The Vivo X200 Pro sets the benchmark for what a telephoto lens can do on a smartphone.
You could be forgiven for looking at Samsung’s latest crop of flagship devices in the S25 series and wonder what the silver lining is. It’s all about AI -- Galaxy AI, that is -- and in doubling down on these features, the company is betting that it has a leg up on what could be the next big thing for mobile devices.
Backers of ShiftCam's SnapSeries Indiegogo campaign claim they were being sidelined so that ShiftCam could double-dip by taking money raised in the campaign and spend it on delivering orders to both retailers and consumers.
In North America, the number 13 is hardly lucky, but the OnePlus 13 may be the one that finally pays off for the brand. Coming off a solid predecessor in the OnePlus 12, the 13 takes several parallel steps in the right direction to make it a serious contender for one of the best of 2025.
The OnePlus 13 got its reveal, but perhaps even more revealing is how much the company is trying to make its flagship more accessible. To do it, it’s embracing MagSafe (albeit only with its phone cases) and including a software feature in OxygenOS to enable sharing with iPhone users. Even faster wired and wireless charging, plus a demonstration of heavy water resistance involving a dishwasher. All that is on top of a focus on improving action photography.
Razer rolled out a slew of new products at CES 2025, led by another iteration of its Blade 16 laptop. Gamers are still the primary targets, but the company has also tried to cater to creatives with what it sees as robust performance.
Foldable smartphones aren’t a total novelty anymore now that various brands make them, but they’re still far from being ubiquitous in people’s hands. There are various reasons to consider one, but how they can affect mobile photography helps make them more interesting.
The Xiaomi 14T Pro is a smartphone that takes better photos than the price indicates, pushing this device into something performative between mid-range and flagship territory. Xiaomi’s T Series continues to mature, and the partnership with Leica is a driving factor.
Small drones aren’t a new concept, but when they’re dependable in creating content, they change perceptions, which describes the DJI Neo in a nutshell. As much as DJI has captured so much of the consumer drone market, the Neo also feels like a response to what others have done.
ACDSee Photo Studio Ultimate 2025 comes with both a premise and a promise in how it aims to be a one-stop shop for organizing and editing your photos.
Australian brand Espresso Displays is coming out with a new 15-inch portable monitor along with a redesigned stand that will work with its existing products.
There’s something happening with foldable phones that isn’t as apparent in North America, and devices like the Honor Magic V3 make that clear. Thinner, lighter, yet also packing a bigger battery and large screen, Honor puts together a compelling combination further enhanced by the camera array.
For many, the Google Pixel 9 Pro Fold is the first look at one of the company’s foldable phones to see how it stacks up against the best in this emerging category. Indeed, it was my first chance to test a Google foldable since Canada wasn’t among the markets selling the original Pixel Fold.
Hobolite is no more. The company that has been making a name for itself in LED photography lighting will henceforth come under a new name: Harlowe.
Whether you consider the Vaonis Hestia a telescope or a monocular device depends on how you interpret its strengths and weaknesses. It’s neither a full-fledged telescope nor equipped with the kind of specialized gear Vaonis includes in its far more expensive models.
Xiaomi is bringing two new mid-range phones to a global launch in the 14T and 14T Pro, along with its first folding phone in the Mix Flip at an event in Berlin.
WuvDay, the Italian-based platform built to verify news content captured via smartphone, is helping young journalists from around the world report from the XIX World Summit of Nobel Peace Laureates.
The Vivo X Fold 3 Pro feels like an outlier. Most foldable phones compromise on camera performance to reduce the price and make the internal components fit better under the hood. No manufacturer admits it, but it’s clear to anyone using them.
Honor is looking to take on the best foldables in the market by launching the Magic V3 beyond China. During a keynote on the eve of IFA in Berlin, Honor outlined plans to infuse the device with AI-driven features to augment the software experience and camera output.
Google is giving it another go with a foldable phone but also choosing to extend its flagship lineup at the same time. The Pixel 9 series comprises four models, with the Pixel 9 Pro Fold being the most unique of the new quartet. The regular Pixel 9, on the other hand, is the modest entry-level choice.
ShiftCam is developing a new set of accessories for its SnapGrip mobile photography grips that it’s calling "SnapSeries" as part of an Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign. The idea is to take the SnapGrip and SnapGrip Pro, which both utilize MagSafe, and broaden the scope of what the grips can do when paired with the new gear.
The Razer Blade 16 is a big laptop in size and capability, though it also comes with some compromises. However, Razer frames its Blade laptops, and they cater to gamers first, a subset of consumers notoriously fickle about performance. Creators aren't far behind with their demanding needs, which Razer knows. They've told me, "We believe gamers are creators, and creators are gamers."
As with any laptop review at PetaPixel, we run through various benchmarks to gauge overall performance. The Razer Blade 16 (2024) and Lightroom Classic proved to be something of a mystery in the process, yielding unsatisfactory results that required further investigation.
The Google Pixel 8a offers compelling, worthwhile photography features at an accessible price point. It’s hardly a perfect smartphone, but it gets a lot of things right the moment you pull it out of your pocket and start snapping away.
The Hobolite Iris, the company's latest addition to its lineup of LED lighting equipment, is small enough to slide into a pocket yet versatile enough to deploy in a variety of ways. The main reason why is because it integrates into the broader Hobolite ecosystem, with particular compatibility with the existing Hobolite Micro light.
The Vivo V30 Pro may be a mid-range smartphone, but with Zeiss in the mix, the camera takes a decisive step forward compared to its predecessors. Until now, Vivo reserved its collaboration with Zeiss for its X Series, but no longer. The Zeiss tech makes the more affordable V Series more interesting to photographers.
The Honor Magic 6 Pro is a quality smartphone with a camera array built to make the case that it has the goods to be among the best. Honor is a spinoff of Huawei, which let the brand go in 2021 in a bid to evade U.S. sanctions. Since then, Honor has carved out its own purpose and identity, including a current attempt to go public with an IPO.
The Xiaomi 14 Ultra is the clearest indicator yet that Xiaomi wants to be the best in mobile photography, even if some parts of the world don't know it. Anecdotal as it may be, people react with surprise at the images they see captured by the phone when I show them.
The Xiaomi 14 may very well be the kind of phone most should experience, in part because it brings the Leica camera hardware and software to the fore. Previously, Xiaomi only included all Leica features in its Pro or Ultra models, but has now done it for this, the smallest of the bunch. This time, the 14 Pro is a Chinese market exclusive, leaving the 14 and 14 Ultra as the two global options.
It's a shame the Vivo X100 Pro won't find itself in the hands of many mobile photographers in North America because it raises eyebrows for all the right reasons.