Apple’s upcoming iPhone 15 Pro Max model will be the only next-gen iPhone to receive a periscope zoom lens, according to Twitter user @Redditor. This corroborates existing claims that suggest the same thing.
While @Redditor does not have a long track record of reputable leaks, it still piles onto the existing heap of rumours about the iPhone 15 series of smartphones.
The new periscope lens technology would provide a big boost to the phone’s optical zoom capability. The existing “telephoto” camera on the iPhone 14 Pro Max reaches a maximum distance of 3x, while the new periscope lens is rumoured to reach 5x or 6x.
Periscope cameras work by bending the light coming into the image sensor in order to amplify the achievable zoom distance. This gives users more room to work with before having to resort to quality-reducing image cropping.
Periscope technology is not new to smartphones — many Android flagships have already shipped with the fancy lenses on deck. Samsung’s Galaxy S23 Ultra and Google’s Pixel 7 Pro can achieve 5X and 10X optical zoom, respectively.
Disappointingly, it looks increasingly likely that the smaller iPhone 15 Pro will not come with the new lens. I’ve always appreciated Apple’s efforts to maintain feature parity in its lineup of phones, which it generally does a good job of.
This time around, those of us with a preference for smaller phones might have to compromise on a top-of-the-line camera setup. To be fair to Apple, its competitors have also made a habit of reserving periscope lenses for only its largest sized offerings.
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