Best iPhone 6/6s camera lenses
The price range, quality and diversity is enormous, but you may have to buy into one ecosystem, writes Glenn Fleishman
The iPhone has a very good camera, but you can get more out of it by using an addon lens. They can increase the amount of zoom, or they provide an effect that gives your photo more impact.
Many companies sell a set of lenses as part of a system. That system can include a wide-angle lens, a telephoto lens, and a fish-eye lens. Each system has it own way of attaching lenses to your
iPhone. The lenses reviewed here work with the iPhone SE, 6s and 6s Plus (as well as any other Apple handset that has a camera bump like those devices, such as the iPhone 6).
In this round-up, we gathered several iPhone lens systems, put tested them with an iPhone 6s, and reviewed each one.
Best overall: ExoLens with Optics by Zeiss
The ExoLens Zeiss (£189) lenses offer the best possible image quality with the least amount of equipment and fuss. While the lenses may seem pricey, they deliver. Photos taken with these lens displayed colours that are perfectly in phase, crisp details, and no distortion. The lenses use an aluminium bracket that fits over the iPhone, and you screw on the interchangeable lenses to the bracket. The frame has a hot-shoe mount and a tripod boss for attaching a standard tripod screw.
Best price/performance: Hitcase Snap
The Hitcase Snap is £49 and includes a iPhone case TrueLux Wide Lens, a selfie stick, a tripod mount, a lens cap, and a keychain lens holder.
The wide-angle lens, which seems to be about an 18mm equivalent, is of medium quality. It’s remarkably free of chromatic aberration, with colours appearing consistent out to the edges. Photos have a high amount of blurriness outside of a broad central circle of focus.
The macro lens produces images that are less blurry around the edges, and the blurriness is also less noticeable. I don’t recommend the super-wide lens, which captures neither the scope of a full
fisheye, nor the realism of a wide-angle. The lenses rotate and snap satisfyingly into place in the case, and are easy enough to remove, but can’t be jarred out of place or unscrewed accidentally.
Low-price leader: Olloclip 4-In-1
The 4-In-1 (£69) has both a 10x and 15x macro lens permanently built into a clip, and screw-on fisheye and wide-angle lens. If you want to take a lot of close-close shots, it’s actually fairly stellar, especially when cropped square.
The wide-angle lens has a lot of distortion, and there’s surprisingly modest aberration around the edges. Again, cropping square removes many defects. The fisheye lens uniquely works with both the rear-facing iSight and front-facing FaceTime cameras on an iPhone. It can be useful in capturing an otherwise impossible group shot.
The macro magnification labels appear on the outer fisheye and wide-angle lens rings, so if you unscrew both, you’re left testing to figure out which macro lens is which. The macro lens are fixed in place such that it’s extremely difficult to clean them.
If you want a compact, versatile solution for images you upload to social media and Instagram, especially of super-close shots of plants, insects, and human artefacts, the Olloclip 4-In-1 fits the bill.