LTPO OLED backplanes

Low-Temperature Polycrystalline Oxide, or LTPO, is an OLED display backplane technology developed by Apple. LTPO combines both LTPS TFTs and Oxide TFTs (IGZO, Indium Gallium Zinc Oxide). LTPO is applicable for both OLED and LCD displays, actually, but this backplane technology is likely to be used exclusively in high-end OLED displays

Apple LTPO OLED backplane (IHS slide)

In LTPO, the switching circuits are using LTPS while the driving TFTs will use IGZO materials. This could lead to a power saving of around 5-15% compared to the currently-used LTPS backplanes. The main drawback of LTPO, however, is that the IGZO TFTs are larger and so the display density may be compromised.

In September 2014 Apple introduced the world's first device to use an LTPO backplane - the Watch Series 4. Compared to the current-generation Watch, the new series has a larger AMOLED display - 1.78" 448x363 on the 44 mm watch and a 1.57" 394x324 one on the 40 mm model.

The latest LTPO OLED News:

Everdisplay to delay production at its new Shanghai 6-Gen OLED production line by one year

China-based AMOLED producer Everdisplay is constructing a new 6-Gen production line in Shanghai, an expansion of its existing fab. The company's original plan was to start mass production in December 2024, but it now announced it will delay this and mass production is now only expected in december 2025. This is the second delay of this project.

Everdisplay 6-gen flexible OLED fab Shanghai (render)

Everdisplay says that the reason for the delay is that the company wishes to upgrade the line to the latest OLED technologies, such as LTPO backplanes, Tandem stack architecture and a hybrid platform (which means rigid OLEDs with TFE encapsulation and a glass backplane).

Read the full story Posted: Nov 13,2024

BOE launches its Q10 AMOLED display, receives DisplayMate's highest ever rating

BOE launched a new flexible AMOLED display, branded as Q10 AMOLED, that has a new OLED stack and delivers increased performance - the company said that compared to its previous flagship OLED stack, it enhances the peak brightness by 12.5%, the lifetime by 33%, and it reduces the power consumption by 10%. The company also says the color saturation and response time is increased.

The new Q10 display will debut at three smartphones, the OnePlus 13, OPPO Find X8 and Vivo iQOO 13. That specific screen is a 6.8" 3168x1440 (510 PPI) 120Hz LTPO AMOLED. DisplayMate tested the new display, and says it is the world's highest performing mobile display ever, seting or matching 21 performance records. It is the first display to receive DisplayMate's A++ rating.

Read the full story Posted: Oct 17,2024

Apple announces its 2024 iPhone 16 series, and the new Apple Watch Series 10, all with AMOLED displays

Yesterday Apple announced its 2024 iPhone 16 series, and its latest smartwatch devices - all based on OLED displays. We'll start with the the iPhone 16 that offers a 6.1" 2,000 nits (HBM) 1179x2556 Super Retina XDR LTPS AMOLED, while the iPhone 16 Plus offers a larger 6.7" 1290x2796 display. Both phones are based on Apple's latest 3nm A18 chipset offering improved performance and AI support.

The iPhone 16 Pro has a more advanced 6.3" 120Hz 2,000 nits (HBM) 1206x2622 LTPO Super Retina XDR OLED. The 16 Pro Max offers a larger 6.9" 1320x2868 AMOLED. These new phones are based on Apple's 3 nm A18 Pro chip, offer a "huge leap in battery life", support Apple Intelligence and feature new a main camera.

Read the full story Posted: Sep 10,2024

Omdia: in 2028, LTPO will overtake LTPS as the OLED backplane of choice for smartphones, by 2031 520 million LTPO smartphones will ship

Omdia says that in 2028, LTPO will overtake LTPS as the leading smartphone OLED backplane technology. By 2031, smartphone LTPO OLED panel shipments will reach 520 million units, with a 52% market share (of all smartphone OLED displays).

Omdia sees the smartphone OLED market rising in the next 10 years. In 2031, over one billion OLED smartphone panels will ship. In 2024, Omdia sees a sharp increase of 24% in smartphone OLED shipments (compared to 2023), which will surpass 800 million units. 

Read the full story Posted: Aug 08,2024

Visionox shows its latest OLED and MicroLEDs at Displayweek 2024

During Displayweek 2024, Visionox demonstrated many OLED display technologies and panels, and also an interesting microLED prototypes (produced by its subsidiarity Vistar).

Visionox is in the final stages of development of its ViP maskless display production process, and the company showcased some nice ViP smartphone panel prototypes (the technology can be used for any panel size). ViP offers a high improvement in aperture ratio (69% up from 29%) which results in low power consumption and brightness (up to 4X according to Visionox), improved lifetime (up to 6X), improved PPI and more.

Read the full story Posted: May 27,2024

Apple develops a higher-efficiency LTPO backplane by adopting IGZO in the driving TFT

Apple was the first company to develop LTPO backplanes and it adopted this innovative and energy-efficient backplane technology back in 2018 in the Watch Series 4. LTPO combines Oxide-TFT and LTPS, by using the IGZO in some of the switching TFTs and LTPS in the remaining switching TFTs and all the driving TFTs. LTPO can reduce the power consumption by 5-15%, and enables variable refresh rate.

Apple Watch Series 4 photo

According to reports from Korea, Apple developed its 2nd-Gen LTPO backplane technology, that uses the IGZO in all the driving TFTs, and uses LTPS only in the remaining switching TFTs. This leads to higher efficiency compared to the first-generation LTPO backplane.

Read the full story Posted: Apr 10,2024

BOE starts constructing its 8.6-Gen IT flexible AMOLED line in Chengdu

Towards the end of 2023, BOE officially announced its plans for a 8.6-Gen flexible LTPO AMOLED line in Chengdu. The agreement with Chengdu's local government was signed in early 2024, and now BOE started to construct its new production line.

The total investment in the fab is expected to reach 63 billion Yuan (over $8.7 billion USD). The fab will have a capacity of 32,000 monthly substrates (2290x2620 mm), and is expected to begin production by Q4 2026 (total construction time will be 34 months, according to the plan).

Read the full story Posted: Apr 02,2024

Samsung and LG begin producing 11" and 13" tandem LTPO AMOLED displays for Apple's iPads

Reports from Korea suggest that Samsung Display and LG Display are starting to produce AMOLED displays for Apple's future iPads, to be announced later this year. Samsung is set to produce 11" LTPO AMOLED displays, while LG Display is producing displays for the 13" model (but LGD will also produce 11" AMOLEDs in the future for Apple). 

Apple iPad (8th-Gen)

The Elec says that both Korean makers developer 11" and 13" displays, but for some unknown reason only LGD will produce the 13" displays. This could change in the future, of course. One reason could be that LG Display has more experience with tandem OLED architectures (developed originally by LGD years ago for automotive OLEDs).

Read the full story Posted: Jan 18,2024