Samsung Galaxy phone with a pop-up rotating camera? It may happen, check out the patent and renders

Xiaomi isn't the only company that's trying out interesting pop-up smartphone camera ideas, as suggested by filed patents. Korean giant Samsung is also trying to figure out the perfect smartphone camera design, in order for a phone's display to be completely free of notches and punch-hole cameras, while still allowing the user to take high-quality selfies.

A patent Samsung filed in mid-2020 was recently published by the WIPO (World Intellectual Property Office), showing a Galaxy phone with a main camera module at the back, that can alternatively rise and turn around to face the user.

Now thanks to LetsGoDigital and Concept Creator's 3D renders shown below, we can see what a Samsung Galaxy smartphone like this could look like.

The idea here isn't too different from what we saw implemented on the Asus ZenFone 7 Pro back in 2020. We have a main camera module, which when needed can flip around to face the user and take selfies too. Thanks to this solution, the front of the phone won't need to feature any selfie camera notches or cut-outs, obstructing the screen. But more importantly, your main camera doubling as your selfie camera can mean much higher quality selfies!

The way Samsung has envisioned its solution is with a tall and somewhat cylindrical camera module containing three cameras. Those will take the usual photos and videos, but when the user switches to selfie mode, a motorized mechanism will rotate and raise the camera module enough for the top camera to end up facing the user.

Realistically, we can't have strong hopes that this Samsung patent will lead to an actual phone with a camera like that. It's quite often that we see large smartphone manufacturers filing patents for ideas and products that never make it. As cool as it might be, a motorized pop-up camera module normally brings the issue of reduced phone durability.

Motorized parts are susceptible to breaking down with time, not to mention accidentally dropping a smartphone with a motorized camera module could potentially damage all of its cameras, rendering them unsuable. Optimistically though, maybe Samsung has an idea of how to make such a module durable enough. That's the same company that designed the ingenious Galaxy Z Fold 2 hinge, after all.

Regardless, it's always fun and informative seeing what ideas the designers behind our favorite phone brands are coming up with and considering.