Chinese smartphone makers are all-in on photography. Xiaomi’s latest Leica-infused phone, the 17 Ultra by Leica, features incredible camera specs, the famous Leica Red Dot logo, and, most interestingly, a manual lens zoom ring.
As reported by Engadget, Xiaomi unveiled its new flagship 17 Ultra by Leica smartphone today, and it has a lot of features designed specifically for photographers.
At the heart of the Xiaomi 17 Ultra by Leica’s triple rear camera is a 50-megapixel main camera. The Type 1 Light Fusion 1050L sensor sports Lateral Overflow Integration Capacitor (LOFIC) technology to deliver dynamic range performance.
While getting into the weeds is unnecessary, the primary takeaway is that the sensor’s individual pixels have additional light-storing capacity and utilize dual conversion gain technology to improve overall imaging performance. When a pixel overflows with light, the excess light is stored in the sensor’s overflow area, effectively increasing its full well capacity in certain situations. Per Xiaomi, the 17 Ultra’s full well capacity is 6.3 times greater than the 15 Ultra’s prior-generation Type 1 image sensor.
This big new image sensor is paired with a 23mm equivalent f/1.7 lens.
The other two cameras in the rear array are a 50-megapixel ultra-wide and a 200-megapixel telephoto. The ultra-wide camera features a Type 1/2.76 image sensor and a 14mm equivalent lens, delivering a 115° field of view. The ultra-wide camera features Leica UltraPure optics.
The telephoto camera has a 75-100mm equivalent periscoping zoom lens, Type 1/1.4 sensor, and multi-directional phase-detect autofocus. Using the camera’s physical zoom ring, photographers can continuously zoom from 3.2 to 4.3x. The telephoto camera also features a Leica APO optical design, which Leica and Xiaomi say reduces chromatic aberrations and improves overall image quality. The Xiaomi 17 Ultra is the first Xiaomi flagship phone to earn Leica’s APO certification, per CineD‘s reporting.
The manual zoom ring does much more than control the telephoto lens, though. When the user rotates the ring, it automatically opens the phone’s Leica-designed camera app and lets photographers switch between the rear cameras. Xiaomi promises that the new zoom ring will mean photographers need to spend much less time tapping their phone’s screen. The zoom ring can also serve double duty, offering both manual focus and exposure compensation control.
Beyond the very impressive camera features, there is much more to the Xiaomi 17 Ultra by Leica. The device is powered by the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 SoC, features 16GB of RAM, and runs Xiaomi’s latest HyperOS 3.0 operating system. The phone has a large-capacity 6,800 mAh silicon-carbon battery, a 6.9-inch M10 AMOLED LTPO with 3,500-nit peak brightness, and a 50-megapixel selfie camera.
For what it’s worth, there are also standard Xiaomi 17 Ultra smartphones that don’t feature the mechanical zoom ring and Leica-inspired design. However, mobile photographers will certainly want to opt for the Leica edition. It also has special Leica Moment camera modes and costs about $75 more than the equivalent standard edition. The Leica phone also ships with a lens cap, a lanyard, a case, and a cleaning cloth.
Per usual, the Xiaomi 17 Ultra and Ultra by Leica have only been announced in China so far. Xiaomi phones do not officially launch in the United States, but the devices should receive a global launch in the coming months. The Xiaomi 17 Ultra starts at CNY 6,999 for the 12GB RAM, 512GB storage version, which is about $1,000 at current exchange rates. The Xiaomi 17 Ultra by Leica has 16GB of RAM and 512GB of storage and starts at CNY 7,999 (about $1,138). The same model without the Leica branding is CNY 7,499, or just under $1,070.
Image credits: Xiaomi, Leica