Punch holes and pop-up selfie cameras are one way to declare war on the notch, but Samsung has a different approach. As revealed by a patent application uncovered by LetsGoDigital, the Korean manufacturer wants to reinvent the notch. Specifically, it wants to take it out of the display, and put it on top of it. That’s what the application calls reverse notch.

A display module with a display panel attached to the back of the cover window used in a smartphone. The cover window includes a protruding portion at the top center and agreed to the protruding portion. By placing the cameras, speakers etc in there, the screen size can be maximized while creating a rectangle screen — patent application

As defined above, the reverse notch is basically a portion of a bezel, with a cutout, keeping only the portion housing the hardware. We’re not quite sure what Samsung’s thinking about here, but, just because there’s a patent, the usual disclaimer goes, it doesn’t mean we’ll see a commercially available product that will employ it.