Credit: E Ink

E Ink Holdings, a leading manufacturer of electronic paper displays, has announced the creation of a new notebook (NB) e-paper touchpad solution. It integrates color e-paper with notebook touchpads by utilizing Intel Corporation’s Smart Base technology.

Most modern laptops have a trackpad below the keyboard, but every now and then a PC maker will decide that this space could be used for something more. We’ve seen laptops with touchpads made from touchscreen LCD displays, as well as laptops with touchpads that serve double duty as numeric keypads.

Soon we could see something new. E Ink has announced it’s worked with Intel to design an ePaper touchpad for laptops.

Basically this solution combines a traditional touchpad with a color E Ink display, letting you use the space below your keyboard both as an input device and also as a second screen for your laptop.

Among other things, you could use this unusual touchpad for:

• Notifications

• Shortcuts

• Weather updates

• Cover art

Because it’s 2025 and no tech-related press release is complete without a mention of AI, E Ink also notes that the touchpad screen could be used to show “GenAI contents like text/image summaries, gaming tactics, or custom AI tasks displayed on the interactive C-cover.”

So why use an E Ink screen rather than an LCD or OLED display? E Ink displays don’t consume much power — in fact they can show a static image indefinitely even when your device is powered off or the battery is completely dead. So there should be little impact on battery life.

E Ink screens can also be viewed using only ambient light, so there’s no need for a backlight or front-light. And they’re flicker-free, so they shouldn’t lead to any additional eye strain.