Vivo smartphone design teased to be just 3.8mm thick

by Mark Tyson on 3 November 2014, 12:05

Tags: PC

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Chinese smartphone maker Vivo has teased that it is readying a new handset which is less than 4mm thick. The firm claimed the feat via its Sina Weibo account (the 'Chinese Twitter') as it described its upcoming smartphone as half the thickness of an Apple iPhone 5/5S.

Last week we saw the smartphone screen with the slimmest bezel available claimed by LG. Some readers questioned the practicality of such a component; many users grip a smartphone and obscure those edges of the screen - so aren't interested in much smaller bezels.

In a parallel race to the smallest bezel, smartphone makers have been gunning for the slimmest handset title. Apple launched its iPhone 6 duo back in September with the new large displays on offer giving customers something that was "bigger than bigger" but also slimming its designs down to as little as 6.9mm thick.

Since that time there have been several thin smartphone feats claimed. Last week Oppo revealed its R5 smartphone which is just 4.85mm thick. Then, at the weekend, we heard that rival Chinese mobile maker Vivo will effectively trump Oppo's yet to be released slim smartphone marvel with its as yet unnamed handset, measuring under 4mm thick.

Vivo published a trio of 'photos' of the new sub-4mm thick handset, some of which show it in comparison with an Apple iPhone 5/S. With the aid of the pictures Vivo claims that its new smartphone will be about half the thickness of Apple's previous gen iPhone which measures 7.6mm. That's a thickness of around 3.8mm or 0.15-inches.

Last week's Oppo R5 had pretty good specs despite its slimness but one might conclude that battery life is one of sacrifices made to aid the slim profile. It packed a 2,000mAh battery to provide the juice for the Qualcomm Snapdragon 615 Octa Core processor, 2GB of RAM and 5.2-inch AMOLED full HD display. It remains to be seen what compromises Vivo might include in its design to create its stunningly slim 3.8mm smartphone.



HEXUS Forums :: 9 Comments

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Interesting achievement, but I bet battery will suck and it will be fragile as hell.
-Sigh-

This thing would be so uncomfortable to hold, surely! I have a One m7 and it's nice, it's comfortable in the hand, I can grip the edges (and because there is a small bezel around the outside I'm not touching the touch screen) and even if it is a bit slippery because of the all metal design I think it's one of the more ergonomic designs out there currently. Also, I read on websites and see people referring to the m7 as chunky! This thin race will only end in heartbreak.

I just can't imagine this being comfortable though, it just doesn't look like it would sit in your head nicely. Though it will be an interesting ‘proof of concept’, especially as they are going to have to do something new with the battery.

I also wonder about build quality. It's probably a large phone , as all flagship phones are now, so structural build quality will be interesting.
Interesting parallels to the ‘race to be smallest’ back in the dumbphone days - culminating in Zoolander's hilarious micro-phone in Zoolander (obviously).

How long before the first reports of someone accidentally snapping their phone in half just by holding too tightly??
“interesting” is definitely the right word for this :) I am definitely curious..

The battery & camera lens are the two things that jump out at me as “hmm” - The Oppo phone isn't really 4.85mm due to the camera lens, and I expect we'll see something similar here, but battery is where it's really going to suffer imo.

Thin is definitely the way to go - I expect phones to be just a screen in 10 years time (if that - I await the Total Recall phone http://www.want.nl/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/25-best-movie-gadgets-hand-mobile-phone-Total-Recall-623x467.jpg) - but as usual Battery tech is years behind everything else :( Curious to see how it turns out though, particularly given the complete lack of innovation in the phone market this year.
Chinese manufacturers tussle to claim ‘world’s thinnest', despite utility value of such a feat.
Quite - at what point is “thin” going to turn out to be “too thin”, or if you'd prefer, “horribly uncomfortable and woefully fragile”?

Or is the end game this: (phone as a weapon)


(This is a phone shop in Perth, Western Australia)
If manufacturers are going to compete, how about “battery life on a single charge”, that at least would be a useful innovation!