iPhone 8 Exclusive: Apple's New Design & Features,Release date

iPhone 8 release date

Hottest leaks:

September 2017 launch for iPhone 7S and iPhone 7S Plus
Slightly later October 2017 date for the all-screen iPhone 8
The iPhone 8 release date is the routine new iPhone rumor we expect to stay the same every year, but Apple may do something different here, too.

Apple has launched a new iPhone in September every year since the iPhone 5 in 2012. September iPhone launches have a pretty consistent track record.

iPhone 7S and iPhone 7S Plus may still launch in September sporting a worthy, but ultimately predictable design and feature upgrade.

iPhone 8 may deviate from this plan, launching a little bit later (still before Black Friday and Cyber Monday) due to reported production delays.

Update: The iPhone 8 release date could be as soon as two months from now, if Apple sticks to its typical launch schedule. And all of the rumored new features prove there's a lot be excited about.

iPhone 8 is set to be one of the biggest overhauls of Apple's handset in years, as the tenth anniversary of this technology-defining smartphone rolls around. It's enough to outshine the unconfirmed chance of production delays and a potentially high iPhone 8 price.
We're expecting big changes to the device in a jump not seen before from the Cupertino brand, with huge overhauls to the design and features.
The most immediate change may be to the name: iPhone 8 is the default name we're using, but it could very well be iPhone X and iPhone Edition. This is bigger than the iPhone 7S and iPhone 7S Plus refresh that's still said to be on the way.

Every iPhone 8 rumor really gives us a sense that Apple is overhauling its phone with at least one premium design – what we're calling the iPhone 8 – while also providing a basic specs bump for an iPhone 7S and iPhone 7S Plus.

We're sorting through all of the rumors to deliver the facts and cut through the far-fetched speculation, from the always-changing release date theories to the all-important iPhone 8 price.

iPhone 8 screen

Hottest leaks:

A curved AMOLED display
A 5.8-inch edge-to-edge screen
No home button and no bezel

The iPhone 8 screen may radically change in size and shape, and it's about time for something bigger and more stylish than the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus era display.

One big rumor is that the iPhone 8 is going to sport a curved AMOLED display instead of a the usual flat LCD panel, according to analyst Ming-Chi Kuo.

We've all seen curved AMOLED displays in the Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge and the even bigger Samsung Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8 Plus. The iPhone 8's curve may be less dramatic, but still cooler looking than a completely flat phone.

There are other exciting benefits to an AMOLED display replacing the normal IPS LCD. It can deliver better contrast, more vibrant colors and include a battery-saving always-on display. It's also better suited for VR and AR.

This has also more recently been rumored by sources, claiming that a curved AMOLED display is one of more than ten prototypes that Apple is considering - and that the phone could even have a higher-than-QHD resolution, though recent images suggest the curved prototype might not be the version we get.

Who's going to help Apple push all of those extra pixels? Samsung is said to be supplying the OLED screens, beating out Sharp, which was once rumored for the job. Samsung may be able to deliver more curved screen in time, and Apple is said to have just put a curved screen order in with its long-time rival.

Just so it's clear: you might not see the fancy, new OLED display on every iPhone 2017 model due to supply issues. Thus, Apple may include it on just one iPhone 8 version.

In fact, leaked images of the iPhone 8 don't show a curved screen at all, so that prototype may not have made it to final production, but we're still expecting AMOLED.

iPhone 8 size

How big will the iPhone 8 screen size be? Rumors for this are all over the place, but everything says it'll be larger – around 5.8 inches, just like the Galaxy S8.

Don't worry. We expect a 4.7-inch iPhone 7S and 5.5-inch iPhone 7S Plus, alongside it, but they probably won't have an all-screen front.

Speaking of which, there's been talk of axing the physical home button and building the Touch ID fingerprint sensor into the screen itself, a rumor that dates back almost two years.

It's not clear if Apple will get this tech ready in time - so the Touch ID sensor might have to go on the back instead - but the newest rumors suggest Apple engineers are in fact going to pull it off.

Yet another leak also suggests the scanner will be in the display. We've now seen images of an iPhone 8 in a case with no fingerprint scanner on the back, along with a CAD image that has an all-screen front and a circle on the back, which looks like it could be a scanner, but which the source claims is simply where the Apple logo will go.

Perhaps our clearest look of all comes from the renders below, showing the screen lit up. You can see that it really is an all-screen front, with just a small black strip housing the camera and earpiece.

Though the source claims that it's not certain whether the display will actually run up the sides of that, or whether the sides of that strip will also be blacked out.

Either way, it's looking increasingly likely that the fingerprint scanner will be built into the screen, just like the earliest rumors said.

Doing this would eliminate the otherwise useless bezel around the screen. "The entire face will be the display," claims Apple blogger John Gruber.

"And the Touch ID sensor will be somehow embedded in the display. The front-facing camera will somehow be embedded in the display. The speaker, everything. All the sensors will somehow be behind the display."
We've also seen how that might look in the leaked schematic above, apparently based on a prototype of the phone. Other leaked dummy models suggest that design is pretty close to being accurate - though note that some of the more recent leaks don't show the camera as being built into the screen.

This dummy model is the latest to hit the internet, and would suggest the Touch ID button will indeed be under the screen.

An unearthed Apple patent also shows this idea in action, eliminating the phone's bezels in the process. Another patent has since emerged, showing a similar concept, so it's certainly something Apple's at least thinking about.

We've heard how Apple might do it too, with the company apparently debating whether to make a pinhole in the glass for the sensor, thinning the cover glass over the sensor area, or integrating a film sensor into the display.

If Apple does ditch the home button, it could replace it with a 'function area,' with virtual keys, similar to the MacBook Pro's Touch Bar, according to one report.

Apple's one hurdle is: can it reliably put the iPhone 8 fingerprint sensor behind glass? Samsung reportedly tried and failed to do this in time for the Galaxy S8. One alternative is to give the iPhone 8 a rear fingerprint sensor, a rumor that keeps popping up that nobody particularly cares for.

Or, Apple could build the scanner into the power button, which there's evidence for in a patent.

It's possible that just a higher-end model will have these new screen features, according to the latest supply chain sources.

This third, premium model is currently dubbed "Ferrari", and this model alone may have an embedded fingerprint scanner and an edge-to-edge OLED display.

Looking even further ahead we might see a flexible or even foldable iPhone, as Patently Apple has found a patent for just such a device, and more recently another similar patent has turned up, but this is likely a long way out yet – as in iPhone 10 .The premium iPhone 8 is heavily favored to get a stunning, new 5.8-inch OLED display, with Touch ID built right into the screen. That's ambitious, but nobody wants a rear fingerprint sensor on the iPhone. Just don't expect these huge feats for the iPhone 7S and iPhone 7S Plus.
3D face-scanning sensor

There's a good chance that the iPhone 8 won't have a Touch ID sensor at all, with Apple ditching it for an on-screen home button.

That is what iphone 8 will look like.