The Most Technically Advanced Cameraphone To Date ▀ Huawei Mate 90 Pro Max Collector's Edition Featuring 10X 1-Inch Periscope Module

Full-fledged cameraphone benchmarks are aimed on screens > 1280px width.
So almost any desktop or laptop should be fine. Smartphones are not supported, in favor of pixel-peeping convenience.

UPDATED ON: 2026-10-26

• found mistakes in measurements will be reported here
• possible participation of Oppo X9 Ultra, however it is slim [two subjects on the agenda]:
  -advanced Oppo 10x periscope vs Ruiying Z10 optical module
  -classic comparison of the main sensor Oppo 1" 200Mp vs Nokia PureView 808

Despite my earlier promise that [no more photography benchmarks] would appear on these pages,
it looks like I’ve broken that commitment again.

Oh, i did not mention the fact that couple of mouthes ago [BlackView] attempted to contacted me for “mutual cooperation and partnership”.
Just for your information, they specialize primarily in the rugged brick phones. After i’ve suggested them a fair comparison with other rugged phones i have they immediately disappeared.

Later, i’ve looked into their site to observe the model diversity and quickly find out that most of their devices are based around 2-3 configurations. So i do not miss anything at all, frankly speaking in the year of 2026 hefty part of companies are just boring to death, because they are directed by golden moma’s boys followed by shitty marketing principles, without any innovative engendering at all.
Frankly speaking, i do not understand for the very life of me, how all these useless marketing specialists are still not substituted by AI?

So what’s the catch you may ask?
I am gently hinting you that i am not a million sub pre-paid sellout blogger, pushing some kinda of sh#t to you.
Moreover, don’t forget that currently i’m out of a decent job and any donations will be very-very much appreciated.
Anyways, back to the subject of the review.

The story of external optical modules began with Sony back in 2012,
with the release of their innovative and hard to control [DSC-QX10] and [DSC-QX100] modules.
Products delivered image quality that was previously unheard on the smartphone arena.
As first generation products, they were clunky and awkward, connecting to a smartphone via Wi-Fi.
True to Sony’s typical strategy, they soon abandoned the lineup and “forgot” about it,
likely to avoid competing with their own portable cameras.
But we are in luck, because Huawei picked up the slack and led us into the future.

Oh, and by the way, the screen is an exceptional in terms of color quality and brightness, to say the least!

[Huawei Mate 90 Pro Max CE] can be equipped with impressive 1" stabilized 24-240mm snap-in module.
The main distinctive feature of the Collector Edition [CE] is an ability to attach external snap-in 1-inch 24-240mm
lens to support extreme periscope distances with unseen before in smartphone arena quality.
It is called [Ruiying Z10] and has following technicalities: f/2.0-f/4.5 PDAF, OIS, 10x continuous optical zoom.

In this review we will compare multiple devices to make overall picture more detailed and comprehensive:

• [Huawei Mate 90 Pro Max CE] + [Ruiying Z10] dedicated external 1" optical module with variable aperture
• [Xiaomi 15 Ultra] + [Neewer LS-79] teleconverter to match Huawei in focal distance.
• [Nokia PureView 808] the king of daylight resolution [even in the end of 2026]

There is a plethora of resolution related questions that we will cover here in this comparison.
I also point out that you can’t get such information anywhere on the good old interwebs.
So, I am maintaining the website’s reputation as a resource for exclusive content.

Anyways, here is a complete list of research investigations:

• how well perform 1/1.4" sensor of Xiaomi 15 Ultra against Huawei’s 1/1.28" in their native focal distances 100/90mm
• performance of Xiaomi 15 Ultra’s 1/1.4" periscope sensor paired with x2 teleconverter against
  Huawei’s 1/1.28" periscope sensor backed up by AI tricks
• compare above mentioned configurations against 1" optical module Ruiying Z10 in 90mm focal distance
• find out what maximum focal length of Ruiying Z10 can be used for commercial purposes
• how variable F-number affects Huawei’s resolution of main and periscope 1/1.28" sensors in comparison to Ruiying Z10
• find out the best main camera detail resolver among the following devices:
  

As you can observe the king of resolution Nokia PureView 808 [2012] is also here.
It doesn’t have periscope of course, but we’ll pit it to the main sensor battle to see how well things turn out at this time.

Oh, and yeah, this review will not cover the quality of ultra-wide angle lens, because i simply not interested in it.

Glitchy modern browsers can easily alter image quality during page rendering or badly construe scaling factors,
so i suggest to download original images from my cloud storage and pixel peep them at 100% manually.

Conclusion: As you can see, 200MP crop is not bringing more detail, it’s just darker and looks a bit overprocessed

Conclusion: almost draw, similar level of detail

Conclusion: obviously optical converter is more resolving in terms of details

Conclusion: as we can observe Huawei digital zoom is a little bit better than provided by Xiaomi,
but still it is not a rival to the optical converter

Conclusion: as expected, the Huawei 1-inch beats the Xiaomi 15 Ultra paired with a Neewer teleconverter without any effort,
although note that long focal lengths require firm support even in bright light.

Currently I don’t have a sturdy tripod, that holds attached Z10 firmly so I shot from a support surface,
which is better than handheld but still a compromise.
So you can freely add around 10% to the Z10 resolution if you shoot from a steady tripod.
You can access the RAW files below, where you can also find the handheld result.

Conclusion: software interpolation can’t compete with raw optical power of the lens

Conclusion: internal x4 telephoto is good, but external optics is substantially better [see the trees]

Conclusion: Re-tested with identical lightning conditions for every camera.

No wonders here: 1" sensor crushes it’s less sized counterpart.

Lens provides excellent resolution for 1" sensor and keep up with modern optical standards.
Detail and sharpness are very impressive across all focal ranges.

Here is a shot done in maximum x10 magnification [240mm], captured without a tripod, in a slightly overcasted weather.

Internal 1/1.28" lens:
Soft at F1.4 - F1.8 range. At F2 gets better. F3.2 peak resolution. F3.2-F4.0 safe to use too.

External 1" lens:
A bit soft at F2 gets better at F4. Maximum resolution is around F4.5-F5.
Around F8 diffraction starts taking place, so don’t go above that.

Conclusion: to pixel-peel original files scroll to the bottom to download all original files in the archive.

Conclusion: smaller 1/1.28" Huawei sensor beats 1" Xiaomi with a style bringing a bit better resolution and less artifacts,
picture is falling apart in browser so i suggest to check RAW files below just to see for yourself

Conclusion: internal main 1/1.28" lens is pretty good and almost on par with external solution, impressive

Conclusion: A 2012 device from Nokia demonstrates extreme resolution, f#cking impressive!

Conclusion: Huawei is doin’ stellar job here and surely touches the back of the head of the holy Nokia PureView 808.
It is worth of noticing that this is the closest rival i’ve been seen in all these years.

Like it or not, the 808 is still holding the crown as the king of camera resolution!
Only external 1" lens [2026] can keep up with mighty Nokia PureView 808 [2012] in terms of details.
But in the end of the day, i am confirming that Huawei Mate 90 Pro Max is surely a worthy rival,
remember that although it losses a bit by a very tiny hair in resolution field,
it can offer exceptional dynamic range and color, things that are obviously not present in Nokia due to it’s age.

The essential explanation of why Nokia from 2012 is still not beaten in the resolution and detail fields is that it is based around a generic,
non-quad Bayer sensor, and as a consequence it has better pixel quality compared with its quad-Bayer rivals.

• taking pictures is noticeably slower compared to Xiaomi 15 Ultra
• internal cameras operate faster than external Z10 module
• shooting experience is way better comparing to previous Sony external WiFi-based optical modules
• Huawei upgraded their CPUs, but they are still below current top Snapdragon chips
  [overall performance is around top flagships of 2022-2023 era, i am fine with this]

The only thing i am still interested in is internal periscope lens providing at least 8x magnification paired with 1/1.2" or better sensor.
According to AI such devices hit probably mainstream around 2029-2030 and they will surely provide less quality in comparison to dedicated external snap-in optics.

Huawei Mate 90 Pro Max CE is surely unique and innovative device, Chinese company demonstrates way
more sense than traditional boring manufactures like Xiaomi, Samsung and Apple.
And yes, i am keeping it as my primary phone, because i was quite pleased with Z10 results.

Take a note that non-standard Android version derived from original Android around version 12 and absence of 100%
compatible Google ecosystem could be a deal breaker for some persons.
Although some of the applications can be executed via EasyAbroad and Droitong emulation tools.

---