OnePlus 7 Leaks With Pop-Up Selfie Cam And No Bezels

Damien McFerran 04/03/2019 – 8:47am

All screen, all the time

OnePlus – like so many other phone makers – has been on a bit of a quest to eliminate bezels on its devices. The OnePlus 5T, for example, was the first device from the company to aggressively reduce the size of the bezels surrounding the screen, while the OnePlus 6 had an iPhone-style notch. The OnePlus 6T went one better with a less intrusive 'teardrop' notch, but it seems that the company is planning to go one better with its first 2019 flagship.

Leaked renders from OnLeaks – which has a great track record for this kind of thing – show that the OnePlus 7 will have a full-screen display with bezels or notches of any description. The company has achieved this by including a pop-up selfie camera on the top edge, as has been seen on other phones, like the Vivo NEX and the upcoming Energizer 'big boi' handset.

The renders show that the OnePlus 7 is equipped with a 6.5-inch Full HD+ panel and three cameras on the back. There's no fingerprint scanner on the back so it's a fair bet that it comes with an in-screen fingerprint reader, like the OnePlus 6T. There's no 3.5mm headphone jack, but that's no shock as OnePlus removed the audio connection from its previous flagships. The alert slider remains in place, and there's a USB-C port on the bottom.

Mechanical pop-up cameras look futuristic and cool, but they're not been tested on a mainstream device yet; some people reported at this year's MWC that the aforementioned Energizer phone suffered from a faulty camera as people were manually pushing it down to close it, which ruins the mechanism. Whenever you introduce moving parts into a phone you create wear and tear as well as the potential for failure; it will be interesting to see if the OnePlus 7 cam is robust enough to survive regular use.

Still, if the design doesn't work as planned, there's always the OnePlus 7T, which will no doubt be coming later in the year.