How to hide the Samsung Galaxy S10’s hole-punch camera cutout - The Verge

By now you may have noticed that the new Samsung Galaxy S10s have a new “hole-punch” design on the front-facing camera that allows for thinner bezels along the top of the screen. Samsung went with this design to avoid the generally disliked notch; the S10E and S10 have a circle hole punch, while the S10 Plus has a longer cutout to accommodate the dual lens selfie camera.

But while this does add more screen real estate for those devices, some might find the hole punch a bit annoying to look at. If you prefer a more classic look to your phone, or at least want to disguise the hole punch and make it less prominent, here are two ways to hide the cutout on the new S10 phones.

Option 1: Turn the hole punch off

If you don’t mind sacrificing a little bit of screen to avoid the camera cutout, one option is to get rid of it altogether. You can do this by going to your Settings menu and selecting Display > Full Screen Apps. You’ll see that the first option at the very top is “Hide front camera.”

Toggling this on will add a black bar to the top of your device. While this effectively hides the hole-punch effect, it unfortunately looks as if there’s a thicker bezel up top. It also looks disproportionate since the bottom does not adjust to offer a more balanced display placement between the forehead and the chin. The black bar will continue to show on other viewing modes like full screen video and camera as well.

Option 2: Disguise it!

For those who don’t want to sacrifice their infinity screen, the more fun option to hide the hole punch is to use wallpapers to playfully disguise the cutout.

There are already plenty of resources for finding some fun wallpapers that do this. Our favorite so far is on the subreddit r/S10wallpapers, where community members are uploading creative wallpapers regularly. You can find everything from the hole punch blending in with a sloth hanging from a thick branch, to quirkier ones like the hole punch cleverly hiding in the... uh... (opens new window, look up the Star Wars essential guide to vehicles and vessels), ahem, “Superlaser focus lens” on the Death Star.

Just download your favorite, then go to Wallpapers and Themes under the Settings menu. Find the photo in your Gallery, and set it as your wallpaper and / or lock screen.

In the future, Samsung may offer more creative wallpapers like these in new software updates. But for now, if you can’t fight it, have fun with it and embrace what you can now do on the new S10s.

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