HTC's Edge Sense seems to be the smartest gimmick after latest update

The HTC U11 has to be easily one of the best smartphones from the Taiwanese manufacturer’s stable in the recent years. We had it on our desk for a few weeks and felt that it is one of the most sensible flagships smartphones in 2017 (read our review of the HTC U11 here). We also felt that HTC’s Edge Sense was a more practical answer to Samsung’s Edge Display on the Galaxy S8. However, Edge Sense was limited to a handful of functions that time, namely app shortcuts and gestures for the camera app. Despite that, we claimed that this would get better with time and it seems that it has already started to do so.

HTC in one of its blog post has mentioned the updates to its Edge Sense feature. With the Edge Sense, you can now use it for individual apps. You can configure the squeeze gestures for specific functions in specific apps. Therefore, if you found the zoom gesture in Google Maps too cumbersome, you assign that function to Edge Sense and a short squeeze will zoom in on your location. If you were already using Edge Sense to snap photos or switch between front and rear cameras, now you can also do that using the Instagram and Facebook cameras.

HTC themselves say that they have completely unlocked Edge Sense for users to use them in any way they deem fit. It will work differently for individual apps and will switch its functions based on the app that’s opened on the display. This will surely make life slightly easier for existing U11 customers and an attractive proposition for prospective customers.