Corning has announced Gorilla Glass Victus 2 with improved protection for first-generation Gorilla Glass Victus that was announced in 2020 as a successor to 2018's Gorilla Glass 6. With smartphone displays getting bigger and more fragile by the day, robust protection for them is no longer a luxury but a necessity. No wonder then that technologies like Gorilla Glass have become so popular over the years, thanks to the heightened scratch resistance and drop protection on offer.
Corning is one of the leading specialty glass companies making display protections for smartphones. Its Gorilla Glass line is among the sector's leading and most well-known technologies. However, other companies, like AGC and Schott, also make similar products under the Dragontrail and Xensation brand names, respectively. All of these brands offer strengthened, tempered glass processed by controlled thermal and chemical treatments that modify the properties of the glass to make it less brittle and more resistant to scratches.
In a press release, Corning said that Gorilla Glass Victus 2 can survive drops from up to one meter (a little more than three feet) onto surfaces "replicating concrete." To compare its next-gen product against competing brands, the company said that other aluminosilicate glasses in the market "typically failed when dropped from half a meter or less." On surfaces replicating asphalt, Victus 2 survived drops from a height of up to two meters and offers up to four times more scratch resistance than competitors' products. Of course, these are all in controlled lab tests, so it remains to be seen how the new technology would perform in real-world tests.
Corning Gorilla Glass Victus 2
David Velasquez, Division Vice-President at Corning, also said that current smartphones are around 15 percent heavier and 10 percent larger than they were four years ago. According to Velasquez, the increased weight and larger screen real estate add more stress on the glass, making them more vulnerable to damage. To for modern designs and reduce the probability of damage, the new protection technology is said to have been designed with heavier devices and larger screens in mind.
Meanwhile, there's no specific information on exactly how much tougher Victus 2 is compared to its predecessor when it comes to drops on hard surfaces like concrete, nor is there any word on how much better the scratch resistance will be. As for when the first batch of smartphones with Gorilla Glass Victus 2 will be available for purchase, Corning said that the new technology is currently being tested by OEMs and is likely to make its way to the market "within the next few months."
Source: Corning