In the smartphone industry, things can take drastic turns in just a glimpse. Back in the hay days of smartphones, the megapixel count was determined as a crucial element if one wants to buy a phone with ‘x’ megapixels. The trend was submerged when smartphones with better computational power arrive which enhances images like never before. Well, the megapixel wars seem to have broken off again as we have already seen smartphones with multiple camera setups and even primary sensors going as high as 48MP and 64MP in one or two smartphones launched recently but it’s just the start.
According to the findings by XDA Developers, they have found traces of four Xiaomi devices that will sport 108MP sensor from Samsung. The sensor uses a 0.8micrometer pixel size which seems to be the ideal size although it is debatable. Since smartphones today use pixel binning technology, it means phones can have four pixels merged into one to create larger 1.6micrometer pixels that produce stunning images at 27MP.
The report suggests that MI Galaxy app within Xiaomi’s MIUI has added support for viewing upscaled 108MP photos in full resolution and adds that devices codenamed “draco”, “cmi”, “umi”, and “tucana” will support photos at full resolution. To put things into context, earlier, Gallery app on most smartphones doesn’t support viewing images at their full resolution and let alone images at 108MP resolution. However, OEMs started adding support to viewing these extrinsic images at their full resolution and allowed zooming in for the 48MP images which have become common now.
This means that since Xiaomi is adding support to viewing 108MP images with zooming into its full resolution, it might be working on smartphones with 108MP sensors at the first place itself.
As the report goes, Xiaomi is likely to use Samsung ISOCELL Bright HMX sensor that we will soon see in one of the high-end Galaxy A series of smartphones. Four of these unreleased devices might be from both Mi and Redmi branding although the Chinese smartphone maker earlier mentioned that these phones will carry Mi branding. Also, Xiaomi Mi Mix 4 pr 5 that we are expecting to arrive later this year will not support 108MP sensor since there is no mention of the device within the source code.
Xiaomi just released a smartphone with the world’s first 64MP sensor i.e. Xiaomi Redmi Note 8 Pro while the non-Pro model was tied with 48MP sensor only. The Chinese brand actually announced the upgrade earlier last month when Realme teased the same although turns out Realme has booked a later date to reveal its smartphone with a 64MP sensor probably Realme XT that will arrive this month.
