Friday, July 4, 2025
iPadOpinionsPatents

Instead of a foldable iPad how about a rollable tablet?

This image of a tablet that can be rolled up is courtesy of Radbound Universiteit.

A foldable iPad has apparently been delayed. How about a rollable iPad instead?

About the patent filing

Apple has filed for a patent for an “electronic device with flexible display structures. However, they’re not just flexible, they’re “rollable” with screens that may be wrapped around one or more rollers. In a stored position, the flexible display may be wrapped around a storage roller. 

Optional deployment rollers may be used to help deploy the touchscreen display as the display is pulled out of the housing. A flexible display may be viewable through a transparent housing window before and after the flexible display is pulled out of the housing. Magnets may be used to outwardly bias edge-mounted bistable support structures and thereby help prevent a rolled flexible display from wrinkling.

FIG. 2 is a perspective view of an illustrative device having with a flexible display that can be rolled.

Summary of the patent filing

Here’s Apple’s abstract of the patent: “An electronic device may have a flexible display. The electronic device may have housing portions that are rotatably coupled to each other so that the flexible display may fold along one or more bend axes. A device may have rollers that store a flexible display and that help deploy the display from within a housing when additional display area is desired. 

“A touch screen in a housing may be overlapped by a flexible display that has been scrolled outwardly from the housing. Wireless transmitter and receiver circuitry may be used to convey image data to display driver circuitry. The display driver circuitry may display images on a pixel array in a flexible display based on the image data. Magnets may be used to outwardly bias edge-mounted bistable support structures to help prevent a rolled flexible display from wrinkling.”

I hope you’ll help support Apple World Today by becoming a patron. All our income is from Patreon support and sponsored posts. Patreon pricing ranges from $2 to $10 a month. Thanks in advance for your support.

Dennis Sellers
the authorDennis Sellers
Dennis Sellers is the editor/publisher of Apple World Today. He’s been an “Apple journalist” since 1995 (starting with the first big Apple news site, MacCentral). He loves to read, run, play sports, and watch movies.

Leave a Reply