iPhone 8 Leak ‘Confirms’ Power Button Touch ID and More

iPhone 8 leaks have been circulating the web for what seems like ages now, with the majority all-but-confirming that Apple’s tenth-anniversary flagship will be its most radically redesigned iPhone yet. While there’s still a lack of consensus on when the device will actually launch, a fresh report published over the weekend by Forbes alleges that the design you’re about to feast your eyes on is, in fact, the iPhone 8 we can expect to debut this fall.

Working closely with iPhone case-maker, Nodus, Forbes’ Gordon Kelly claims he was granted exclusive access to factory CAD renders of the upcoming flagship — and, as you’ll see below, the images appear to corroborate a myriad of previous leaks, including the exclusive iPhone Edition renders that were shared with iDrop News back in March.

Here’s what we can expect to see this September, according to Kelly.

Touch ID on the Side

With display-embedded Touch ID still a wild-card, Kelly notes that the iPhone 8’s power/sleep-wake button will be approximately twice the size of current power buttons, according to Nodus’ CAD renders as shown above. That’s because, he suggests, Apple may be planning to take a page out of Sony’s playbook by embedding the Touch ID fingerprint reader into the power/sleep-wake button, itself. Lending further credence to side-mounted Touch ID, Kelly notes that back in June, Apple was granted a patent describing an Alternative Touch ID Button Location that outlines a solution where the fingerprint-reading technology is embedded into a physical button on the side or top of an iDevice.

Nearly Edge-to-Edge, 5.8-inch OLED Display

Echoing multiple previous reports, the iPhone 8 will feature a nearly edge-to-edge OLED display measuring 5.8-inches diagonally. There will be no physical Home button on the device, however, given this new design which features ultra-thin bezels all the way around. The only exception, as Kelly notes, will be the small bar you can see at the top of the display which will house crucial components like the earpiece, frontal sensor array, and what appears to be a dual-lens camera system that will facilitate Apple’s advanced 3D facial recognition system.

Virtual Home Button

While the fate of Touch ID on the iPhone 8 remains up in the air, Kelly corroborates a previous report from KGI Securities analyst, Ming-Chi Kuo, who in predicting the flagship’s most noteworthy changes speculated that the device will feature a Virtual Home button. Kelly says this will in fact be the case, while adding that the button will not only be twice as large as the standard, clickable Home button, but it will rest at the bottom of the display in an all-new ‘Function Area‘, which will also serve as the iOS 11 notification panel on the top-tier iPhone.

Vertical Camera Orientation

Back in March, iPhone concept artist Benjamin Geskin shared exclusive inside information about the iPhone 8‘s new design with iDrop News, in which it was suggested that Apple will shift the rear-mounted dual-lens camera module to a vertical orientation. As you can see above, this will in fact be the case, as Kelly suggests, with the rationale being that a vertically-oriented camera (when the handset is used in landscape mode) will help facilitate the device’s Augmented Reality capabilities made possible by ARKit.

How Accurate Are These Leaks?

Kelly noted that several iPhone 8 case-makers have already begun selling their offerings based on this same design, and so his confidence in Nodus’ CAD renders is iron-clad at this point. While other factors, including battery capacity and the clock speed of Apple’s A11 SoC, for example, remain unknown at this time, as far as a physical design is pertinent, this is the iPhone 8 we can expect to see unveiled on stage.

[The information provided in this article has NOT been confirmed by Apple and may be speculation. Provided details may not be factual. Take all rumors, tech or otherwise, with a grain of salt.]