A fresh leak from prolific tipster Digital Chat Station suggests that the upcoming OnePlus 15 may sport more optical zoom than the current OnePlus 13 (if you're wondering what happened to the OnePlus 14; that number's being skipped, as the number 4 is unlucky in China - there was no OnePlus 4 either).
Read more: OnePlus 13 full review
The tip states that the OnePlus 15 will feature a 50MP periscope telephoto module with an 85mm-equivalent lens and an f/2.8 aperture. For comparison, the OnePlus 13 has a 73mm-equivalent telephoto lens. If, like the 13, the 15 ends up with a primary, wide-angle camera with a 23mm-equivalent focal length, then an 85mm telephoto lens would provide around 3.7x zoom (the OnePlus 13's set-up produces approximately 3.17x zoom).
However, if the leak is correct and the new lens has an f/2.8 aperture, this would actually be a slight downgrade on the f/2.6 periscope lens in the OnePlus 13. While this is technically detrimental to image quality, the difference would likely be so marginal that it could plausibly be cancelled out by advances in image processing.
A separate post also suggests that the OnePlus 15 may get a price cut. Though little more than speculation at this stage, it does tally with another Digital Chat Station leak claiming the new phone might have a 6.78-inch 1.5K display, much like the cheaper OnePlus 13R, whereas the full-fat OnePlus 13 has a 6.82-inch 2K screen. It's also been revealed that OnePlus's partnership with Hasselblad has come to and end, with the former now developing its own image engine, called the DetailMax Engine. This may save OnePlus money in the long term from not having to pay licencing fees, but the cost of developing a new image engine might not bring immediate overall savings.
The OnePlus 15 doesn't yet have a definitive release date, but with the last two flagship OnePlus phones both launching at the end of each year, we likely only have 2-3 months to wait for the OnePlus 15 to break cover.
Story credit: Android Authority
