It was rumored a few weeks ago, that the upcoming HTC flagship, the HTC One M10 aka the HTC Perfume, would feature an UltraPixel camera. After using UltraPixel in the HTC One M7 and M8, they dropped the UltraPixel camera from the backside and put it on the front for the front-facing camera. It's making a return in the HTC One M10, apparently. Now thanks to famed HTC leaker @LlabTooFeR, we have some more information on that camera that HTC is supposedly using.

We are looking at an UltraPixel camera here, according to LlabTooFeR's tweet. HTC appears to be using Sony's IMX377 sensor, which is the same one as the Nexus 5X and Nexus 6P are using. Reviewers have loved the camera quality of both the Nexus devices, so there's hope for the HTC One M10. This means the sensor is a 12-megapixel sensor, similar to the Nexus 6P and Nexus 5X, it is also a larger sensor, about 1.55 um. LlabTooFeR also mentioned that it will have laser auto-focus and phase detection auto-focus which should make for some lightning fast auto-focus on the HTC One M10. When talking about the front-facing camera, it's also an UltraPixel camera using the Samsung s5k4e6 5-megapixel sensor.


While HTC is indeed using the same Sony IMX377 sensor as the most recent crop of Nexus devices, that doesn't necessarily mean that the camera will be on par with the Nexus 5X and Nexus 6P. It could be better, it could also be worse. Cameras on smartphones aren't just about the hardware, the other part of the equation is also the software. Without great software for post-processing as well as actually taking the picture, the camera can really suffer. Lately, we've been seeing many manufacturers add in capabilities for manually adjusting settings for the shot, as well as allowing their smartphones to shoot in RAW. If HTC allows users to shoot in RAW, then the software shouldn't be as big of an issue.

Right now, the rumor is that HTC will be announcing the HTC One M10 in April with it being available in May. A bit later than usual for HTC, hopefully this means we'll see a much improved device over last year's HTC One M9 that was announced at Mobile World Congress.