What if I told you the iPhone Air has a hidden camera that solves one of the biggest pain points of Apple’s ultra-thin phone? You’d be skeptical, but it’s true because of the new front-facing camera that has a square sensor and thus can take wide-angle shots. As you’ll see in this article, using the front-facing wide camera to take photos gives you a much wider angle than the single camera’s 1x camera. It’s not a perfect solution, by any means, and most people looking to buy a new iPhone should just buy the iPhone 17 and call it a day, but for those that need a little bit of versatility in the admittedly-lacking iPhone Air camera suite, this trick gives you options if you use it right.
No need to take a step back to get a wide shot
Using the front camera in wide angle mode is like having a 0.7x lens
Flip through the above gallery, and you’ll see what I mean. In the 1x shots, I just took a photo from the main rear camera on the iPhone Air. Then, I turned the phone around to use the front camera to capture the first shot, but I hit the “wide” button in the camera app. As you can see, the wide shots from the front camera, while certainly not as clear and consistent as the 1x lens (due to the smaller aperture and lack of OIS on the front camera), are passable and absolutely give you a wider shot than the main camera. In a pinch, this method gives you access to 0.7x wide lens similar to a 19mm focal distance without having to physically take a step back to capture more of the scene.
It helps a lot if you have a tripod or cradle and can use the self-timer to take the wide shot, as it’s obviously not easy to steady the camera when you’re holding it backwards. This is especially important as the front camera is not stabilized, so unless the phone is held perfectly still, you’ll probably end up with a blurry shot.
Here’s the catch
The front camera has far worse optics than the single rear camera, and it shows, so you don’t want to rely on it. The aperture of the front camera is f/1.9, versus f/1.6 on the rear camera, which means it lets in a lot less light. Taking wide shots on the front-facing camera in conditions that lack enough light creates a grainy image. Not only that, but the front camera does not have optical image stabilization versus the rear camera, again resulting in softer and less bright images than the rear camera, which has Apple’s acclaimed Sensor Shift image stabilization.
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And of course, using the front camera as the primary is awkward — you don’t get a viewfinder, so you’re kind of shooting blind, and you have to physically turn the camera away from you. Again, it’s not ideal, but in a pinch, it works, and this trick is akin to getting access to a wider focal lens versus what you get on the 1x camera.
Does iPhone Air really have a hidden wide-angle lens?
Most people won’t buy the iPhone Air because it’s too expensive and too compromised. But for people like me who are smitten and awe-struck by how thin and light it is, and are willing to make a few usability tweaks to make living with this phone easier, the iPhone Air can do more than meets the eye. While it might not be until 2026 or even 2027 before the Air gets a proper successor with a second wide-angle lens on the back, the new Center Stage front camera is flexible enough to give you semi-wide-angle shots when needed, even if that means holding your phone in an awkward way to get the shot. But it’s certainly possible, and having this (imperfect) trick at your disposal makes living with the iPhone Air more palatable. That’s really the theme of the iPhone Air: if you’re willing to make a few sacrifices (like battery life that might require you to charge midday, or a loudspeaker that isn’t quite room-filling), the iPhone Air rewards users who are intentional, adaptable, and a little forgiving.
8/10
- SoC
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A19 Pro chip 6‑core CPU with 2 performance and 4 efficiency cores 5‑core GPU with Neural Accelerators 16‑core Neural Engine Hardware-accelerated ray tracing
- Display
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Super Retina XDR display 6.5‑inch (diagonal) all‑screen OLED display 2736‑by‑1260‑pixel resolution at 460 ppi
After using the iPhone Air for several weeks now, I can honestly say that it’s the closest we’ve ever come to Steve Jobs’ full realization of his vision for the iPhone, but there are trade-offs like battery, speaker volume, and camera versatility. But with this little tweak, you can indeed get wide-angle shots from the iPhone Air if you’re willing to be a bit creative.
