I Moved the iPhone 18 Pro Max’s Camera Blades With a Magnet
I was about to take apart the iPhone 18 Pro Max’s camera. Then I held a magnet near it, and the aperture started moving. Okay, that’s pretty cool.
Those are actual moving blades
The main camera has a variable aperture with six tiny blades. They move together to make the opening bigger or smaller, changing how much light gets in. In the teardown, I showed four settings ranging from f/1.48 to f/4. This is a physical mechanism inside the camera.
A magnet gave us a closer look
After separating the camera module, I brought a magnet close to the exposed assembly. You can see the blades move together as the opening changes. It gave us a look at the mechanism without pulling all those tiny pieces apart.
The movement suggests a magnetic drive mechanism, but it doesn’t tell us exactly how every part inside works. And this was an exposed camera on my workbench, not a test of everyday MagSafe use.
Did it survive?
Yep. After all that, the camera still worked. I’m glad I didn’t have to put six tiny aperture blades back together.
Seeing those blades move up close was easily one of the coolest parts of the teardown. It’s impressive how much mechanical engineering fits inside such a tiny camera module. Just don’t take this as a reason to experiment with magnets on your own iPhone!
See you in the next article!
