Samsung's filed a patent for a very odd Galaxy Note design

Future Galaxy Note 9 Could Look Like This - But Don't Get Your Hopes Up!

 

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Samsung's filed a patent for a very odd Galaxy Note design

Samsung has filed a patent for a new Galaxy Note series design which is very interesting indeed. There's no way it's the Galaxy Note 8 for 2017, as the firm will already be too far along in the development process to incorporate a design that's only just come off the drawing board. But, with that said, the design could show what a future Galaxy Note will look like, perhaps the Galaxy Note 9.

The patent was picked up by Patently Mobile, which includes a technical diagram showing the front and back of the handset. The design is incredibly thin, but appears to sport an asymmetrical design where one edge curves inwards towards the user - the inverse of Samsung's current EDGE flexible OLED displays - while the other edge appears to be flat. Looking at the drawing more closely, it appears the inward curving edge is somewhat thicker and could have some kind of cut-out for the S-Pen ( the D-Shape at the bottom). Additionally, although it's not clear, it looks as though the display could wrap-around from the front panel to the rear, in fact the device may be hinged to allow it to open like a notebook, although this isn't shown in the patent and, frankly, if it were a flexible folding OLED device we'd expect this to be illustrated given previous patents from Samsung.

Following the explosiongate fiasco of the Galaxy Note 7, Samsung will almost certainly keep the Galaxy Note 8 this year fairly vanilla, but this patent does suggest Samsung is still planning to innovate going forward. The issue is that a thinner bodyshell does mean more of a hazard for things like battery instability if any problems occur. Having said all of that, as always with such patents, an OEM designing and patenting a new idea doesn't necessarily mean it will become reality; Apple, Samsung, and the rest, file thousands of patents which never become a final product.

So between potential design issues, the fact that this definitely isn't this year's phone, and a few other factors; don't hold your breath for this design hitting the market any time soon, if at all! But still, it's interesting to see what Samsung is scheming as it means we can get a rough idea of what it's thinking for future designs. The aim, for the Note series at least, seems to be thinner, with more interesting curvature and form factors.