I held the first truly bezel-free phone

我上手了第一款真正意义上的“无边框”手机

Cast your mind back a decade or so, and smartphone makers were obsessed with shrinking the bezel on phones. Screens got bigger, the black bars around them got smaller, and for a while it looked like truly edge-to-edge displays were imminent. 回想十年前，智能手机制造商曾痴迷于缩小手机边框。屏幕变得越来越大，周围的黑边越来越窄，一度让人觉得真正的“全面屏”指日可待。

Then, progress just stopped. The bezel shrunk down until it was a millimeter or so on every side, on just about every phone, and phone manufacturers seemed to agree as one that this was probably far enough. 然而，这种进步随后停滞了。几乎所有手机的边框都缩小到了一毫米左右，厂商们似乎达成了一种共识：这大概就是极限了。

Tecno, a budget brand in the same family as Itel and Infinix, has stepped up to see if it could push things just a little further. Its new device, the Bezelless, is strictly a concept phone, never destined to go on sale, but it proves the point: It is possible to remove a smartphone screen’s bezel entirely — so long as you don’t mind still having a little frame around the edge. 作为与 Itel 和 Infinix 同属一个集团的平价品牌，Tecno 决定挑战一下极限。其新款设备“Bezelless”是一款纯粹的概念手机，虽然不会上市销售，但它证明了一点：完全消除智能手机屏幕的黑边是可能的——前提是你不在意边缘依然保留着一圈金属边框。

The screen runs from edge to edge, with no visible inactive area. At the right angle you can see the tiniest black line in the corners, but that’s about it. The frame, however, is a bit thicker than on some other phones. It’s still a decent OLED display, with a 144Hz refresh rate and 1.5K resolution. 屏幕从边缘延伸到边缘，没有任何可见的非活动区域。在特定角度下，你能在角落看到极细的黑线，但仅此而已。不过，它的边框比其他一些手机要厚一些。这依然是一块不错的 OLED 显示屏，拥有 144Hz 刷新率和 1.5K 分辨率。

The company sent me a prototype of the Bezelless ahead of its unveiling at the IFA trade show in Berlin, so I could see it in action for myself. There is truly no black border at all around the 144Hz, 1.5K, 6.78-inch screen, except for the tiniest hint of a fraction of a black line I can see just under the frame when I look at the phone at an angle. Looking head-on, the screen ends, then the frame begins, and that’s that. 在柏林 IFA 展会发布之前，Tecno 将 Bezelless 的原型机寄给了我，让我能亲身体验。在这块 144Hz、1.5K 分辨率的 6.78 英寸屏幕周围，确实没有任何黑边，只有当我从侧面观察时，才能在边框下方隐约看到一丝极细的黑线。正面看去，屏幕到头即是边框，非常干脆。

There is still an inactive edge to the OLED panel, but Tecno has hidden it beneath the frame. The key to the design is the use of two layers of cover glass: The top layer goes up to the edge of the frame, while the lower glass layer and the OLED panel itself both extend underneath it. Designing the phone this way had knock-on effects. It meant building the phone backwards, mounting the display from the phone’s rear rather than its front, which in turn requires securing the screen from the front, with a custom adhesive that sits between the frame and the lower piece of glass. OLED 面板边缘确实仍有非活动区域，但 Tecno 将其隐藏在了边框之下。该设计的关键在于使用了两层盖板玻璃：顶层玻璃延伸至边框边缘，而底层玻璃和 OLED 面板则延伸至边框下方。这种设计带来了连锁反应：手机必须“反向制造”，即从手机背面而非正面安装显示屏，这又要求必须通过定制的粘合剂从正面固定屏幕，使其位于边框和底层玻璃之间。

And while I might cynically point out that the frame here is probably a hair thicker than on most other modern smartphones, it’s a fractional thing. Stand the Bezelless side by side with this year’s flagship Samsung Galaxy S26 Plus, and there’s clearly a little less material wrapping around the screen — though there’s not much in it. 虽然我可能会挑剔地说，它的边框可能比大多数现代智能手机稍微厚了那么一点点，但差距微乎其微。将 Bezelless 与今年的旗舰机三星 Galaxy S26 Plus 并排对比，可以明显看出它包裹屏幕的边框材料更少——尽管差距并不大。

Tecno bullishly claims that the Bezelless “redefines how users will interact with their phones in the AI era,” which feels a bit much. Manufacturers stopped shrinking the bezel because it got small enough that most people stopped caring. Removing a strip of black from the screen doesn’t make this phone feel dramatically more impressive or useful than any other I’ve tested this year. A functional upgrade, this is not. Tecno 雄心勃勃地宣称 Bezelless “重新定义了 AI 时代用户与手机的交互方式”，这听起来有点夸张。厂商们停止缩小边框是因为边框已经窄到大多数人不再在意的程度了。去掉屏幕上的一条黑边，并不会让这款手机比我今年测试的其他任何手机更令人印象深刻或更实用。这绝非功能上的升级。

Still, it does look good. Helped by the light silver frame, the display feels more expansive without a black bar enclosing it. The Android interface now stretches right to the edge, and photos and videos have no border at all (well, at least on two edges — removing the bezel isn’t enough to solve letterboxing). It also allows a fractionally larger display, or a fractionally smaller phone, depending on how you look at it. It’s welcome, but not a game changer — eliminating the front-facing edge of the frame entirely would feel more dramatic, but that’s another ask entirely. 不过，它看起来确实不错。在浅银色边框的衬托下，没有了黑边的束缚，显示屏显得更加开阔。Android 界面现在可以延伸到边缘，照片和视频也没有任何边框（至少在两个边缘是这样——消除黑边并不能解决视频的黑条问题）。这同时也意味着在同样的机身尺寸下，屏幕可以稍微大一点，或者在同样的屏幕尺寸下，手机可以稍微小一点。这值得欢迎，但算不上颠覆性创新——如果能彻底消除正面的边框边缘，视觉冲击力会更强，但那是另一个层面的技术挑战了。

As a concept device, the specs of the Bezelless don’t matter too much. But for the curious, it’s powered by a MediaTek Dimensity 7400e chipset, bolstered by 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage. There’s a big 6,000mAh battery, though the phone itself is fairly slim and light; I suspect silicon-carbon might be involved. What appear to be three rear cameras are actually two — a 50-megapixel main shooter and 8-megapixel ultrawide — with a single 32-megapixel selfie camera on the front. I’m a little surprised Tecno didn’t go all in and use an under-display selfie camera to complete the all-screen effect. 作为一款概念设备，Bezelless 的规格并不重要。但对于好奇的朋友，它搭载了联发科天玑 7400e 芯片组，配备 8GB 内存和 256GB 存储空间。它拥有一块 6000mAh 的大电池，但手机本身相当轻薄；我怀疑它可能采用了硅碳负极电池技术。看起来是三个后置摄像头，实际上只有两个——一个 5000 万像素的主摄和一个 800 万像素的超广角镜头，正面则是一个 3200 万像素的自拍镜头。我有点惊讶 Tecno 没有更进一步，采用屏下摄像头来彻底实现“全屏幕”效果。

The rear of the phone is fun too, with a red notification LED and a butterfly design created with a 3D effect, so that the wings appear to rise out of the phone as you move it in the light. It brings to mind Tecno’s other concept devices from MWC this year, which included a phone with a color-changing E Ink rear, and another with neon built in. Most exciting of that set was a magnetic, modular concept with a range of compatible accessories. 手机背面也很有趣，配有一个红色通知 LED 灯，以及一个带有 3D 效果的蝴蝶图案，当你转动手机时，蝴蝶翅膀仿佛会从机身中浮现出来。这让我想起了 Tecno 在今年 MWC 上展示的其他概念机，包括带有变色电子墨水背板的手机，以及内置霓虹灯的手机。其中最令人兴奋的是一款带有多种兼容配件的磁吸模块化概念机。

None of those concepts have yet become real products, and I doubt the Bezelless will either, and certainly no time soon. But it does prove that it’s possible, which raises the prospect of whether another manufacturer will bring the idea to market. Apple has long been rumored to be developing a bezel-less, “edge-to-edge” iPhone for the phone’s 20th anniversary next year. If nothing else, Tecno just proved that rumor isn’t so far-fetched. 这些概念机目前都没有成为真正的产品，我怀疑 Bezelless 也不会，至少短期内不会。但它确实证明了这种可能性，这引发了一个问题：是否有其他厂商会将这一理念推向市场？一直有传言称苹果正在为明年 iPhone 诞生 20 周年开发一款无边框的“全面屏”iPhone。至少，Tecno 刚刚证明了那个传言并非遥不可及。