iPhone 7 Rumors: Dust- And Water-Resistant Chassis With Touch-Sensitive Home Button Expected

The Apple iPhone 7, set to launch in the third quarter of the year, is not expected to have a major design overhaul. However, fresh speculations suggest it won’t feature a physical Home button. Rather, it will have a touch-sensitive digital Home button. It is also expected to feature dust- and water-resistant chassis.

Citing information from Storm, a Chinese site, 9to5Mac has reported that the iPhone 7 will feature haptic feedback motors like the one present on the Force Touch trackpad of Retina MacBook. It means that even though the iPhone 7 will come with a flat capacitive surface, it will create an illusion of a real Home button. Smartphones running on Android and Windows already feature touch-sensitive Home buttons, but the iPhone 7 would be the first Apple smartphone to feature it.

Previous rumors about iPhone 7 have suggested that the smartphone would feature a water- and dust-resistant chassis. The axing of the physical Home button to make way for a touch-sensitive one will assist the California company to completely seal the chassis of the phone, thus protecting it from damage through contact with water and dust. There is no information on how Apple will be incorporating the Touch ID fingerprint sensor on the touch-enabled Home button.

Since the end of 2015, speculations have indicated that iPhone 7 will not have a 3.5 mm headphone jack. Instead, the phone will support connectivity for wired headphones through its Lightning port. The removal of the 3.5 mm audio jack also indicates that the upcoming smartphone will be a completely waterproof device.

The Chinese publication has also said that the iPhone 7 will sport a matte black color. The color shade would be similar to the slate black-colored iPhone 5. The iPhone 7 is also expected to feature a Smart Connector that will allow users to connect different accessories.