This new Ultra phone could actually be overkill for low-light photos

HUAWEI has regularly offered some of the best camera phones, and the company is preparing to launch the Pura 70 series soon. However, a Chinese leaker has made a rather interesting claim about the rumored Pura 70 Ultra phone.

Digital Chat Station on Weibo has claimed that the Pura 70 Ultra will be equipped with a 50MP one-inch main camera (1/0.98-inch) with an RYYB color filter. Check out the screenshot of the post below.

Why would this be a huge deal for phone cameras?

RYYB color filters debuted on the P30 Pro’s main camera in 2019, and this tech captures more light than the RGB filters used on conventional smartphone camera sensors. In fact, we praised the P30 Pro at the time for its unparalleled image quality in extreme darkness, noting that it beat the Pixel 3 XL with Night Sight. HUAWEI has also used an RYYB color filter on secondary cameras like the Mate X3‘s periscope camera to improve zoomed images in low light. However, it wasn’t uncommon to see a yellow tint in some images taken with an RYYB-enabled camera, so we hope HUAWEI is on top of this issue.

Meanwhile, one-inch sensors capture a ton of light compared to smaller sensors. Phones like the Xiaomi 14 Ultra, vivo X100 Pro, and OPPO Find X7 Ultra all have a one-inch sensor, delivering brighter, cleaner low-light snaps as well as naturally shallow depth-of-field. This huge sensor also lets OEMs offer features like handheld astrophotography and instant shots with zero shutter lag in low light.

However, we’ve never seen a one-inch smartphone camera sensor paired with an RYYB filter before. So this combination means the HUAWEI Pura 70 Ultra could be the undisputed king of low-light photography and videography on paper. There is more to hardware, though, but HUAWEI has a great track record on the software processing front. So we’re extremely interested to see what the Pura 70 Ultra can do in low light if it is indeed offering a one-inch RYYB camera.