Xiaomi Mi 15 Ultra 5G (16GB Ram +1TB) Smartphone

One of our favourite camera phone line-ups just got a refresh and the new model adds an industry-leading telephoto camera to what was already a hard-to-beat multifaceted setup. Indeed, with top-quality hardware around that Leica logo on the back, the Xiaomi 15 Ultra has every chance of being the ultimate smartphone for photography in 2025.

In case you're not entirely up to speed, the longer of the two telephotos on the 15 Ultra gets one of those 1/1.4" 200MP sensors we've been loving on other models, coupled here with a 100mm-equivalent lens (4.3x zoom). It's not the same package that the vivos have (X100 Ultra and X200 Pro), and it's also different from the Honor Magic7 Pro's zoom camera, so we'd still be in for some new discoveries.

Some restructuring had to happen with the zoom levels, so the shorter tele now stands at 3x (3.2x on the 14 Ultra). The main camera remains sort of the same - it's still a 1.0"-type sensor (one of few remaining), but what was a variable-aperture lens is now a good ol' fixed-aperture lens.

The 15 Ultra joins this year's Elite club, picking the unimaginative path of fitting the latest and greatest Qualcomm chipset (vivo/Oppo have strayed into Mediatek camp). A battery capacity increase is one entry on the list of welcome generational changes, and you'll also find a switch from optical to ultrasonic fingerprint recognition in there.