Nokia 9 may have a dual-lens camera with optical zoom

HMD Global – the company behind the recent Nokia phones – may have inadvertently given away one of the features of its upcoming Nokia 9 flagship, as an update to the camera app included in the Android Oreo beta for the Nokia 5 highlights some modes that none of the company’s current phones are capable of.

Specifically, there’s mention of both a 2x telephoto zoom and a wide-angle option, either of which would typically require two lenses on the phone.

But the Nokia 5 has just a single-lens camera, and even the Nokia 8, which is a dual-lens phone, isn’t capable of either of those features, instead combining the images from separate color and monochrome lenses for better quality shots.

Nokia 9 makes sense

So it’s very likely that one or both of these features are coming to a new phone, and the Nokia 9 is the obvious candidate, since it’s both set to be a flagship and likely to arrive soon, with rumors pointing to a January 19 announcement.

Supposedly a new Nokia 8 (2018) will also be announced on that date, so that’s a possible candidate too. Or perhaps one of these phones will get a zoom lens while the other gets a wide-angle one.

And this isn’t the first time we’ve heard of a dual-lens camera on the Nokia 9. According to an earlier rumor it might have a pair of 22MP snappers, which would mean it also has a lot more megapixels than the 13MP Nokia 8. If talk of a January launch is accurate we should know the truth of all this soon.

• The Samsung Galaxy S9 might also arrive in early 2018

Via Phone Arena and Nokiamob