Other Could someone please help me understand the iPhone 17 Pro camera optical zoom values

[AnTaR3s]

Hey all. I don't get it, the iPhone 17 Pro has three rear cameras, yet everywhere I read about optical zoom levels of 1x, 2x, 4x, and 8x. One of these has to be a digital zoom. Could someone enlighten me what the true optical zoom values are of the lenses? I would assume it's the standard lens with 2x digital zoom (48MP -> 24MP) and a 4x camera with an 8x digital zoom (again from 48MP to 24MP).

I am asking because I do not care about their trickery with naming things, I would like to know about true optical zoom without cropping or other post-processing tricks.

thanks!

 

[BigBlur]

Main camera (1x optical lens):

• 1x = 24MP or 48MP optical
• 2x = 12MP digital crop

Telephoto camera (4x optical lens):

• 4x = 48MP optical
• 8x = 12MP digital crop

Ultra Wide Camera (0.5x optical lens)

• 0.5x = 48MP optical

Essentially, only 0.5x, 1x, and 4x are truly optical that make full use of all the megapixels. Anything else is just a digital zoom. They say "optical-quality" because there is no scaling or interpolation going on, but it's really just a digital crop that results in a lower/smaller megapixel sized photo.

 

[AnTaR3s]

Main camera (1x optical lens):

• 1x = 24MP or 48MP optical
• 2x = 12MP digital crop

Telephoto camera (4x optical lens):

• 4x = 48MP optical
• 8x = 12MP digital crop

Ultra Wide Camera (0.5x optical lens)

• 0.5x = 48MP optical

Essentially, only 0.5x, 1x, and 4x are truly optical that make full use of all the megapixels. Anything else is just a digital zoom. They say "optical-quality" because there is no scaling or interpolation going on, but it's really just a digital crop that results in a lower/smaller megapixel sized photo.

Thanks, yes that makes much more sense. So we have a 0.5x, 1x, and 4x camera. Compared to the previous year with 0.5x, 1x, and 5x. 😊


Which makes things worse for some applications, I assume.

 

[cannono]

Apple has some frankly false claims online, but as stated above, the real optical modes are 0.5x ultra wide lens, 1x standard wide, and 4x tele.

This list is just Apple being slick about using partial resolution and calling it optical. It’s what everyone else would say is digital, as it uses the same optics and simply blows up a portion of what that camera and lens capture.

 

[Tdude96]

Yeah, the moment they said "optical-like" 8x during the presentation my ears pricked up. And then when they said 12MP it confirmed that it's a sensor crop, not an optical zoom. So effectively they went from 5x optical at 12MP on the 16 Pro to a 4x optical at 48MP on the 17 Pro and an option to do a sensor crop to 8x at 12MP.

Just so we're clear, it's deceptive, but not as deceptive as it sounds, and it's not as bad as digital zoom. Digital zoom enlarges a portion of an image by interpolating pixels, reducing quality and detail. No matter how much you mess with digital zoom output, it's going to look bad. Sensor crop uses a smaller area of the camera sensor to capture the image, maintaining the quality and reducing the field of view (zooming in). It's something photographers do all the time manually to make framing corrections. Except since it's sensor crop, you can get a better original to work with in your focus and exposure than you would by cropping a 4x image after the fact.

Between that and Apple's computational photography and (almost certainly) AI processing, I'm sure the 8x will look nice, even though calling it "optical-like" is somewhat misleading.

 

[thecautioners]

Yeah, the moment they said "optical-like" 8x during the presentation my ears pricked up. And then when they said 12MP it confirmed that it's a sensor crop, not an optical zoom. So effectively they went from 5x optical at 12MP on the 16 Pro to a 4x optical at 48MP on the 17 Pro and an option to do a sensor crop to 8x at 12MP.

Just so we're clear, it's deceptive, but not as deceptive as it sounds, and it's not as bad as digital zoom. Digital zoom enlarges a portion of an image by interpolating pixels, reducing quality and detail. No matter how much you mess with digital zoom output, it's going to look bad. Sensor crop uses a smaller area of the camera sensor to capture the image, maintaining the quality and reducing the field of view (zooming in). It's something photographers do all the time manually to make framing corrections. Except since it's sensor crop, you can get a better original to work with in your focus and exposure than you would by cropping a 4x image after the fact.

Between that and Apple's computational photography and (almost certainly) AI processing, I'm sure the 8x will look nice, even though calling it "optical-like" is somewhat misleading.

Hey, this makes me feel better! Thank you for this explanation