The fingerprint scanner technology was first introduced by Apple on its iPhone 5s that featured Touch ID. Now, a research firm Counterpoint’s report is speculating that over a billion of smartphones will be shipped with a built-in fingerprint scanner in 2018. Therefore, smartphones with fingerprint scanner are expected to become the standard feature in 2018.
Presently, the fingerprint scanner has been already a primary feature in latest mobile phones, regardless of the price. Initially, the iPhone 5s model boasted the fingerprint scanner which later adopted by all smartphone manufacturer. Even a budget smartphone like Xiaomi Redmi 4 has a fingerprint scanner at a price point of Rs 6,999.
The Counterpoint report mentioned that the top OEMs like Samsung, Apple and Huawei are likely to be the leader among the other mobile phone makers in the allocation of smartphones with fingerprint scanner. Samsung has been the top phone maker in the second quarter of this year for shipping 12 percent of all smartphones with a fingerprint sensor. Later, Apple followed the trend with 11 percent market share and Huawei with 8 percent market share.
“The penetration of fingerprint sensors in the low-mid end smartphones will increase next year due to rising scale and declining cost of the fingerprint sensor, making it one of the essential components in a smartphone,” said Parv Sharma, Research Associate.
One of the prime concerns associated with the fingerprint scanner was the reliability of fingerprint scanner. Most of the smartphones in the market come with capacitive fingerprint scanners which are prone to be spoofed easily. Nowadays, the latest fingerprint scanners are competent to detect the live finger.
Furthermore, the sensors utilize ultrasonic fingerprint sensing tech that generates a 3D fingerprint image which is likely to be more advanced and secure option.
The Chinese smartphone brands are already offering fingerprint scanner in their smartphones. The penetration of Chinese smartphones with fingerprint scanner will be more especially in the emerging markets. Besides the unlocking feature, the fingerprint scanners can also be used to secure the payments. Also, the sensor could be used to control various gestures to operate camera, gallery and other applications.