Surprisingly, netizens are petitioning for LCD flagship phones. Is this a doomed self-rescue attempt?
Humans are always contradictory.
The principle sounds simple, but in fact, it's a judgment I made boldly after observing for a long time.
For example, some parents stay up late scrolling through their phones but accuse their children of being "lack of self - discipline" for staying up late; when stuck in traffic, they scold the traffic police for being "inactive", but when they run a red light themselves, they claim it's a "special case". The instinct of human nature to seek advantages and avoid disadvantages always drives us to measure right and wrong from a self - centered perspective.
The same goes for consumer electronics.
On the one hand, we enjoy the fun brought by mobile phones and computers. On the other hand, we put on a posture of being very concerned about eye health. When buying a mobile phone, we not only care about the screen dimming method, whether it has hardware low - blue light, how well it suppresses stroboscopic effects and adapts to brightness. Sometimes, we even come up with this ultimate extreme statement:
"It seems that... OLED screens are not as good as LCD screens."
What? In an era when OLED has adopted hundreds of millions of colors, 2K resolution, and LTPO adaptive refresh rate, and made mobile phones thinner than paper, there are still people missing the LCD screens that require backlight panels, often have light leakage issues, and have such thick bezels that it's like an aircraft carrier deck?
Recently, there has been such a strange story in the tech circle. A group of users who call themselves "OLED victims" can't stand the stroboscopic effect, so they spontaneously organized a large - scale "LCD self - rescue signature campaign". They created groups, invited people, and filled out questionnaires. They planned to take the signatures of thousands of people to "petition" the mobile phone manufacturers.
What they want is for the manufacturers to build a flagship mobile phone for the LCD faction.
The Aborted Petition
The whole thing actually started with an unknown netizen named Zha Ge.
On August 11th, Zha Ge, a netizen, posted a video on bilibili. He claimed that he uses three mobile phones for work every day and has made thousands of calls to various manufacturers, just to persuade the mobile phone manufacturers and give himself a glimmer of hope for crowdfunding an LCD flagship mobile phone.
According to his vision, this product should be equipped with Dimensity 8400/Dimensity 9300 and a 6.78 - inch LCD screen customized by China Star. If it really comes to fruition, it will be the highest - spec LCD model on the market currently.
(Image source: bilibili)
Under Zha Ge's initiative, the LCD faction began to collect signatures from LCD device users on various social media platforms such as QQ groups, Bilibili, and Tieba.
The incident fermented much faster than expected. As of August 17th, in less than five days, more than 2000 netizens using LCD - screen mobile phones and more than 3600 filled - out questionnaires had gathered in the QQ group of the "LCD self - rescue signature campaign". They sincerely hoped that these data could prove the existence of their group and the authenticity of their needs.
Unfortunately, the answer is no.
(Image source: Zhihu)
So far, relevant personnel from Meizu and Lanhu mobile phones have clearly stated their refusal.
It is reported that TCL mobile phone said that they are willing to learn about it and can help customize a TCL P10 phone with a new chip and screen based on the old production line. However, they require the customized quantity to be at least 5000 units, and the crowdfunding process cannot be used. Users need to pay directly to TCL on the official website.
This only official channel ended up with no further progress because of the contradictions within the LCD user group and the denials from insiders.
(Image source: Zhihu)
Since the official channel didn't work, this group of LCD faction members had to resort to the old way of "modifying" phones.
Here, I'd like to introduce a unique business on Xianyu: Forcibly replacing the screen of a brand - new OLED flagship phone with a third - party LCD screen.
(Image source: Xianyu)
Out of curiosity, I contacted several merchants on Xianyu who offer screen - replacement services. Surprisingly, most of them are not interested in the topic of "eye - protection".
A seller frankly explained that the maintenance cost of the original OLED screen of a flagship phone is extremely high, often reaching thousands of yuan. Replacing it with a much cheaper domestic LCD screen can not only solve the problem of a broken screen but also earn a considerable price difference. It's just a pure economic calculation.
In other words, in their view, "eye - protection" is just a marketing slogan, and the real driving force is the profit brought by the low - cost maintenance solution.
(Image source: WeChat, Xianyu)
It's worth noting that replacing the screen with an LCD one doesn't mean everything will be fine. Except for the iQOO 12, which has many bugs, many products, including the iQOO 12 Pro, will have a problem of reduced resolution after replacing with an LCD screen. In addition, many replaceable LCD screens have a 60Hz refresh rate and a 120Hz sampling rate, and functions such as proximity sensing, double - tap to wake, and under - display fingerprint will also malfunction.
It can only be said that even if users sacrifice the official warranty and some functions, this screen - replacement operation is still the only way for some users to retain the flagship performance.
The Decline of LCD
Looking back three years ago, it was the last days of the "LCD will never be a slave" era.
Although flagship mobile phones at that time had generally switched to OLED screens, LCD screens were still an option for mid - and low - end models. Redmi even came up with the slogan "Revitalize the glory of LCD, Redmi takes it as its bounden duty" and spent a lot of money to open a screen production line, showing high hopes for this niche category.
(Image source: Redmi)
What was the result? The sales of the Note 11T Pro were extremely poor. By the next year, among the LCD mobile phones released by manufacturers, only the iQOO Z8 and the Note 12T Pro were still worth mentioning.
In 2025, there is only a rebranded product like the vivo Y50 5G left on the market.
(Image source: vivo)
From a business perspective, every decision of mobile phone manufacturers is a comprehensive consideration of cost, technology, supply chain, and marketing.
In my opinion, the complete retreat of LCD from the flagship market is not accidental.
Firstly, there are structural changes in the supply chain and cost.
As leading manufacturers such as Apple, Samsung, and Huawei have fully switched to OLED, the entire high - end mobile phone supply chain has also tilted. Almost all top - tier screen suppliers (such as Samsung, China Star, and BOE) have focused their R & D and production capacity on OLED.
(Image source: Redmi)
At this time, if a manufacturer wants to customize a small batch of top - tier LCD screens for a flagship phone, it not only has weak bargaining power and high procurement costs but may even fail to find a top - tier supplier willing to take the order.
The cost of large - scale procurement of OLED is significantly lower than that of small - batch customization of top - tier LCD.
Secondly, there are problems in product definition and marketing.
In the general perception of consumers, OLED has been deeply associated with high - end and flagship products. Its self - luminous characteristic brings pure black, higher brightness, wider color gamut, and faster response speed, which are all excellent selling points in marketing.
(Image source: Redmi)
In contrast, the physical structure of LCD that requires a backlight panel limits its performance in contrast and thickness, and also restricts the application of under - display fingerprint technology. Due to its physical structure, it is also difficult for LCD to achieve an extreme screen - to - body ratio with equal - width bezels on all four sides.
The pursuit of thinness, lightness, and high screen - to - body ratio in modern smartphones is naturally contradictory to the physical structure of LCD.
Finally, there is a serious lack of user demand.
Undoubtedly, the real demand of LCD users is not enough to support a product. Although the Redmi Note 11T Pro has a certain reputation in the circle, its sales volume is far lower than that of the mainstream OLED models in the same series; after adhering to LCD screens for several generations, the successor of the iQOO Z series, the iQOO Z9, still resolutely switched to OLED.
The actual product iterations of mainstream manufacturers have proved that the commercial value of this niche market is limited and cannot support continuous investment.
Is It Sentimentality or Paranoia?
As a consumer, I can understand the "persistence" of some LCD users.
Although LCD has no advantages over OLED in terms of contrast and viewing angle, it is good for eye - protection and won't suffer from screen burn - in. Some users who are really sensitive to stroboscopic effects do get more eye fatigue when using some OLED phones.
The problem is that such a group is too niche. Even among the LCD faction on the Internet, there may not be many real stroboscopic - sensitive users. The impression these people who talk a lot about eye - protection leave on the public and manufacturers is that they are like those paranoid consumers on Tieba and Coolapk who are as picky when buying a thousand - yuan phone as if they were buying jewelry.
(Image source: Tieba)
When they buy ten phones and return nine because of minor problems, don't expect manufacturers to treat them nicely.
The good news is that technology is always advancing.
The problems of screen burn - in and stroboscopic effects that OLED was criticized for have been greatly improved. The common screen dimming frequency has increased from a few hundred Hz to 1920Hz, 2160Hz, or even higher; some manufacturers have successively launched eye - protection solutions such as Oasis Eye - Protection and Bright - Eye Protection, which incorporate low - blue light, similar - natural light, and ambient light adaptation.
