The notch.
Does hearing that word trigger you? What about seeing one in a smartphone?
When it comes to display cutouts you probably feel one of two ways about them; you either don’t care or you don’t shut up.
Love ‘em or hate ‘em, they aren’t going anywhere anytime soon. It’s the hot new trend and a way for OEMs to get a little more screen real estate from their phones.
The Google Pixel 3 XL is a perfect example. Announced in early October, it’s the latest flagship handset to feature the “notch”.
If you’re among those who were just about sold on the device except for that nagging little cutout, you’re in luck. It’s not something you have to live with.
As we quickly learned from Google, the display can be adjusted for users based on personal taste. In short, you can disable the notch.
We’ve been using a review unit for a couple of days now and are happy to show you how to do it. The process is fairly simple and takes but a few taps.
Until Google pushes out a different method, or adds it into the main settings, there’s only one way to remove the notch: enable and modify developer options.
Here’s how to disable the Google Pixel 3 XL notch:
Enable Developer Options
First things first — you need to turn this setting on in order to unlock the other stuff.
In your Google Pixel 3 XL, open your apps tray and follow these steps:
- Settings>System>About Phone>Build Number
Tap on Build Number a few times until it tells you that you’ve enabled Developer Options. All set? Great!
Now, back out a few steps and you’ll now go into those settings.
Hide the Display Cutout
- Settings>System>Advanced>Developer Options
Inside of Developer Options you will look for the subcategory of Drawing and scroll to where it says Display Cutout. Tap that and you’ll get a popup window. Select “Hide” and back out to your home screen. All set!
You can play with this setting whenever you want, enabling and disabling as needed.
