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Samsung has played a big role in bringing back styluses. Prior to the iPhone we were used to clunky PDAs that were often controlled via a stylus. Then the iPhone came along and wipe out that entire range of products. Samsung brought the stylus back with its popular Galaxy Note phablet series, the entire lineup has been quite popular and doesn’t seem to be going away anytime soon. We’re used to seeing changes being made to these devices every single year, but the stylus has essentially remained the same over all these years. Two new Samsung patents could hint what the next generation S Pen may be capable of.

The United States Patent and Trademark Office has published two new Samsung patent applications that detail a stylus with both a microphone and a speaker. These components will then enable the stylus to let users take phone calls as well as give voice commands without having to even hold their device. The stylus effectively “functions as a substitute for a wireless headset,” Samsung says in one patent application. Users will simply be able to mount the stylus to a shirt pocket, much like a pen, and do a variety of tasks completely hands-free. The second patent deals with the grip, basically the next generation S Pen could have a protruding grip that would come out once the stylus is drawn from the device. Even though the patents are there, it doesn’t necessarily mean that Samsung will bring all this to light. Though its possible that we might see some of these improvements in the Galaxy Note 4, fingers crossed till then.

Filed in . Read more about Galaxy Note and Samsung.