HUAWEI P30 model to arrive with periscope camera, should be a zoom champ

Huawei has developed a periscope camera set to arrive on one of its HUAWEI P30 handsets when they’re revealed later this month. The company discussed the camera technology at a meeting during MWC 2019, letting us in on what’s in store for at least one of its phones’ rumored multi-rear camera setups.

Periscope lenses can offer mobile devices superior zoom capabilities compared to other, more traditional camera setups. HUAWEI suggested this periscope lens was its own, not one touted by Chinese competitor OPPO. OPPO’s solution has 10x zoom capabilities, but we don’t know the level of zoom HUAWEI’s lens will afford.

We do, however, have some idea of what HUAWEI’s lens will be capable of, thanks to a photo posted by the company’s consumer business group CEO Richard Yu. Check it out below (click for larger version).

Assuming this image is unedited (that is, just the phone camera and onboard processing), it’s a mighty impressive effort for a smartphone product.

The HUAWEI P20 Pro from April 2018 maintains the joint-highest smartphone camera score on mobile camera reviews site DxOMark, and HUAWEI is keen to maintain the name it has built for producing powerful cameras. But the company isn’t necessarily aiming for greater resolutions this time around.

Huawei’s focus is more on dynamic range and low-light performance — something HUAWEI said would be a merger of hardware and software technologies. We’re expecting AI skills similar to the Google Pixel 3, which is the current champ when it comes to low-light shots.

HUAWEI didn’t mention which handset the periscope camera would feature on, but we suspect at least the P30 Pro. We don’t know what that means for the regular P30 or P30 Lite.

HUAWEI said it wants to “re-write the rules of photography” with its new hardware, but whether it will achieve that we’ll have to wait and see. Thankfully, we don’t have long to find out: the HUAWEI P30 series launch is set for March 26 in Paris.