Apple’s iPhone 18 Pro main camera has a mechanical variable aperture, and third-party camera apps can now offer more granular control than the built-in Camera app. Blackmagic Camera and Halide Mark III 3.2 allow photographers to select aperture values throughout the hardware’s f/1.48-to-f/4.0 range, rather than being limited to Apple’s four default settings.
In the stock Camera app, the available aperture positions are f/1.48, f/1.8, f/2.8 and f/4.0. The updated Blackmagic Camera and Halide Mark III apps expand those steps, giving users finer manual adjustment of the physical aperture mechanism.
Halide Mark III 3.2 also adds two shooting modes tailored to the new Pro models. Aperture Priority lets the photographer set the aperture while the app automatically adjusts shutter speed and ISO. Its Manual mode exposes independent controls for aperture, ISO and shutter speed.
The variable aperture changes both the light reaching the sensor and depth of field. A wider f/1.48 setting can admit more light and produce stronger background blur, while f/4.0 increases depth of field for scenes such as landscapes. The bokeh difference remains more limited on phones than on dedicated cameras because of their smaller optical systems, and software can simulate blur on phones without adjustable apertures.
Apple is not the first phone maker to use the technology: Samsung offered two aperture positions, f/1.5 and f/2.4, on the 2018 Galaxy S9 and S9+, while Huawei’s 2022 Mate 50 Pro used an adjustable f/1.4-to-f/4.0 system. On Apple’s side, the iPhone 18 Pro reaches f/1.48, compared with the fixed f/1.78 aperture of the iPhone 17 Pro. Halide’s developers are also considering aperture presets, depending on user feedback.
