Vivo shows concept smartphone of which almost the entire screen is a fingerprint scanner

Vivo has unveiled its Apex 2019 concept phone. The smartphone, which won’t actually go on sale, has a fingerprint scanner that sits behind almost the entire screen, rather than just a portion of it. Also, the housing has no buttons or ports.

Vivo has replaced the USB port on the housing with MagPort, a magnetic port for charging and data transfer, says the manufacturer. This means that the phone does not rely on mobile networks for data transfer and wireless charging for charging, such as the Zero smartphone that competitor Meizu showed on Wednesday.

The Apex 2019 has no front camera and has a housing that is completely made of glass, without a metal edge. That should give the smartphone a futuristic appearance. Vivo has replaced the buttons with capacitive surfaces with pressure sensitivity.

The fingerprint scanner covers almost the entire screen, claims the manufacturer. The images seem to show that only the extreme edges cannot serve as a fingerprint scanner. It is an optical scanner, just like current fingerprint scanners behind the screen. Software detects the finger before it touches the screen and makes the pixels already light up in order to scan the fingerprint.

The Apex 2019 will not hit the market, but Vivo did come out a few months after the Apex concept last year with the Nex, a smartphone that took over many of the functions. It is unknown whether that will now happen.