Samsung presents second largest camera sensor for smartphones to date

Samsung has presented the second largest camera sensor for a smartphone to date. The Isocell Bright HMX has a 1/1.33″ sensor with pixels of 0.8 microns in size, good for a resolution of 108 megapixels. It comes in a phone from Xiaomi.

Manufacturer Xiaomi hinted last week about the arrival of the camera sensor for smartphones and now Samsung has put details online. It is a 1/1.33″ sensor, much larger than the 1/2″ sensor of many current smartphones and also larger than the 1/1.75″ sensor of some Huawei smartphones such as the P30 Pro. The only smartphone with a larger camera sensor is the 2012 Nokia 808 Pureview with a 1/1.2″ sensor.

Samsung uses the smallest pixels it has developed to date, 0.8 microns. The software can combine information from four neighboring pixels for a 27-megapixel photo. The manufacturer does not mention a possibility to combine information from nine pixels for a 12-megapixel photo. The video resolution is up to 6k, with 6016×3384 pixels. The 4:3 sensor has a maximum of 12,032×9024 pixels.

The camera sensor will go into mass production at the end of this month and will probably come first in Xiaomi’s smartphone. It was previously rumored that this concerns the Mi Mix 4. Whether and when the sensor will come in other smartphones is still unknown. Samsung specifically mentions Xiaomi as a partner in the development of the camera sensor, so it is obvious that the Bright HMX will only be found in Xiaomi devices for the time being.

Earlier this year, Samsung presented a 64-megapixel sensor for phones, the GW1. It will probably also appear in smartphones this fall. Many this year’s phones, including midrange models, have 1/2″ sensors from Samsung and Sony on board. That’s a step in sensor size from the 1/2.3″ or smaller camera sensors in smartphones in recent years. years.