If you called 2018 the year of notched phones, you would have made a spot-on observation. While the Essential Phone, launched last year, represented the first mobile phone running Android OS that features a display cutout, the notch just grew in popularity on the heels of Apple iPhone X launch. This year saw both flagship and mid-range mobile devices from brands, such as OnePlus, Google, Nokia, Huawei, Xiaomi, LG, OPPO, Vivo, etc. incorporate display notches. As you already are aware, a few of these notches are a lot better than some other ones. Irrefutably, notched displays have now been embraced by users as an acceptable compromise towards “full-screen” displays.
Until this moment, there has not been a smartphone released with dual notches. The status quo has now been changed today by the newly-launched Sharp Aquos R2 Compact in Japan, which is currently the world’s first phone, engineered with dual notches on both the top and bottom of its screen display. The handset is coming with a 5.2-inch “freeform” display with one of the 2 notches containing the 8-MP front-facing (selfie) shooter and the other one housing the fingerprint reader.
The Aquos R2 Compact’s screen is an IGZO panel that features a 1,080 by 2,280- pixel resolution as well as 120Hz refresh rate. A Snapdragon 845 chipset sits within the device, which works in conjunction with Android v9.0 Pie. It comes with 4GB RAM and 64GB built-in storage, which can be expanded up to 512GB via microSD card slot.
Its battery capacity is not that great as it is pegged at 2,500mAh. The Sharp Aquos R2 Compact has only been released in Japanese markets in the meantime.
