Cellables - ScreenProtectors

Smartphones screens make or break your experience. This is also the second most expensive element of the phone to replace. If you value your device, apply a protective screen film to stop scratches and other damage. Or should I?

Most smartphone manufacturers use tough glass developed by Corning for their screens. Many Androids come with Gorilla Glass, and Apple purchases custom-made glass for the iPhone. This means your phone is less likely to shatter with every single drop or scratch on contact with your keys.

Screen protectors, meanwhile, can actually get scratched or dinged or cracked depending on the material—and unless they’re installed perfectly, they may make your screen look less perfect than it actually is. Plus, a screen protector will only help the screen itself. It won’t prevent dings on the edges or back or your phone—for that you’ll want a case—and it probably won’t prevent a shattered screen if you drop your phone on a really hard surface.

The smartphone screen glass is incredibly tough. Corning’s Gorilla Glass on Android phones or Ceramic Shield Glass on the new iPhones are aggressively impact and scratch-resistant. These glasses are so hard that only minerals can scratch them. Metals, like car keys in your pocket, are unlikely to leave a mark. On the Mohs hardness scale, The Gorilla Glass Victus lies somewhere between 6 and 7. Steel, for comparison, is between 4 and 4.5. This means that hard minerals like quartz can make visible scratches to this glass, but most common materials shouldn’t mark it. Corning has actually been releasing new versions of Gorilla Glass over the years. At the time of writing in January 2023, the newest version is Gorilla Glass Victus 2.

Many people overlook one source of glass damage: common minerals found in beach sand or hiking trails. If some grit ends up in your pocket with your phone, it may get scratched up to the point where it’s not good to use anymore. If you work in construction, have terrible luck, or want to resell your phone at the end of the year, then a screen protector may be worth using. But screen protectors come in all sorts of flavors, so I am going to go through each type of screen protector to make shopping a bit easier for you.

Screen Protectors Are Not Made Equal

We can’t talk about screen protectors as one single type of product. There are different screen protectors, and some have more practical use than others. Some protectors do more than just protect your screen. You can get protectors that add a matte anti-glare coating to make your phone more usable in bright conditions. Ultra-clear protectors minimize the effects of the protector on the image and filter out UV rays. On the other hand, privacy screen protectors obscure what’s on the screen to anyone except the person looking at it straight-on. So these protectors have utility beyond screen protection.

When it comes to the main job of providing extra protection for your screen, different protectors focus on it in varying ways. Here are the four types of screen protectors I could find some information on:

Tempered Glass: These bad boys are way tougher than plastic screen protectors, they feel nice, and they’re really easy to apply to your screen. But they can make your phone feel like a bubbly kids’ toy.
Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET): These plastic screen protectors are super cheap, thin, light, and smooth. They’re difficult to install, and they’re not that tough, but they’re nearly invisible once they’re applied to your screen.
Thermoplastic Polyurethane (TPU): Most plastic screen protectors are made of TPU. It’s a thin, flexible plastic that feels weird and is challenging to install. But it’s thinner than glass and tougher than PET screen protectors, so there’s that.
Liquid Screen Protectors: Yes, liquid screen protectors are a thing. They can prevent some scratches, but that’s about it. A liquid screen protector won’t save your phone from a disastrous accident, and it’s kind of hard to tell when you need to reapply the stuff. Some do call these types of screen protectors as self-heal screen protectors. Fancy.

The final verdict –

Screen protectors aren’t nearly as important as they used to be. They add a bit of extra protection to your phone, but that additional protection isn’t always necessary. Think of it like wearing knee pads while riding a bike. They could be super ugly, but they might come in handy during a freak accident.

In the end, whether you put a screen protector on your phone or not is up to you, but based on what we’ve discussed, you should keep these essential points in mind:

Screen protectors are primarily good at protecting your device from minor scratches that wouldn’t affect your use of a phone anyway.
Screen protectors always impact your phone’s image quality and usability to some extent.
You can often get screen replacement insurance or protection for very little money.
It’s debatable whether thick tempered glass screen protectors make a difference in a fall severe enough to smash modern smartphone glass.
If you use your phone in hazardous environments, consider a ruggedized case or phone instead.

Perhaps future smartphone glass technology will make screen protectors completely redundant, but even today they are optional.

Let us know your thoughts and comments on this topic in the section below.

References:

www.corning.com

Wikipedia.org

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