no sense on an iPad. With an iPhone, I can hold the phone securely in one hand by the side edges of the frame, no accidental touches of the screen. Try doing that with an iPad Pro--sure, you could one-hand it, with a thumb on the side and the rest of your fingers under it, but that's just begging to drop it at some point. Mostly though, thin bezels will mean accidental screen touches when you're trying to hold it securely. Even when I'm reading on my iPad Mini, I tend to have my thumb resting directly on the bezel area. 
    danoxdewme
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  • Reply 4 of 9
    anthogaganthogag Posts: 122member
    "Why did you shrink the bezels?"..."Because we can, bwahahahahahahaha"
     0Likes 0Dislikes 0Informatives
  • Reply 5 of 9
    danoxdanox Posts: 3,882member
    robin huber said:
    They’re already to the point where I have to careful about holding it or picking it up to avoid invoking some touch screen command. I know, I’m “holding it wrong.” 😑 
    On the M4 iPad Pro I have hit Siri many times by accident….
    neoncatmr moeWillfulJonsinRogue01
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  • Reply 6 of 9
    melgrossmelgross Posts: 33,710member
    I guess it varies person to person. For me, the bezels could be about a third thinner and it would be fine. beyond that, its hard to tell.
    Rogue01
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  • Reply 7 of 9
    dewmedewme Posts: 6,093member
    No matter how thin Apple makes the bezels, there’s still going to be that not so thin chunk of valuable real estate consumed by the notch, Dynamic Island, or whatever you want to call it. Thinner bezels aren’t going to give me edge to edge landscape viewing of on-screen content as long as the notch is still there. 

    Getting rid of the notch is a much higher priority for me than slimming down the bezels. I have zero concern for the size of the bezels on any Apple device currently in their lineup. Apple and its fan base are very quick to come up with rationalizations for why the notch is still there. I’d like to see a list of rationalizations for why they need to keep slimming down the bezels, other than pure vanity. Reassign the tiny bezel team to a mission to get rid of the notch. 

    If we’re going to say things like “don’t worry about the notch because you’ll acclimate to it being there” is considered reasonable for something we really don’t want to see, then why should Apple expend resources adding a few more pixels to something that we’re not bothered with at all? The notch is a problem, thinner bezels aren’t. 

    If we’re going to argue about words like “it’s not a notch, it’s an island” I’m not convinced. The Dynamic Island is lipstick on a pig, with the pig being the notch. 
    muthuk_vanalingam
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  • Reply 8 of 9
    sloth77sloth77 Posts: 62member
    dewme said:
    If we’re going to say things like “don’t worry about the notch because you’ll acclimate to it being there” is considered reasonable for something we really don’t want to see, then why should Apple expend resources adding a few more pixels to something that we’re not bothered with at all? The notch is a problem, thinner bezels aren’t. 
    Because reducing bezels is a (somewhat) easy problem, whilst reducing or removing the notch is not.  And like it or not, many people feel thinner bezels makes a phone look more modern and expensive.
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  • Reply 9 of 9
    Rogue01rogue01 Posts: 308member
    Thinner bezels means more false inputs from holding the iPad.  I have a 2018 iPad Pro and when your hands get near the edges of the display, random false inputs and web pages quickly scroll back to the top with a false input.  You can't hold an iPad the same way you hold a phone.
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