![\"Close-up](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/google-pixel-camera-animations.jpg\"\/)
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Related<\/p>\n
\t\t Unlock your lens beyond selfies<\/p>\n Telemacro and macro aren’t the same thing<\/p>\n And the difference actually matters<\/p>\n The ability to take macro photos<\/a> is a common feature in premium and flagship Android phones. That said, it’s not the same as telemacro.<\/p>\n With macro support, your phone uses the ultrawide camera to capture extreme close-up shots. On paper, it sounds good and enables the possibility of capturing a subject with a new perspective.<\/p>\n However, in practice, there are several issues. It is difficult to get so physically close to the subject, and even the slightest hand movement can ruin the shot.<\/p>\n This is where telephoto cameras with macro support come in. It doesn’t require you to get as physically close to a subject.<\/p>\n Instead, it uses the longer focal length of the telephoto camera (and a floating lens) to enable you to capture close-up shots from a comfortable distance.<\/p>\n This might not seem like a big deal, but in daily use, it’s the difference between actually getting a sharp, stunning, and usable macro shot vs. not taking one at all.<\/p>\n Admittedly, I didn’t pay much heed to macro support on phones before switching to the Xiaomi 14 Ultra last year. That’s despite having used devices like the Google Pixel 8 Pro and Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra, which technically support macro photography.<\/p>\n Given the effort required to click a decent macro picture, I tried the macro mode a handful of times on these phones and then promptly forgot about it. And this isn’t just a me problem.<\/p>\n It all comes down to implementation. These phones rely on their ultrawide camera for macro shots, which makes it awkward and challenging to take a usable shot.<\/p>\n The Xiaomi 14 Ultra’s telemacro feature removed that friction. Being able to shoot close-ups from a comfortable distance instantly changed how I use macro mode, and I found myself taking more macro shots than ever before.<\/p>\n And this was not a feature whose sheen wore off with time.<\/p>\n Nearly two years later, and after switching to the Xiaomi 15 Ultra and now the Vivo X300 Pro, I’ve consistently taken some of my favorite shots using telemacro.<\/p>\n And at this point, I can’t think of going back to a phone without a telemacro lens.<\/p>\n See the sample shots below. I took all of them with ease, without once having to worry about my shadow ruining the scene or getting uncomfortably close to the subject.<\/p>\n Before getting the Xiaomi 14 Ultra, I rarely clicked macro shots due to the challenges involved. And even if I did take all that effort, there was no guarantee I would end up with a usable shot.<\/p>\n That all changed after I got used to clicking pictures with the telemacro lens.<\/p>\n In the last two years, I’ve captured tens of amazing macro photos. All of them came organically, and not because I forced myself to.<\/p>\n This was only because the entire process became effortless and stopped feeling like a struggle.<\/p>\n Once again, the biggest smartphone players missed the mark<\/p>\n Telemacro shouldn’t be a niche feature<\/p>\n Unfortunately, like many other mobile hardware trends, Samsung, Google, and even Apple have missed this train.<\/p>\n While their flagship phones do support macro photography, they rely on the ultrawide shooter instead of the telephoto camera.<\/p>\n Contrary to rumors<\/a> and what even Google’s AI Overviews might suggest, the Pixel 10 Pro<\/a> and its XL sibling also miss out on telemacro photography.<\/p>\n Like the Galaxy and iPhone, the Pixel uses the 48MP ultrawide camera to capture macro shots. And so, the same caveats apply to it.<\/p>\n Disappointingly, this means that no major flagship Android phone available in the US supports telemacro.<\/p>\n It’s understandable that companies like Apple, Samsung, and Google may want to avoid using bigger camera sensors on their phones due to design, thickness, and internal space constraints.<\/p>\n However, skipping a genuinely useful feature like telemacro is another thing altogether, especially since it does not require radical hardware upgrades.<\/p>\n Plus, telemacro is no longer an experimental feature. Chinese smartphone makers have proven its real-world value, and the technology has been around for a few years now.<\/p>\n No telephoto, no purchase<\/p>\n Heading into 2026, telemacro has become a non-negotiable feature for me in my primary smartphone.<\/p>\n If a $1,000+ flagship phone cannot let me capture close-up macro shots without getting awkwardly close to a subject, it’s already off my shortlist, irrespective of how good its other features and specs are.<\/p>\n Unfortunately, if the leaks are accurate<\/a>, the Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra is already off my list<\/a> as it’s unlikely to use a telemacro lens for its 5x periscope shooter.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After years of using Samsung Galaxy and Google Pixel phones as my daily driver, I switched to Chinese…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":215000,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[85,46,321,125],"class_list":["post-214999","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mobile","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-mobile","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214999","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=214999"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214999\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/215000"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=214999"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=214999"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=214999"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n\t\t\tThese are the 8 weirdest ways I use my phone camera, and my life is easier for it
\n\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/xiaomi-15-ultra-back-speakers.jpg\")
<\/p>\n![\"Google](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/img_0990.jpg\")
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