
The iQOO 13 is the second phone to launch in India with the Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset. While it’s no surprise that the phone is a performance powerhouse, the company has also started focussing on its camera capabilities. We saw this with the iQOO 12 last year, and we can see that this year too, but with some tweaks. While we await the full review of the iQOO 13, let’s look at our initial impressions of the camera on this flagship.
iQOO 13: Camera Specifications
The iQOO 13 features a triple camera setup on the back, which looks similar to the one on the iQOO 12, but now comes with an additional camera and is 30% thinner than its predecessor. The upside to a thinner camera array is that it enhances comfort and grip while gaming. The camera module also hosts the Monster light, which lights up when you receive notifications.
The iQOO 13 switches out the 64MP 3x optical zoom lens for a 50MP 2x optical zoom lens, reducing the zoom-in capacity; this might have been a necessary sacrifice to bring down the phone’s price. That’s unfortunate because the 3x gives you more flexibility when framing shots.
Cameras | Specifications |
Primary camera | 50MP Sony IMX921 (1/1.56″ Sony VCS TrueColor Camera) |
Ultra-wide camera | 50 MP (1/2.76″) |
Telephoto camera | 50MP Sony IMX 816 (1/2.93″ 2x) |
Selfie camera | 16-megapixel, f/2.45 |
Video recording capabilities | Up to 4K 30fps |
iQOO 13: Camera Modes and Samples
The iQOO 13 comes with a host of different camera modes to experiment with. The new addition – Snapshot mode – lets you get creative and capture fast-moving objects with very low shutter lag. We tested the feature to catch a glimpse of a BMW racing at over 220 km/h.
The iQOO 13 has three picture modes – Vivid, Textures, and Natural – which take images with distinctive colour tones. The phone takes 4K 60fps videos with all three lenses, while 8K 30fps videos are limited to the primary camera. Impressively, the phone can also take 4K 60fps videos using the front camera.
Daylight Shots
Under daylight, most shots taken by the primary camera of the iQOO 13 come with accurate colour reproduction, but it occasionally struggles, particularly under harsh sunlight, producing over-processed photos.
Macro Shots
We found the macro mode quite impressive. The phone utilises its ultrawide lens to take macro shots with a much shorter focusing distance, allowing shots very close to the subject. While the mode occasionally struggles with autofocus when tracking tiny moving objects like bees, it performs quite well when taking shots of flowers and petals.
NOTE: We noticed a white balance issue in some scenarios, specifically when the subjects were under warm lighting conditions. The images produced a cooler colour temperature, which was different from what our eyes could perceive. We’ve reached out to the iQOO team, and they promised to fix the issue in the next update. We will update this piece once a fix is rolled out.
Human Portraits
The iQOO 13 captures great human portraits with good skin tones, and excellent edge detection, even around the hair strands. The depth of field also appeared natural. This is where iQOO gains points back.
Low Light
The iQOO 13 performed decently under low-light environments, but the low-light images suffered from noticeable noise and occasionally exhibited white balance issues under warm light.
The portrait mode shots were quite good, delivering images with good edge detection and bokeh, but they could have been even better if they didn’t soften the skin textures even when all filters were off.
Conclusion
Overall, we would rate the camera 8 out of 10. The phone takes impressive shots under daylight, in macro mode, and for human portraits. The phone adds noteworthy features like the Snapshot mode, the ability to record 4K 60 fps videos on all three lenses, and 4K 60 fps videos on the selfie camera.
However, there’s still room for improvement, including the low light performance and the issues we highlighted with white balance. We hope a fix is issued for all these before the phone launches in India, which is scheduled for 3rd December 2024. We will have more things to say about the phone in our full review of the iQOO 13, so stay tuned to MySmartPrice.
Inputs provided by Divyakant Thaledi, Anchor and Video Producer at MySmartPrice
*Disclaimer: iQOO sponsored the correspondent’s flights and hotel for the trip to Dubai. However, our take on the phone will not be affected by this.