iPhone 13 Camera Upgrade vs. iPhone 12: Why Autofocus Ultra-Wide Lens Is a Big Deal

Among the many exciting features in the upcoming iPhone 13 are its improved cameras. These reportedly include an autofocus ultra-wide lens with sensor-shift optical image stabilization and an array of software features, such as night-sky photography and Portrait Mode video.

iPhone 13 Camera: Ultra-wide Camera Autofocus in Pro Models

But what truly makes these iPhone 13 cameras eagerly anticipated is the capability to auto-focus using the new, enhanced ultra-wide camera. According to respected Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo in a 9to5Mac report, only this year’s awaited iPhone 13 Pro models will offer the new lens, with the other models offering it in further upgrades of the iPhone starting in 2022.

This is really a great upgrade, considering that the current iPhone 12 Pro Max features a 12MP ultrawide camera, carrying a mere fixed-focus f/2.4 lens that pales in comparison to the phone’s main and telephoto lenses.

These ultra-wide lenses are really important in the ever improving quality of high-end smartphones. It gives a large depth-of-field that makes a great portion of the image in adequate sharpness. Without needed to make focus adjustments, objects would appear sharp wherever they are in the image.

iPhone 13 Cameras: Enhanced Autofocus Ultra-wide Lens

However, adjusting to a wider aperture or increasing the pixel count could diminish the sharpness. Users would have to select parts of scene that are kept sharp by way of the autofocus feature. Autofocus would help in decreasing the ultra-wide lens’ minimum focus distance, so that allowing close-up shots to be snapped.

The iPhone 12 Pro Max offers a tremendously fast and accurate autofocus. As such the autofocus on the iPhone 13 should have huge enhancements. These camera upgrades should also serve as encouraging updates on the new iPhone model in the face of uncertainty of the actual iteration of the phone that is set to rollout this year. Some rumors say that the forthcoming release is just an incremental update to the iPhone 12S, instead of a new full upgrade that Apple fans had been anticipating.

Early leaked images of the new iPhone 13’s schematics showed that the camera module is larger than the current series, with the camera bump protruding farther than in the iPhone 12. Other rumors had said that the new cameras would protrude less than the current model, with the bump itself sticking out more than the lenses. A glaring change is the diagonal positioning of the lenses on the iPhone 13.