Tianma Just Made the World’s First NFC-Enabled Display Official

Last year, China-based display manufacturer Tianma showcased an NFC-based display technology prototype, but it was far from reality. Now, the brand has officially launched a working model of this panel and it's expected to find widespread application in the future.

Tianma's latest display breakthrough eliminates the need for a dedicated NFC chip

As of now, this feat has been achieved on a 4.6-inch AMOLED panel and Tianma has used it inside a smartphone prototype to demonstrate the tech. It uses a specialised NFC coil structure, which is integrated and baked into the pixels of the screen.

This new architecture eliminates the need for a dedicated NFC chip or coil inside smartphones, which take up additional space. By equipping the display with wireless communication capabilities, Tianma says that it can achieve a sensing distance of up to 3 centimetres. For context, a dedicated NFC chip/coil will achieve up to 4 centimetres of wireless communication. It is what we see inside smartphones today.

So, the breakthrough tech is not too far behind the traditional design. Also, since this is the first working model of the said technology, expect it to advance further in future iterations. Tianma says that the panel uses shared driving circuits, low-resistance materials and a time-division algorithm which allows for both touch and NFC operations to happen simultaneously.

Combined with Tianma's TED touch technology, users will be able to use their device normally while making NFC-based communication like payments and smart home actions at the same time. Also, this integrated design doesn't make the display panel thicker than it normally is. Thanks to reduced component layering, manufacturers can easily maintain the flagship-level edge-to-edge viewing experience while supercharging it with NFC functionalities.

That said, at the time of writing, manufacturers and vendors are yet to adopt this technology in their existing products. Tianma has also not shared any timeline as to when this new display technology will enter mass production. However, we expect smartphones and smart home gadgets to adopt this NFC-enabled display tech soon into their future products.