Apple recently filed for a patent to use the logo on the back of its phones as a notification light. The patent application outlines how the “adjustable decoration” could respond to events by changing its appearance or flashing to attract your attention. These notifications could include an “incoming communication” or “a calendar reminder”.

But using a logo as a notification light is not entirely new. The helpful feature made an appearance on the Razer Phone 2 in 2018. The Motorola One Zoom also uses its rear Motorola logo as a notification light rather than a fingerprint sensor as in previous models. Although it’s not that much of a grand feature, it can be quite useful. It’s helpful if you want to know you’re not missing anything important while your phone is facedown on a desk or table.

The notification light logo feature also makes sense for Apple products.

You can recall that the company illuminated its logo on older MacBooks. However, it dropped the design feature with the laptop’s 2015 redesign. Bringing back its illuminated logo with a little practical functionality added to it truly wouldn’t be much of a massive leap.

In addition to the notification light feature, the application makes frequent references to “cellular telephone” calls as part of its description. This heavily suggests that Apple is considering using the feature on a future iPhone. If thi is so, then perhaps users will switch from using LED flashes for incoming calls and alerts to this.

However, the patent also includes images showing a series of “illustrative electronic devices” including a laptop, a tablet, and what appears to be an iMac.

As is always the case with Apple patents, it’s best to read this with a healthy degree of scepticism. Just because Apple considers a feature doesn’t mean it’ll include it in any of its products in the near future. That doesn’t mean we don’t want this to happen. Perhaps we just want to see the company’s glowing logo make a long-overdue return.