Apple’s upcoming iPhone 15 Ultra is reportedly going to get a big upgrade in terms of its camera.
According to longtime Apple tipster Revengus, Apple’s upcoming iPhone 15 Ultra is set to come with a big camera upgrade: a telephoto camera with a variable zoom lens. This is the same rumored setup we’re reportedly going to see come with Samsung’s Galaxy S24 Ultra, putting these two upcoming flagship phones in fierce competition with each other when it comes to their cameras.
Currently, Apple’s iPhone 14 Pro Max (the ‘Pro Max’ moniker is expected to change to ‘Ultra’ with iPhone 15) supports up to 3x optical zoom, while the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra has 3x and 10x telephoto lenses. The upcoming iPhone 15 Ultra and Galaxy S24 Ultra are rumored to come with single telephoto sensors with a variable system, meaning that you can move optically between degrees of magnification at will. This is a meaty upgrade, as you might expect.
This is especially true for iPhone when you consider that the current Pro Max only has a 3x optical zoom instead of the up to 10x optical zoom you get with the Galaxy S23 Ultra. Either way, variable optical zoom cameras are pretty rare in the smartphone world. They do exist, but they’re certainly not plentiful, so if either the upcoming iPhone Ultra or Galaxy Ultra do manage to pack in a variable optical zoom camera, that would be a big upgrade.
Of course, though, whether it’s the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra or the iPhone 15 Ultra, both of these products are still just rumored and any features in them are similarly just speculation at this point, so we’ll have to wait and see if a variable optical zoom camera does, in fact, ship with either smartphone. Nonetheless, big upgrades are always welcome, especially for higher-end smartphones.
