Back in January, we covered a Reddit user’s story of their new 16-inch MacBook Pro display cracking because of a cover over the notebook’s camera.
Six months later, Apple has released a support document informing MacBook customers to not put a cover over your camera. It turns out this can indeed wreck your display.
“Closing your Mac notebook with a camera cover on it might damage your display. Designed to protect your privacy, Mac notebooks have a camera indicator light to let you know when the camera is on,” explains Apple.
Apple further explains, “If you close your Mac notebook with a camera cover installed, you might damage your display because the clearance between the display and keyboard is designed to very tight tolerances. Covering the built-in camera might also interfere with the ambient light sensor and prevent features like automatic brightness and True Tone from working.”
The company says the front camera is engineered to only turn on alongside the green LED light. While this may be reassuring, some people cover their cameras anyways, just in case.
Apple says if you work somewhere that requires your camera to be covered, make sure your cover is “not thicker than an average piece of printer paper (0.1mm)”.
Just use painter’s tape as it won’t leave a residue and is very thin, if you’re going to cover your MacBook’s camera. Common sense says not to use a cover that is a huge and bulky, closing your lid on that would definitely harm your display.
