- Leica unveils the Leitzphone, its first globally available phone
- The US is set to miss out, though
- The camera hardware is similar to Xiaomi’s latest flagship
Leica makes phones, but you probably wouldn’t know it because so far they have been exclusive to Japan. That situation just changed, however, with the new, globally available Leitzphone.
There’s bad news if you’re in the US, however, because that’s the one market set to miss out on what looks like a fabulous flagship phone – especially for photographers.
Powered by Xiaomi and wrapped in a typically premium Leica shell, the Leitzphone shares much of the same hardware as the latest flagship Xiaomi phone — meaning an iPhone and Galaxy-beating triple camera unit.
The main camera is equipped with a large 50MP 1-inch sensor and LOFIC tech, for natural photo quality and less of a reliance on HDR and computational processing. For camera nerds, LOFIC stands for Lateral Overflow Integration Capacitor. In short, the capacitor sits at the pixel level and reduces clipping, thus increasing dynamic range. Leica hasn’t provided me with the actual numbers.
What’s unique to the Leitzphone model — besides its slick Leica design and UI / UX that’s consistent with its actual cameras, and which is a first for phones as far as I know — is a mechanical ring around the camera unit. It’s a real design centerpiece for photographers, providing a tactile way to manually control a setting of the camera.
By default the control ring is set to zoom, this avoiding screen tapping to switch between cameras and zoom settings. (The 200MP telephoto lens has a 3x to 4x optical zoom.) However, the ring can be reassigned to functions such as exposure compensation and white balance. Proper photographer’s stuff.
The Leitzphone will also be compatible with the latest version of Xiaomi’s camera grip, which comes in a photographer’s kit, and which will go a long way in improving the phone’s handling for photography. That was certainly my experience with the Xiaomi 15 Ultra.
There’s one version of the Leitzphone; a matte black with silver knurled trim, priced at £1,700 (around $2,000 / AU$3,400). Inside the box you’ll find a cleaning cloth, red wrist strap, silver lens cap plus a case (which is compatible with the mechanical ring).
My dream phone for photography?
I have previously declared the Xiaomi 15 Ultra as my favorite camera phone, and although I’m yet to properly try out the new Leitzphone, I’m pretty sure it’ll win my heart.
It’s equipped with the latest Xiaomi tech, as per the 17 Ultra announced on the same day ahead of MWC in Barcelona. I really felt that the larger 1-inch sensor delivered the natural photo quality I expect from a premium compact camera, rather than the overly processed look I often experience with camera phones.
Throw in Leica’s gorgeous design and UI, plus the various color profiles and bokeh characteristics inspired by Leica cameras and lenses, and it looks set to be my dream phone for photography.
One profile is inspired by the Leica M9 — the last Leica camera to feature a CCD sensor (before CMOS became the industry standard). Images made with CCD sensors have a different look about them.
A black-and-white mode is inspired by Leica’s new Monopan 50 film roll, too — its first film, revealed last year.
Leica isn’t skimping elsewhere, either. The Leitzphone features a healthy 6.9-inch display with 3500nit brightness, 16GB RAM, 1TB storage, 6,000mAh battery, and a Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset.
Speaking of chipsets, there’s a unique (to phones) additional security chip, designed for securely embedding content credential information onto images — the industry standard way of authenticating images as real.
All in all, the Leitzphone feels like the luxury phone for photographers and, ironically, one of the more affordable ways to shoot with a Leica. I’ll report back once I’ve had an extended time photographing with the phone.
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