Here's the 2019 iPhone XI camera bump up close and detailed
Love it or loathe it, the iPhone XI camera design that leaked way back in January is apparently final. And, after releasing renders of both the iPhone XI and iPhone XI Max earlier this week, Steve Hemmerstoffer and CashKaro have now returned with a detailed look at the controversial design feature.
Curved glass and a bump that doesn't protrude quite as much
Leaked iPhone XI and iPhone XI Max dimensions suggest Apple’s next-gen iPhones will be slightly thicker than the current models. The reason for this, apparently, is the presence of significantly larger batteries, but the move should also result in a camera bump that doesn’t protrude quite as much – it should be around 2mm shorter.
With the objective of making the bump blend in more, the iPhone XI and iPhone XI Max will make use of a single slab of glass on the rear that curves upwards around the camera module. The iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus adopted this design way back in 2016, although they used aluminum rather than glass.
The iPhone 7's rear panel also curved upwards around the camera
Three camera bumps... within the camera bump
Zooming in on the area, the glass that curves upwards actually provides a slight lip around the camera bump visualized in the iPhone XI renders. Curiously enough, though, the curved portion of the glass isn’t actually colored. Hemmerstoffer says the glass is transparent and simply picks up the color from its surroundings.
Moving on to the glass within the camera bump, as revealed yesterday this will match the color of the phone’s rear. This means that Space Gray iPhone XI’s will feature Space Gray glass for the camera, silver iPhones will use silver glass, and so on. Contained within this area is, as visualized, the triangular camera setup, the quad-LED flash, and the microphone. The latter two lay flush against the glass, but each individual camera actually protrudes slightly creating three individual bumps within the camera bump. These, however, aren’t expected to stick out any further than the surrounding lip mentioned above.
As for the sensors themselves, these are surrounded by a black ring. Previous renders suggested the ring would match the color of the glass but this no longer appears to be the case.
Apple iPhone XI/XI Max camera specifications
Regarding actual specifications, the expectation is that both the iPhone XI and iPhone XI Max will carry a total of three 12-megapixel cameras on the rear. Like previous models, there should once again be a primary sensor alongside a telephoto zoom alternative. Accompanying these is then expected to be a new super-wide-angle camera.
Software features are yet to leak but Apple presumably has some in the works that’ll require data from all three cameras. After all, it's the only logical explanation for the triangular camera setup – if data from all three wasn't required simultaneously the company could opt for a horizontal design instead. Regarding optical zoom improvements, it's currently unclear if any will be made – existing iPhones support 2x zoom.
Completing the iPhone XI and iPhone XI Max camera setup should be a new selfie camera. Since the iPhone 7, Apple’s devices have carried 7-megapixel sensors, but with the next-gen models, this should be swapped out for a 12-megapixel camera.
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