Ciccarese’s concept makes some small tweaks to the current design of the iPhone 5s, most notably with an edge-to-edge display that would help keep the device as small as possible.
I’ve always loved the tapered back of the iPhone 3GS and it would make sense to give a larger device a tapered back for a better grip in your hand and an overall thinner appearance.
The 4.7-inch device would have a resolution of 750-by-1,338 pixels and a larger 5.5-inch iPhone would max out at 878-by-1,568 pixels. By comparison, the current iPhone 5/5s/5c have a 640-by-1,138 screen.
Having inherited that design, the iPhone 5 replaced the glass cover on the back with an all-metal two-tone backplate. Still, the fact remains that there’re only minor visible differences between the 2010 iPhone 4 and the 2013 iPhone 5s in terms of the chassis.
So, is Apple going to give as a radical new iPhone look this year or simply rehash the four-year-old design? Only time will tell – and there’s only so much ways one could make an all-glass frame.
Apple in 2010 signed an exclusive agreement with Caltech spinoff Liquidmetal Technologies (later re-newing that agreement) which gave it exclusive worldwide rights to use the advanced alloy for consumer electronics purposes.
