Rumor: Apple won’t release iPhone with Touch ID next year

Apple probably no longer releases iPhones that support the fingerprint scanner Touch ID. Instead, all models from next year will probably recognize faces via Face ID, which is on the iPhone X this year.

Stopping Touch ID on iPhones is necessary because all models of the iPhone in 2018 will work with minimal bezels on the top and bottom, MacRumors reports based on the reliable analyst Ming-Chi Kuo. As a result, there is not enough space for the fingerprint scanner on the front and Apple does not want to place it in a different location.

Kuo notes that next year smartphones with Android will probably appear with a fingerprint scanner under the screen, but that those models will not be very numerous. The technology would also be expensive to make. Apple would have first tried to integrate Touch ID below the screen before making Face ID for the iPhone X.

Apple CEO Craig Federighi hinted during an interview on The Talk Show podcast that Apple might not be ready to say goodbye to Touch ID altogether. He noted that in some cases ‘a combination of biometric systems’ would make sense, without specifying what he meant.

The American company showed Face ID during the presentation of the iPhone X last month. The new iPhone with facial recognition will be released early next month. Facial recognition for authentication is not a new technique. Microsoft has been using facial recognition for Windows Hello on laptops for several years now.