The history of mobile phones with multiple cameras.

Since cameras have become the most attractive selling feature on a smartphone, manufacturers are making great efforts to improve their quality. At one point, great attention was paid to the number of megapixels that a smartphone camera could pack. So, we reached a point where we saw really high resolution cameras on smartphones, as an attempt from companies trying to attract buyers. Unfortunately, many times these cameras don’t produce high quality pictures, due to other other deficiencies in the smartphone. As we said in the corresponding article, the resolution alone does not guarantee the quality of a photo.

Nowadays, we see the phenomenon of multiple cameras in smartphones. Do the many cameras really help a smartphone, or are they another marketing trick of manufacturers to increase their sales?

First mobile phones with multiple cameras; how the trend started.

It all started in 2014. HTC was then one of the leading smartphone manufacturers and launched the HTC One M8. This was the first smartphone with a dual camera setup. Or not… Actually, the first was the Samsung B710, from the most distant 2007. The B710 was designed to take 3D photos and videos, as at that time 3D TVs were considered the future… something that did not really happen in the end. But the first “normal” smartphone with a dual camera was the HTC One M8.

The HTC One M8 has two 4MP cameras. One is the “normal” camera, the same as its predecessor, the HTC One M7, and the other is used as a depth sensor. In this way it gave depth to the images, giving a more natural blur to the background behind the person or object it was focusing on, the so-called bokeh effect. Nevertheless, this innovation was not enough to make up for HTC’s shortcomings in software and resolution, as even then, 4MPs were very few. The HTC One M8 was another disappointment for fans of the brand, the second in a row, after the One M7, which also failed in the field of photography for similar reasons. It could not compete with the flagships of that time such as the Samsung Galaxy S5, Galaxy Note 3, LG G Pro 2, Sony Xperia Z2, but also other innovators such as the Nokia Lumia 1020, which brought a 41MP camera and Windows Phone software.