Xiaomi Quad-Curved Waterfall Display Concept for Smartphones, Revealed!

Curved displays for smartphones are nothing new.

If my memory serves me right, Samsung was the first company to introduce it through the Samsung Galaxy Round in 2013 which has a screen that curves vertically inwards around the middle part. It was quickly followed by the 2014 Samsung Galaxy Note Edge featuring a display that curves downwards on the right side. After those two, the Korean Giant had a slew of Android smartphones with curved displays on both edges, including the Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge, Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge, Samsung Galaxy Note8, and Samsung Galaxy Note9, among others.

(I've featured all of these Galaxy smartphones on TechPinas so feel free to use our search bar to look for those articles in case you are interested.)

Eventually, other brands started adapting this display innovation on their devices. My favorite remains to be Vivo's NEX 3, which features a brilliant AMOLED panel that generously curves on the left and right sides, complementing the phone's buttonless design. I still use this 2019 handset as one of my daily drivers because it still has great imaging capabilities, video recording prowess, and gaming performance.

Interestingly, today - February 5, 2021, disruptive tech giant Xiaomi unveiled its own version of next-level curved screen for smartphones, which they call "Quad-Curved Waterfall Display".

Essentially, this panel curves on all four sides of the handset's face; That is, in front, at the bottom, and on the left and right sides. 

This allows the concept smartphone to have capacitive touch volume up and down buttons, taking the physical-button-less design idea even higher.

Since the display extends to the very rear of the device, this means that the smartphone also won't have a USB Type C charging port nor a row of holes for the loudspeaker.

I'm thinking that Xiaomi could address this by putting fast wireless charging feature on the device and by placing the speakers under the display like what we have seen on Google Pixel 5.

A few days ago, Xiaomi also disclosed that they are working on Air Charging Technology which uses a node that could charge supported devices from a few meters away. It would be nice to see a Xiaomi Android smartphone with a Quad-Curved Waterfall Display that could be charged using that innovation.

Anyway, I intend to talk about Xiaomi Air Charging Technology in a separate post so please stay tuned for that.

To wrap up, I guess I want to say that the one thing that worries me about a smartphone that has glass on all sides is its durability or lack thereof. Will it be able to survive the drops, knocks, and bumps of daily use? That's my main concern. I think you'd have to be extra careful when handling a device with such a screen -- unless Xiaomi would use an extra-tough kind of glass or crystal to protect it. I believe that's possible but it will surely make the final product very expensive.