The iPhone 8 Could Reportedly Be Released Earlier Than Expected

The way we anticipate phones is nothing like it used to be. In days gone by it was all about how much memory your Sony Ericsson had for all the tunes you'd be Bluetoothed in school, or about whether or not the new Samsung would be a slide or flip phone.

Now it's all about wifi, 4G, wireless headphones, brew making capabilities and if it can hold your pint to your mouth and light your cig at the same time.

Point being technology has come a long way, so with every new handset or device that comes out, the expectations are that it'll have more bells and whistles than ever before.

A phone that's garnering a lot of anticipation is the iPhone 8. Since 2017 marks the tenth anniversary since the first gen iPhone was released there's rumours that the eight edition will be something truly remarkable.

Credit: PA

Rumours have already been spread about what features there might be. Apparently, a similar technology to Samsung's eye-scanning unlocking system will be introduced. This means that iPhones will be unlocked simply by looking at the handset, which will be terrible when you're pissed out of your skull and one eye is looking at Trafalgar Square, while the other is gazing upon the Angel of the North.

A Chinese tech website, MoneyDJ.com, reported that a Taiwan-based company called Xintec is going to start producing the eye recognition feature and will begin to embed it into this year's iPhones.

As for the home button, experts believe that 2017 will mark the end of it. Storm, another Chinese digital site, reported that the current home button will be replaced by a 'touch-sensitive digital button', which will be something similar to the MacBook's touch pad.

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Given the exciting things that may appear on the device, people are eagerly looking forward to its release date. Good news for those people then, as boutique research firm BlueFin Research Partners believe that the iPhone 8 will arrive earlier than expected, the Mirror reports.

"The most intriguing data points that we have uncovered suggests that AAPL is ramping the next generation iPhones earlier than historical norms," the firm said. "Additionally, AAPL has adjusted iPhone 7, 7 Plus, and SE production downward in preparation for the next generation launch."

In short, they expect that production on it will start in June as opposed to September, which is the norm for all of the devices which have come before it.

Alongside the rumoured home button reshuffle on the 8, there will also be a reported redesign of the phone. Ming-Chi Kuo, a KGI Securities analyst, who is known for his reliable Apple information leaks, reckons the new iPhone will feature an all-glass design.

This is bad news for those serial phone droppers, who can't go a day without having to watch their phone plummet onto the softest of surfaces, smashing the screen into an almost invisible shard of glass.

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There are also rumours to suggest that the device will be waterproof for up to one metre for 30 minutes. I guess this is most useful for those who can't get a bath without snapchatting it. Y'know, bubble bath, one knee out of the water, candles in the background - we've all seen them.

When it comes to the screen itself, apparently the traditional LCD screen will be ditched, paving the way for a OLED. Personally, all of that could have been written in Japanese and it would have made just a little sense.

Apparently, rather than requiring a backlight, like an LCD screen does, an OLED-based screen lights up individual pixels when necessary. This is good because it saves power, and the colours are more, erm, colourful.

As to continue with the current theme of ditching the traditional components of the iPhone, another thing will be following in the footsteps of the wireless headphones.

Apparently, wireless charging will become the next big thing with iPhones, with Bloomberg reporting that Apple was working on overcoming "technical barriers, including loss of power over distance". If it can keep my phone from losing all of its battery in as little as two hours, I am game.

The main thing to take away from this is that, as a generation, we are all far too arsed about what a new phone is going to be like. It's good to be passionate about something, though, I guess.

"The iPhone has been evolving and now it is switching from LTPS (low-temperature poly-silicon) to OLED panels," Jeng-wu told a group of students at Tatung University in Taipei. "We don't know whether Apple's OLED iPhones will be a hit, but if Apple doesn't walk down this path and transform itself, there will be no innovation. It is a crisis but it is also an opportunity," he said, according to the Nikkei Asian Review.

Although all of this will send the price of the device soaring, tech experts believe that OLED screens are the way forward.

Yes, yes, it's all well and good, but can we play Snake and make our own polyphonic ringtones on it?

Topics: Apple

Mark McGowan

Mark is a journalist at LADbible, who joined in 2015 after a year as a freelance writer. In the past he blogged for independent football fan channel Redmen TV, after graduating from Staffordshire University with degrees in journalism and English literature. He has worked on campaigns such as UOKM8? and IIOC.