AG glass (Anti-Glare glass) refers to glass that has undergone special surface treatment—such as etching, coating, sandblasting, or polishing—to alter its surface roughness, creating a matte effect that achieves diffuse reflection.
Early AG implementations for mobile phone glass covers primarily relied on chemical etching, as seen in models like Huawei’s Mate 20, OPPO R17 Pro, and OnePlus 6. However, chemical etching is costly and has significant environmental impacts. According to reports, the glass casing of Apple’s new model released on September 11 adopted a next-generation process developed in collaboration with manufacturing partners: ceramic bead sandblasting (rather than AG etching). The glass back cover of the iPhone 11 Pro series also transitioned from a glossy finish to a custom matte texture.
Sandblasting Process
Sandblasting is a process that uses a mixture of sand and water as the medium, which is pressurized and sprayed onto the glass surface via a sandblasting machine to achieve polishing. As early as 2018, an Apple patent titled "Surface Finishing" revealed the company’s development of a new treatment process for iPhone casings. The patent detailed a technique involving sandblasting to create textured grooves on the device body, with ceramic beads used in place of conventional abrasives.
Sandblasting impacts the workpiece surface with propelled abrasive particles, imparting specific smoothness, varying roughness, and granularity. This process enhances the mechanical properties of the surface, thereby improving fatigue resistance, increasing coating adhesion, extending film durability, and promoting better leveling and decorative effects for coatings. It also removes surface impurities, discoloration, and oxidation layers while roughening the substrate surface, relieving residual stresses, and increasing surface hardness. Multiple companies worldwide now possess mature processes and equipment for this technology, which has been deployed in numerous well-known smartphone brands.
Advantages of Sandblasting:
Streamlined process flow
High production efficiency
Enhanced environmental friendliness
Sandblasting has broad applicability, including on ceramic covers. Reports indicate that the latest Apple Watch also utilizes sandblasting. With the release of Apple’s iPhone Pro frosted AG glass, next-generation AG glass sandblasting is poised to become the mainstream surface treatment for future 5G smartphone casings.
As technology advances, AG sandblasting has emerged as a leading glass surface treatment process. It not only reduces glare and blocks blue light but also enables intricate texture designs on glass surfaces.
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