Samsung Display smallest 1.4R foldable OLED
Samsung Display has announced the successful commercialization of the industry’s Samsung smallest curvature 1.4R foldable OLED. As the world’s first foldable OLED display with a 1.4R curvature, it improves usability by enhancing folding durability and reducing harmful blue light emissions.
1.4R represents the curvature of a circle with a radius of 1.4mm, with the smaller the curvature value, the greater the curvature of the screen. When the curvature (R) value is small, there is no more space in the folded part and it can be considered as fully folded. As Samsung Display’s third release of the foldable OLED display, by reducing the folding curvature to 1.4R, can make the folding screen smartphone more stylish and slimmer.
The display features a resolution of 2208×1768, a larger screen size than its predecessor, and uses ultra-thin flexible glass (UTG) as a cover. The UTG is more robust and aesthetically pleasing than the transparent PI (polyimide) material.
This OLED display was recently used in the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 2, a foldable smartphone from Samsung Electronics. Usually, when a panel composed of multi-layered structures is folded, the compression stress on the front of the panel and the tensile stress on the back of the panel collide with each other, affecting the panel structure, which we call “folding stress” (folding stress).
The folding stress is closely related to the curvature. The smaller the curvature, the higher the folding stress. This is why folding (inward folding) panels with smaller curvature are more difficult to develop than folding (outward folding) panels with large curvature.
To overcome the folding stress, Samsung Display has optimized all aspects of materials, design, and modules to cushion the effects of external forces generated when folding multilayer structured panels.
The durability of the screen has been verified by Bureau Veritas, a global certification body. As the first foldable product with a large UTG area, it has a 1.7x larger foldable area than the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip, which made development difficult. However, in the folding test, the screen passed 200,000 folding endurance tests.
Besides, the screen has also received the Eye Care Display certification from SGS, a global certification body, which reduces the percentage of harmful blue light to 6.5 percent, an industry low, making it more comfortable for users.
