We all know that an Apple patent does not a product or feature make, but that doesn't mean that we can't look at what the company has been working on and extrapolate what that could one day mean. And in the case of the latest patent, it means that a future iPhone case could have Touch ID and support for capacitive buttons built right in.
Amid ongoing rumors that the iPhone 16 lineup will feature a capacitive Capture Button, a new Apple patent suggests the company has plans for a case that will work with such a button. What's more, there's support for essentially passing a Touch ID signal through the case and onto the iPhone button beneath it, too.
Such a feature has obvious implications, not least the fact that any future Touch ID-powered iPhone would still be protected from iPhone droppers everywhere while still providing support for what is still one of the best biometric security systems we've ever seen.
Getting all touchy-feely
The patent in question, first spied by Patently Apple, relates to both the iPhone and the iPad.
Currently, putting a case on a button that has Touch ID built in renders it useless. A similar issue can befall capacitive buttons that need to sense a user's touch — and the pressure with which it's being touched — which is likely to be an issue for the rumored Capture Button.
The patent understands that cases could accidentally trigger actions and has a solution to that — by building new capacitive buttons into the case itself. Such buttons could theoretically also support swipes and other gestures for adjusting media playback volume and more, too.
It is, as ever, important to remember that Apple patents almost everything its engineers come up with which means there is no guarantee these case ideas will ever see the light of an Apple Store. But it doesn't hurt to wonder, right?
