If Apple made an iPhone mini, this might be what it would look like

By Oliver Haslam
published

Mosaic Phone Concept
Mosaic Phone Concept (Image credit: Louis Berger)

What you need to know

  • Mosaic is a concept phone that's a bit like an iPhone mini.
  • Or an iPod turned into an iPhone, maybe?
  • Whatever it is, you're going to want one.

We've seen more than enough concepts in recent weeks but they all tend to revolve around what people think the iPhone 12 or another future iPhone might look like. This concept might also be what a future iPhone has to offer. But not for a long time!

Mosaic, spotted by Yanko Design, is the creation of Louis Berger and it's what you'd expect if the iPhone's camera unit was ripped out and turned into a phone of its own.

Content creation and sharing evolved to probably the most important functions of smartphones. Mosaic rethinks the smartphone camera as an independent & modular device.

Mosaic Phone Lanyard Concept

Mosaic Phone Lanyard Concept (Image credit: Louis Berger)

What you end up with is what Berger calls a Photo Tile, the camera that includes a small display, a processor, and a battery. Oh, and all the camera gubbins. That can then be added to by either attaching a screen or putting the Photo Tile into a Large Display Tile. That creates a package more akin to a traditional iPhone with a larger screen, more battery power, and a beefier processor.

The result is a modular phone that can be used as a lanyard or a traditional phone.

With necklaces & clothing clips, Mosaic aims at making your phone more wearable. A magnetic grip pad attaches to the back of the larger display tile to even out the z-height difference between the body and the camera module. 3rd party cases could turn the Mosaic Photo Tile into a rugged action camera etc.

Pretty cool, right? You can head over to Berger's full explanation of how all of this would work. Or just enjoy the awesome images they created. I'd love to see a future iPhone morph into something like this and who knows, maybe the Photo Tile could also be turned into a watch as well?

You can have that one for free, Apple.

Oliver Haslam
Oliver Haslam
Contributor

Oliver Haslam has written about Apple and the wider technology business for more than a decade with bylines on How-To Geek, PC Mag, iDownloadBlog, and many more. He has also been published in print for Macworld, including cover stories. At iMore, Oliver is involved in daily news coverage and, not being short of opinions, has been known to 'explain' those thoughts in more detail, too.

Having grown up using PCs and spending far too much money on graphics card and flashy RAM, Oliver switched to the Mac with a G5 iMac and hasn't looked back. Since then he's seen the growth of the smartphone world, backed by iPhone, and new product categories come and go. Current expertise includes iOS, macOS, streaming services, and pretty much anything that has a battery or plugs into a wall. Oliver also covers mobile gaming for iMore, with Apple Arcade a particular focus. He's been gaming since the Atari 2600 days and still struggles to comprehend the fact he can play console quality titles on his pocket computer.

2 Comments
  • Sorta reminds me more of like a ipod nano/shuffle... Even if Apple ever made something like this. I mean you already have the iWatch. If im not mistaken you can make calls on it with out a phone. Assuming you have the one with data plan. If im not mistaken.
  • You can make calls with the LTE version of the Apple Watch. What you can't do is take pictures.