I’ve been writing about the best phones for almost 20 years now, but 2025 proved that phone makers can still surprise experts like me.
Take Realme, for example, which decided – with the Realme GT8 Pro – to offer a feature I never realized I wanted: an interchangeable camera housing.
Meet the Realme GT8 Pro’s changeable camera design
Before unboxing the Realme GT8 Pro a few weeks ago, I had no idea that it offered an interchangeable camera housing. At first, I dismissed it as little more than a gimmick, but then I changed the housing from the default round design to the included square version, and fell in love with the idea of being able to swap it out at will.
This interchangeability isn’t just limited to the regular Realme GT8 Pro, but is also a feature on the gorgeous green F1 Aston Martin Aramco version (pictured above). I was able to mix and match the black and green housings on both devices for some really eye-catching results.
Realme also offers additional color options across both versions of the GT8 Pro, giving users the opportunity to truly stand out from the crowd in both their choice of finish and the camera housing they opt to equip at any given time.
Realme isn’t the only tech product with modular components
As alluded to already, Realme joins a slowly growing yet still nascent list of phone makers experimenting with modular and interchangeable components in smartphones. The GT8 Pro is the latest in a line of phones that have attempted to make customization easier, but it’s also the best example to date.
The most prominent other example is the Fairphone 6, a fully modular, sustainability-focused phone that makes it easy to swap out key components like the battery or display when needed. In theory, Fairphone offers infinite customization options, but the complexity of implementing them has kept its smartphone a mostly niche product that has yet to achieve true market fit.
Then there’s Project Ara, the ill-fated Google project which saw the Pixel maker attempt to build a fully modular phone. This was ultimately canceled due to complexity and cost issues, but it also wasn’t the right time for such a product when it was announced at Google I/O in 2014. A decade on, could now be the right time to attempt such a product again?
The semi-interchangeable add-on industry
We’ve also seen other companies pursue a semi-interchangeable approach through device add-ons.
The most renowned of these attempts came from Motorola, with its infamous Moto Mods lineup, which extended the Moto Z’s features through magnetic snap-on accessories that connected to the phone with pogo pins. Some of these features included powerful JBL speakers, Insta-Share projectors, Mophie and Incipio batteries, and even 5G connectivity, long before it was as ubiquitous in smartphones as it is today.
LG followed suit with a much less successful range of add-ons for the LG G5, and more recently, HMD has attempted the same with certain devices under the Nokia brand. Dubbed Smart Outfits, these add-ons include a ring light for selfies, a rugged case with an IP rating, a battery booster, and a gaming controller with joysticks and buttons.
Most recently, we saw Nothing take a similar approach to HMD with the CMF Phone 1, which features screw-in accessories like stands, card holders, and magnetic mounts. CMF also took the Realme route by letting users change the design, color, and materials of the Phone 1, rather than simply add specific features. This made the CMF Phone 1 one of the most unique phones you could buy at the time of its launch, and CMF has continued that approach with the excellent CMF Phone 2 Pro.
And then there’s some of the best camera phones – specifically the Vivo X300 Pro, Oppo Find X9 Pro, and Xiaomi 15 Ultra – which all feature add-on photography kits that include an additional telephoto lens to further their respective cameras’ zoom capabilities beyond what’s natively possible.
I hope more tech makers follow suit
Building a smartphone is incredibly challenging, and with the cost of components increasing (especially RAM in the current AI-dominated era), each phone requires companies to make trade-offs to achieve the right price and product positioning. As such, each phone maker is forced to launch many variations of its flagships, each one designed for a different type of consumer. But what if there’s another way?
Imagine being able to buy a single base model of a phone – say, the upcoming Galaxy S26 – and then swap out the core components, such as the camera lenses or battery, to make a phone that’s designed specifically for you. This was part of the dream and allure of Project Ara, and one of the reasons why I really like the Realme GT8 Pro’s interchangeable camera design. And while Google’s project failed a decade ago, now could be a good time to try again.
Alongside giving users more customization, offering add-on accessories and components would also help phone makers increase their average revenue per user. The success of Vivo’s and Oppo’s photography kits proves that some customers will buy additional components to achieve the best features, so I hope that more phone makers follow Realme and others by attempting to bring add-on accessories and components to the mass market.
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