Samsung Display is reportedly working on pushing the limits of OLED / AMOLED panels by creating a display with an astonishing pixel density of 1,000 ppi (pixels per inch). Recent reports passed along by the Korean media aren’t very clear about the purpose of this 1,000 ppi display and whether or not it will be developed and used for the mobile market, but that’s a reasonable expectation.
More unusual is the fact that the company is reportedly developing new TFT (thin-film transistor) technology for OLED panels to achieve this high 1,000 ppi density. Since OLED panels don’t use a TFT backplane, it’s likely that the company is actually developing a 1,000ppi AMOLED screen, to be precise, and the finer details were lost in transit. Time will tell.
The new TFT solution for AMOLED could be a lot faster
Aside from enabling the incredibly-high 1,000ppi pixel density, Samsung’s future TFT technology is also said to be a whole lot faster than current solutions. Ten times faster, to be precise, and of course assuming that the rumors are technically correct.
Samsung also intends on making its future high-density display more power efficient and cheaper to manufacture. Exactly how the company may want to achieve this is unclear, but the 1,000ppi panel is reportedly planned to become available by 2024.
In theory, a 1,000ppi display would be a great match for VR headsets, but Samsung hasn’t really shown much interest in this product category lately. Nevertheless, 1,000ppi is the level of pixel density that Samsung’s Gear VR division was aiming to achieve nearly four years ago, claiming that once VR screens exceed 1,000ppi, any issues related to motion sickness and a false sense of reality will be negated.
However, since Samsung’s VR ambitions have apparently waned, it’s more likely that this new TFT technology will be used for future smartphone displays. And to put things into perspective, the smartphone with the highest pixel density to date isn’t made by Samsung but by Sony. It’s the Xperia 1 II with its 6.5-inch OLED that has a pixel density of 643ppi.
