Apple’s iPhone 16 gets ‘stunning’ camera upgrade
Rumors are swirling that Apple’s iPhone 16 will feature a “mind-blowing” camera upgrade that will change the way users capture the world around them.
A tech expert has suggested that the iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max could support an AI camera with 100x zoom, which adds missing details to a photo to create clearer results.
The AI capabilities would be possible with Apple Intelligence, but the expert noted that the new hardware of the high-end smartphones would be the key to improved photography capabilities.
While the upcoming iPhones will be the first Apple devices to feature an AI camera with 100x zoom, Samsung and Google have long incorporated this technology into their smartphones.
A tech expert has suggested that the iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max could support a 100x zoom AI camera, which adds missing details to a photo to create clearer results.
The upgrade was unveiled at the ‘Matt talks about technology‘ YouTube channel this week, where Matt claimed he had found ‘breadcrumbs’ in the iOS 18 system that prove the new system that the public called ‘mind-blowing’.
The discovery was likely made in the beta version of the operating system, which developers typically use to test new features for bugs.
The improved zoom feature comes as a result of Apple adding AI to iOS 18, bringing editing features to the table.
However, Matt claimed that the new technology combined with the super-telephoto periscope camera, which is also rumored to be coming to high-end iPhones, would give Apple the means for an AI camera with 100x zoom.
Periscope telephoto cameras use prisms and mirrors, allowing for longer focal lengths or higher optical zoom without making the phone thicker.
The periscope camera is believed to have a focal length of over 300mm, compared to the 120mm focal length in the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max, which offer 5x zoom capabilities.
The focal length is the distance in millimeters from the center of the camera lens to the image sensor on the camera.
“A 300mm focal length could result in a zoom capability of 12 or 13 times. And then if we add some Apple Intelligence about the digital zoom capability, we get even more zoom capability,” Matt said.
He gave an example of how an AI camera with 100x zoom would work, using the Samsung Galaxy s24 Ultra.
The smartphone can take photos with a zoom factor of up to 100x, making photos clearer and giving users the ability to clean up images with built-in AI features.
Tech experts claim to have found images of iPhone 16 cases that show a sleeker, pill-shaped camera system capable of capturing 3D “spatial video” for playback on Apple’s Vision Pro VR headset.
“They’re not the only ones doing this by the way, Google does this quite often,” Matt said.
‘For example, Google also has a 5x telephoto lens with their Pixel phones that can zoom up to 30x digitally.’
The camera is typically the biggest change in Apple’s latest smartphones, as the device itself has largely remained the same since the launch of the iPhone X in 2017, which featured an edge-to-edge display.
Apple has said that no changes are being made in order to stay true to the brand and maintain consistency.
But it is especially the camera that moves with the times and continues to change.
Technology experts claim to have found images of iPhone 16 cases that show a sleeker, pill-shaped camera system that can capture and play back 3D “spatial video” on Apple’s Vision Pro VR headset.
The change would be a stark departure from the current iPhone layout, which has a bulky, diagonal camera design.
Until now, only the iPhone 15 Pro has been capable of recording such stunning and immersive 3D “spatial videos,” which you can view on the Vision Pro headset.
These vertically stacked cameras on the iPhone 16 and 16 Plus would mark the first major change to the alignment since diagonally-aligned lenses were first introduced with the iPhone 13 in September 2021.
According to this report, the new setup will allow the phone to capture images with both the main camera and the ultra-wide camera simultaneously.
By synthesizing these two video feeds, even the cheaper iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Plus can capture video with a sense of depth, making it seem like you’re seeing a real scene unfold before your eyes.