To predict what Android phones will look like in 2026, I don’t look at last year’s phones. I’m looking at the best phones of 2024. Phones typically have an 18-month development cycle, so this year’s new phones will be informed by the best phone of the second half of 2024 – the iPhone 16 Pro. This iPhone brought us a major innovation from Apple, and this is the year I hope to see Android finally steal a huge feature that Apple missed.
The iPhone doesn’t change often, so adding or removing a button is major. Major iPhone redesigns are usually at least five years apart. The iPhone 4 refined the design. The iPhone X (ten) finally got rid of the Home button. Then the iPhone 15 Pro replaced the mute switch with an action button.
None of these changes excited me as much as the rumors of 2024. The iPhone 16 Pro introduced camera control. I’ve been hoping for a proper camera button on a phone for years, even decades. I’m sure a good trigger would be the perfect solution to improve phone photography.
Unfortunately, what Apple gave us in 2024 did not live up to my expectations. Camera control fails. I never use it – not on purpose. I press it by accident every day. If it worked as I hoped, I would use it often, but Apple has failed to provide a proper trigger.
This is how the camera control button would work if Apple did it right
When using a real camera, this is how the shutter button works: First, you hold this button halfway down, until you feel a little resistance. Pressing the button halfway tells your camera to focus. Then you squeeze all the way to take the photo.
This is how Apple’s camera control button should work. This isn’t the case, so you don’t get the biggest benefit of a trigger: stability.
The hands move and tremble. Cameras take photos at speeds that are only a tiny fraction of a second – 1/30th of a second is a relatively high speed. slow camera shutter speed – so a little movement is not noticeable. Pressing the camera button moves your phone slightly.
Instead of a trigger we get…zoom controls? On an iPhone?!
Back to the iPhone 16 Pro. The camera control button had been rumored for months in advance, and I hoped it would be a real trigger: press to focus, then press a little more to take the photo. It wasn’t even close to that. At launch, focus was not a feature of Camera Control; it was added later. By then I had already given up on Apple’s failing button.
What does Camera Control do instead? Nothing that matters to me. It can zoom in and out, adjust exposure settings, or switch between camera lenses. It can change the style in weird ways that are Apple-specific and hard to explain. All of these tools are useless compared to an actual trigger that helps me maintain my focus.
I’m hopeful that Android phone makers will get this right. Google surprised us this year by adding MagSafe compatible magnets to its Google Pixel 10. I’d like to see them take more inspiration from Apple and steal the camera button, but do it right. I could also imagine OnePlus making the shutter button a key feature for an upcoming OnePlus 16, even though we won’t see that phone until late 2026.
Samsung expected to bring back its famous phone and camera combo devices
I’m even more hopeful that Samsung jumps on the camera button bandwagon, because Samsung knows how a phone and a camera can work together. When Samsung had its own Camera division making standalone cameras (it still makes sensors and other camera parts), it created a combo device that put a real camera, with a wide zoom range, on the back of a Galaxy S phone.
The first of these was the Samsung Galaxy Camera. It was big and clunky, but it was an incredibly innovative way to share digital photos in the early days of social media. The follow-up was the Galaxy S4 Zoom. It was too expensive, but still a cool concept. This gave Galaxy owners a true zoom camera, with a large extendable lens, to carry in our pockets.
Samsung knows how to combine a camera and a phone and does it well – better than Apple. I’d love to see a Galaxy S26 Ultra with a real shutter button, one that I can press halfway to focus and then press to take my photo. I’d be even more excited to see a Galaxy S26 Zoom that brings back the combo concept, using today’s higher-quality Samsung Galaxy phones as a basis.
