The first smartphone with an in-display fingerprint sensor goes on sale February 1st for about $560. The Vivo X20 Plus features a 6.4 inch, 2160 x 1080 pixel display that covers most of the front of the phone. But rather than put a fingerprint sensor on the side or back, Vivo used under-glass fingerprint sensing technology from Synaptics to let you unlock the phone by placing your fingertip on the display itself.
Unfortunately the Vivo X20 Plus will only be available in China at launch.
The phone’s most unusual feature is that sensor that can scan a fingerprint through the cover glass, allowing you to tap the spot where you’d find a home button on many other phones… but without requiring a bezel big enough for a home button.
It’s likely that we’ll see other phones adopt this technology (or something similar) in the coming months and years, but for now the Vivo X20 Plus is unique.
One thing to keep in mind about this particular device is that it won’t work with thick screen protectors, so if you’re the sort of person that likes to put a piece of plastic or glass on top of the phone, you may want to opt for an ultrathin one (or just use the film that comes with the phone).
Other specs for the Vivo X20 Plus look pretty decent for an upper mid-range phone, including a Qualcomm Snapdragon 660 processor, 4GB of RAM, 128GB of storage, a 3,905 mAh battery, Bluetooth 5.0, dual rear cameras, and Android 7.1 software.
Not ever buying a phone with fingerprint sensor or face recognition.
Don’t call this “under glass”, that’s when the FP sensor in under the cover glass but not on the display so like Xiaomi MI 6.
This one is called “in-display” by Synaptics but the sensor is really under the display stack.