Oppo Reveals Its Retractable Smartphone Camera

Phone maker Oppo thinks pop-up cameras on smartphones are annoying, so it developed a camera capable of retracting instead.

As The Verge reports, ahead of this year's Oppo Inno Day on Dec. 14, the company released a short teaser video attached to a tweet demonstrating how its new retractable camera works. As you can see, the camera extends and then retracts back into the body of the smartphone.

Tweet

All we have to go on so far is the video, which shows the camera extending when the camera app icon is tapped. The phone is also shown wet and being sprayed with water, suggesting the handset remains waterproof despite being fitted with this moving part. And if you drop the phone, the handset reacts by automatically retracting the camera to prevent it getting damaged.

What's unclear is how Oppo has taken advantage of being able to extend the camera out of the body to improve photo and video capture. It's unlikely Oppo would do this just as a gimmick, so the company must have discovered a significant advantage to designing and manufacturing the mechanism into the body of a phone. We'll probably find out more on Dec. 14.