Tim Cook confirms iPhones have been using Sony camera sensors for over a decade

Apple CEO Tim Cook recently confirmed the tech giant’s partnership with Sony for the camera hardware on the iPhone. Unlike popular Android smartphone makers, Apple doesn’t disclose information about its camera hardware, apart from the resolution, aperture, and other minor details.

While there have been several rumours suggesting Apple uses Sony camera sensors on its iPhones, no confirmation was provided until now. In his tweet, Cook noted that the iPhones have been using Sony image sensors for over a decade. The tweet also included an image of Cook visiting the Kumamoto facility along with Sony CEO Kenichiro Yoshida.

We’ve been partnering with Sony for over a decade to create the world’s leading camera sensors for iPhone. Thanks to Ken and everyone on the team for showing me around the cutting-edge facility in Kumamoto today. pic.twitter.com/462SEkUbhi

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— Tim Cook (@tim_cook) December 13, 2022

According to Cook’s tweet, Apple’s partnership with Sony remains strong, which suggests that next year’s iPhone models will also use Sony camera sensors. A previous report by Nikkei claimed that the Sony Group would supply Apple with a “state-of-the-art” image sensor for the iPhone 15 series.

The report noted that the new Sony image sensor would roughly double the saturation signal level in each pixel compared to conventional sensors. This would enable the sensor to capture more light and reduce overexposure and underexposure, thus enabling the camera to capture a person’s face even if the subject is standing against a strong backlight.

Cook's tweet also indicates that the new 48 MP camera sensor on the iPhone 14 Pro models was engineered by Sony. For now, we’ll have to wait and see what improvements Apple and Sony bring to the cameras on the iPhone 15 series and whether a periscope 5x or 10x optical zoom lens is in the cards.