Samsung's next Galaxy Note flagship may come with a camera inside the S Pen

A recent patent filed by Samsung at the USPTO (U.S. Patent and Trademark Office) paints a rather weird picture concerning the upcoming Galaxy Note flagship. It appears that Samsung is looking for ways to completely remove both the notch and “punch hole” display designs, but still allow Galaxy Note owners to take selfies.

The schematics shown in the patent suggest Samsung plans to make important changes to the S Pen rather than the phone. Long story short, the patent describes a method including a camera into the S Pen, which will feature at least one lens and an image sensor.

The camera embedded into the stylus is supposed to be controlled by an external button. Another external button placed lower on the S Pen should allow users to adjust the zoom. Spotted by PatentlyMobile, the patent mentions that the S Pen is meant to an upcoming Galaxy Note device, but doesn't specify which one.

Although adding a camera to the already multi-functional S Pen will further improve its usefulness, it's hard to believe Samsung is willing to drop the selfie camera on the next Galaxy Note altogether.

In fact, we're not even sure that the camera on the S Pen is meant to replace the Galaxy Note's selfie camera. For the time being, the only thing that we're certain of is that a future S Pen stylus might allow users to take pictures without having to use their Galaxy Note phone.