A Taiwanese company called Novatek announced this week that they will begin production of a new OLED display featuring a new technology called touch and display driver integration (TDDI), which may feature in next year’s iPhone 17.
The report comes from the Asian paper DigiTimes, shared by MacRumors, which claims that the new TDDI displays will start production in the second quarter of 2025.
According to the report, Apple is “expected” to be one of Novatek’s first customers.
“While industry insiders remain tight-lipped about potential end customers, speculation suggests that Novatek’s proposed shipping schedule could align with the next-generation iPhone displays in 2025,” claims DigiTimes.
The new TDDI tech could enable next year’s Apple devices to have thinner OLED devices since the touch and display layers are integrated, which could point to the future of the much-rumored iPhone 17 Air, which we’ve also seen referred to as the iPhone 17 Slim.
It’s not clear if Apple will adopt the technology from Novatek.
Because the rumor is mainly speculation on the part of DigiTimes, they also opined that Apple might test the new display on some other products, including future iPads and Apple Watch models. It’s also possible that the Cupertino company might be using the thinner display on the rumored iPhone Flip or a potentially folding iPad.
For now, the only other rumors we’ve seen regarding the iPhone 17 Slim and its potential display is that the new Air model might replace the Plus and have a similarly large display at 6.6 inches. It could feature a smaller hole and pill-shaped cutout for the Dynamic Island.
If it the tech makes its way onto the mainline iPhone 17 series, it may join a potential 120Hz ProMotion display, which is supposed to be a LTPO OLED panel. A leaker on Weibo claimed that the iPhone 17 will get a “super-hard AR (anti-reflective) layer” to make it more scratch-resistant.
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