Apple’s iPhones have a reputation for having great cameras. For much of their history they have been up there with the best, in fact. It started with the iPhone 4 in 2010 (the cameras of the original, 3G and 3GS seemed more like an afterthought). We already talked about it in a Flashback, so we’re not going back that far today. Instead, we’ll look at the last 10 iPhone generations starting in 2012 with the iPhone 5.
If you scroll through the graphs below you will see that there is not much progress on the resolution front. The iPhone 4 had a 5MP camera, the 4 went up to 8MP, which has been stuck for a while and has been 12MP ever since. This includes the telephoto and ultrawide cameras, which started appearing later. These days the front camera is 12MP too.
Of course, there are rumors that this is the year Apple will finally adopt the high-resolution sensors that have taken control of most Android cameras: 48MP for Pro models, presumably, while vanilla phones will likely stick with it. at 12 MP once again. The 14 series could also bring autofocus for the selfie cam (all the front cameras on iPhones so far have had fixed focus).
IPhones Plus or Pro generally get better camera hardware (especially the Pro Max)
Going back to resolution for a moment, Apple A-series chipsets are super powerful, but so far no iPhone has offered 8K video resolution. This is a limitation of the sensors, 12 MP is not enough pixels for that.
As for the division between the base model and the Plus / Pro models, this was declared immediately. The iPhone 6 series was the first generation to split into the Vanilla and Plus models, and the Plus had Optical Image Stabilization (OIS), while the Vanilla did not. This remained the case for the 6s / 6s Plus generation as well.
Those features take a year or two after introduction to reach basic phones. The iPhone 7 was the first to have OIS, for example. In 2020, Apple introduced sensor shift stabilization, exclusive to the iPhone 12 Pro Max. This technology was later adopted by all iPhone 13 models. Note that the Pros have larger sensors and brighter apertures, however.
With that in mind, it’s no surprise that the alleged 48MP sensor will be exclusive to the Pro duo. Indeed, that’s the norm for Apple. Vanilla models have never offered a telephoto lens and that may not change this year either.
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