Question 16: 9 or 18: 9 has been in the air for a long time, but the last announcement from Meizu made me touch on this topic.
Line presentation Meizu 15
A week ago, the company presented its anniversary line Meizu 15. One of its features was the preservation of the standard aspect ratio of 16: 9. In the comments, part of the readers wrote that this is an outdated ratio and it is high time to switch to elongated screens. But is 18: 9 as good as some of our commentators think?
Pros and cons of 18: 9
The main advantage of elongated displays is that it is possible to fit a larger screen into the same width of the case, as a result, we can boast that we have a 5.7-inch display in the case from a 5.2-inch device. And indeed it is. The second advantage of such screens is the larger amount of text that fits vertically, so you will have to flip pages less often. And for some reason, manufacturers, for some reason, along with the transition to a new aspect ratio, reduce the upper and lower bezels and there is an erroneous impression that the display takes up most of the body precisely due to the transition to the new aspect ratio.
At the same time, such screens also have enough disadvantages. The most obvious is the black bars on the sides when watching standard 16: 9 movies. You don't get a large diagonal in this use case. The second disadvantage is that reaching the top of the screen becomes even more problematic due to its elongation.
Pros and cons of 16: 9
In fact, the top and bottom bezels can be reduced perfectly in the old 16: 9 ratio, and the same Meizu 15 is a great example of this. As a result, we will get a full 5.5-inch screen without any black bars on the sides when watching the same YouTube and TV shows. Plus, most monitors and TVs have such an aspect ratio, so it's unlikely that the same YouTubers will quickly start shooting in 18: 9, this will be an additional work that does not make much sense at all.
Yes, a display with a 16: 9 ratio you will have to scroll a little more often, but we are in 2018, when the average diagonal of a smartphone approached 5.5 inches. Since there is enough information on such screens, increasing the display length is not critical when it comes to such a diagonal.
Conclusion
Every year it becomes more difficult for smartphone manufacturers to surprise a picky audience. And then such a great idea with elongated screens appeared and everyone began to talk about how cool they fit six-inch displays into a 5.5-inch case. And of course, in pictures and in numbers, it looks impressive, but the useful area is not useful in all scenarios of use, so this mod seems to me very doubtful, as well as the use of the cutout on the display.
What do you think, dear readers? Which displays do you like best? 16: 9 or 18: 9? Why?