The smartphone market has, for the most part, reached maturity, with not much room left for improvement in the basic form factor. Of course, Apple is expected to launch the iPhone Fold next year, with analysts hoping that Apple's pivot towards foldables might finally push this form factor out of the niche category and into the mainstream.
Even so, the foldable tech has been on the market for almost a decade now, and lacks the requisite oomph factor for delivering a truly differentiated product. Against this backdrop, smartphone OEMs, including Apple, are increasingly pivoting towards next-gen camera tech to create differentiation. And, Samsung might finally have an answer to this differentiation conundrum.
Samsung is working on a global shutter-level high-definition image sensor, and Apple appears eminently interested
A South Korean publication is now reporting that Samsung is working on a global shutter-level HD image sensor that would allow next-gen smartphones, including Apple's future iPhones, to accurately capture very fast moving objects.
Currently, smartphones use a rolling shutter to capture images with a high resolution. However, when trying to capture fast moving objects, rolling shutters create image distortions as pixel lines are only exposed sequentially to read incoming data.
In contrast, all pixel lines are exposed simultaneously to read the incoming data in a global shutter, allowing for the capture of the entire frame at once. This approach allows for an accurate rendering of fast moving objects.
Until now, it has been difficult to implement global shutter technology in smartphones, owing to their complex structure and the need to enlarge pixels, which then compromises the resolution fidelity.
Samsung, however, has managed to implement the global shutter technology within the confines of a smartphone camera sensor by introducing a new pixel structure to a 1.5-micrometer (µm) pixel pitch of a 12-megapixel, rolling shutter lens.
Typically, smartphone camera sensors convert analog signals from pixels to digital ones at the ADC (Analog-to-Digital Converter), but Samsung has designed a structure where the ADC is embedded within the pixel itself, creating a pixel-level ADC.
Of course, this approach inevitably increases the size of each pixel, with the size of the smallest such pixel currently hovering at around 3-micrometer, as opposed to the 1.5-micrometer pixels typically found in high-end smartphone cameras.
To circumvent this obstacle, Samsung retained a 1.5-micrometer pixel, but packaged it into a 2x2 bundle, effectively creating a 3-micrometer basic unit.
A Samsung official explained the approach as follows:
"It is a structure where 4 pixels share one ADC; in this case, only the part corresponding to 2x2 operates sequentially like a rolling shutter, and the rest can operate as a global shutter."
The official then went on to note:
"However, since rolling shutter operation is included, there is slight image distortion, so it cannot be seen as a perfect global shutter. We extracted optical flow (brightness change of each pixel within the image when the camera or subject moves) from this and performed motion compensation. By applying that [motion compensation by] including the algorithm, a high-resolution image sensor with global shutter characteristics became possible even at a very small pixel pitch."
Samsung plans to present these findings at next year's ISSCC (International Solid-State Circuits Conference) 2026, which is often labeled as the Olympics of semiconductor circuits.
Meanwhile, Apple appears eminently interested in this technology, as evidenced by its patents to mount global shutter sensors on the iPhones.
Of course, Apple and Samsung are also collaborating with each other to develop next-gen CMOS image sensors.
A Complementary Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor (CMOS) sensor is a chip that converts light into digital images by capturing photons with an array of millions of photosensitive pixels. Each pixel contains a photodiode to collect light and an integrated circuit (or transistors) to amplify and convert the charge into a voltage signal.
Meanwhile, as we noted recently, Samsung has now filed several trademark applications for its new "DeepPix" CMOS camera sensor, which suggests it might finally be preparing to move away from its aging ISOCELL sensors.
Apple's ongoing experimentation with new camera tech
We noted recently that Apple's upcoming iPhone Fold is likely to ship with an in-screen camera, bearing a 24MP resolution. The foldable's display is also expected to boast of COE or Color Filter on Encapsulation tech, which allows for a thinner display, higher brightness efficiency, increased resolution, and reduced weight.
Similarly, Apple is also likely to place the TrueDepth sensor for its Face ID under the display in the iPhone 18. To do so, Apple intends to use "spliced micro-transparent glass" on the display section directly above the sensor, allowing sufficient light to pass through.
Separately, Apple's iPhone 20, due for release in 2027, is widely expected to feature a 100MP LOFIC camera sensor. LOFIC is a type of CMOS that is much more efficient at capturing and converting incident light rays into digital images. It does so by capturing both low-light details and bright highlights without noise, resolving the inherent tradeoff between light sensitivity and saturation signal.
Clearly, Apple appears bent on using high-tech cameras to create differentiation with other smartphones going forward.
About the author: Writing is my one incontrovertible passion. Over the past six years, he has authored over 2,200 distinct articles on financial and tech-related topics, spanning nearly 1 million words. And he has been a member of Wcctech mobile team since 2025. As an alumnus of the University of Toronto, Rotman Commerce Program, I bring nuance, in-depth knowledge, and a unique perspective to every topic that I cover. When I'm not writing, I'm traveling the world, exploring hidden confectionaries and restaurants as an aspiring food connoisseur.
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