All eyes on 2014: what's next for mobile displays

Did you know that the screen of your phone or tablet is actually the part that eats the most battery in daily use? While battery breakthroughs are hard to come by and seem to happen once in a century rather than a decade, there are a few technologies coming on a larger scale in 2014 that will help our phones and tablets last longer and look better. How do we know? We already got a taste of the future in 2013, and all chances are that small bite will finally turn into a feast in 2014.

The biggest advancement in screen technology is something we don't talk about that often - power consumption. Just a couple of years ago, nearly all mobile displays were made using amorphous silicon (a-Si) technology. Even the state of the art 2012 Nexus 10 with its extremely sharp screen uses it. In 2013, we finally got a bite of IGZO and LTPS. The cryptic acronyms (we explain them in more depth in the slideshow below) bring us huge power savings. IGZO is used in the iPad Air and draws just nearly 75% of the power a Nexus 10 display uses, while LTPS in tablets like the Amazon Kindle Fire HDX tops that and uses just a fraction of the power.

Along with that huge innovation come the now usual advancements in screen resolution as we move to QHD (2560 x 1440 pixels on a smartphone), a more resilient Gorilla Glass and more. Take a look at what this year will bring right below.