Galaxy S10 could include “swipe to selfie” feature

One of the highlights of Samsung’s imminent flagship will possibly also be it is most contentious. Never mind the notch, Samsung has moved out with a punch hole for the Galaxy S10 instead. Of course, it will do the whole thing it can to sell that feature, or misfeature if you will, like a spinning light or glow to indicate its attendance and activity. It turns out, it might also have another feature that apparently makes use of that dead space to immediately launch the camera app into Selfie mode.

This information isn’t exactly a leak, even though it comes from the @Ice universe. It is, instead, more conjecture based on such a feature that previously exists on the Galaxy A8s. And since that is Samsung first punch hole phone and supposed to be the Galaxy S10’s precursor, chances are the latter will have it too.

Although the hole for that camera is dead when it comes to pixels, it apparently still touches responsive. A less known feature of the Galaxy A8s is that you can swipe down from that punch hole to launch the camera app instantly in Selfie mode.

It’s definitely an expedient trick but doesn’t expect to execute it with one hand only. Depending on how you hold your phone, you’ll have to stretch out your thumb to perform the gesture. At best, it reduces what would usually be at least two to three taps into one swipe.

Is it leaving to help sell the punch hole design? Probably not. This hidden feature is less of justification and more of a compensation. But just as with the notch, perhaps users will finally get used to it and mentally become blind to it, particularly if more and more smartphone makers adopt the same design.