Some of the 2027 iPhones could bring an under-screen selfie camera and Face ID for a seamless appearance with no visual interruptions.
Weibo leaker “Digital Chat Station,” who has a decent track record, shared information about industrial design changes coming to the iPhone in the next three years, citing unspecified supply chain sources. The changes allegedly include the removal of all visible sensors, which entails putting both the Face ID components and the selfie camera under the display.
The leaker also said that this year’s iPhone lineup will have a redesigned rear camera system, while the 2026 models will introduce under-screen Face ID but leave a small hole in the display for the selfie camera. Even that will be gone in 2027, the leaker claims, as Apple will release an iPhone with no visual interruptions to the display around that time, which coincides with the iPhone’s twentieth anniversary.
Rumor: iPhone 19 to bring an under-screen selfie camera
But will Apple be able to create an under-screen camera that matches the performance and image quality of the front-facing camera on current iPhones?
Well, under-screen or under-panel cameras have existed for several years now, but they’re not as good as standard selfie cameras on phones. Besides, under-panel cameras leave a visible hole in the display.
The Information said recently that the 20th anniversary iPhone coming in 2027 will sport a true edge-to-edge display with a small pinhole for the front camera in the display. The Elec reported in April 2024 that Apple supplier LG Innotek was developing under-panel camera technology without a visible hole in the display when not in use, using a freeform optic multiple lens system to achieve this.
As for under-display Face ID, the problem with that is that infrared light, which the TrueDepth camera uses for Face ID, doesn’t travel well through glass. But Apple has already solved this problem with a solution described in a patent granted in January 2025, titled “Methods and configurations for improving the performance of sensors under display.”
In a nutshell, Apple proposes removing subpixels by iteratively eliminating the nearest neighboring subpixels of the same color, which wouldn’t be noticeable, creating a clear area for infrared transmission. Subpixels are separate emitters for the red, green and blue components of each pixel, which are combined to allow a pixel to render any color.