iPhone 14 Camera is Blurry

What you have linked is new in iOS 16.0, not 16.0.1, 16.0.2 etc.

Patches don't have API changes in them.

I appreciate that you have taken a moment to search for something that fits, but this doesn't fit. There is no camera announcement for the patches. No matter how hard you try, you unfortunately won't find any to support your claim.

You misunderstand.

It's possible that Apple disabled the option in 16.0.1 because so many third-party vendors got implementation of changes in iOS 16 wrong, but only Apple knows.

The fact that Apple apps functioned correctly and third-party apps did not puts the blame squarely on third-party app developers.

As I stated, it's also not an issue for all third-party apps, as some like Walmart Pay focusing on register QR codes work perfectly fine.

I suspect new settings like those I mentioned can be used to have the iPhone automatically switch to the wide camera to allow it to focus on bar codes to generate an image of the appropriate dimensions for reading.

We'll see how it works out in future releases.

> It's possible that Apple disabled the option in 16.0.1 because so many third-party vendors got implementation of changes in iOS 16 wrong, but only Apple knows.

You are correct if you want to assume that Apple would voluntarily risk iPhone customers breaking their cameras by using non-updated apps. There is no way that they would call that a reasonable choice. That also doesn't explain Apple's silence on the whole issue.

> The fact that Apple apps functioned correctly and third-party apps did not puts the blame squarely on third-party app developers.

If they didn't work with iOS 16.0 I'd agree, but again they did work with iOS 16.0

> Walmart Pay

That app doesn't switch cameras either. You assume it does because their physical product codes are large enough to be scanned with a distance of the focus length. Can't expect every barcode from now on to be "Apple size"™ because of that.

The bottom line is that it still comes down to third-party apps needing to be updated by their authors to properly work with iOS 16.

Apple in general doesn't release statements on issues except when they are fixed.

• Third Party apps cannot really use the Auto switch to shot Macro Photos
• It has to be done manually by shooting in a normal distance then use the Zooming option to get the image clear

We actually don't know that; I don't know enough about the changes in iOS 16 to know how the camera API may provide for this with iOS 16 changes but there is no evidence that Apple uses a "private" API to provide this functionality only to their own apps.

Sometimes those authors have their hands tied. I work with a cross-platform framework and have recently gotten bug reports on my app that the iPhone 14 has the issue described in the thread. The reports have been solely from iPhone 14 users. After some research, I've seen the issue personally and confirmed that the 14 is the only phone my app is deployed to that has this issue. There is no documentation from Apple that said there were camera API changes between 16.0 and 16.0.2, yet I only started getting the reports after the release of 16.0.2.

I bet most of the 3rd party apps don't access the Apple API directly but rather use cross-platform libraries to make the calls. I can't do anything about my own situation, where nothing has changed in the API that I use (I still access the iPhone camera through the same device ID that I always have, using the same configuration for focusing. There's no new device IDs listed in the system on the 14 that wasn't available on the other iPhones. The same code works on every phone except for the iPhone 14). The developers in this case can't simply "code it better" without re-coding the entire App specifically for iOS in Swift or Obj-C, which isn't feasible for any business. Regardless, Apple has been very good in the past about making their interfaces backwards-compatible with existing code so that Xamarin/Qt/Flutter/etc. can continue working well with no changes even after major updates to iOS. Maybe the Walmart apps for different platforms were written specifically for those platforms, and that's why the Walmart app you mentioned earlier isn't having the same issue.

If an Apple engineer is reading this, perhaps you might take a look into whether it's cross-platform frameworks specifically that have this issue?

Perhaps true, in which case app writers need to hold the authors of the supposed cross-platform frameworks to the fire.

IMHO developers should be coding directly for iOS to avoid such issues, but that’s just my opinion; more often than not when cross-platform frameworks are used it makes the app feel generic and somewhat unfriendly, but I get the reason why it’s done, but it’s also far from the truth to state that apps are not written in Objective C for iOS as the vast majority actually are.

Regardless, it still needs to be fixed by a third party as if Apple’s apps work, it’s a compatibility issue and isn’t because Apple’s apps are using a “secret” API.

You are making strawmen here. No one claims it's a private API. It's simply that the changes between iOS 16 and iOS 16.0.2 weren't announced for, regardless of how often you keep telling that to yourself.

Just received my 14 pro after having an 11 pro for almost 3 years, same issue. 3rd party apps are horrible but also just the normal camera on the phone, will not focus up close without macro mode which still isn’t that good and I’m hating how it so obviously switches between with different quality as well.

I only updated for more storage so am thinking about going back to an 11 with more gb.

That's not a bug, it's by design.

The larger sensor in newer iPhones means that the 1x "wide" lens has a more distant minimum focus distance, which is why the Camera app will automatically switch to using the Ultrawide lens in macro mode to focus closely.

Third party apps can do the same thing but they need to properly use the appropriate APIs to do so.

I also just recently got my 14 pro max coming from an 11. The 14 selfie camera is too grainy and saturated I’ll say. Before you take your picture it looks smooth and perfect but once you take the picture it changes the quality. I hope Apple fixes this. Asap.

Dogcow, I'm honestly interested if you can point me to a Third Party app that is currently doing this Macro switch correctly? I have tried it on Turo (license scan), Target (barcode scan), Walmart (barcode), Banking apps (check deposit picture), and none of them are working properly on my iPhone 14 Pro Max.

ProCam for one allows you to manually select which lens you want to use and focuses just fine when you select the ultrawide lens, allowing you to fill the screen as much as half way with a bar code that measures 1 5/8" x 3/4" on paper, so it is possible for third-party apps to request the proper lens based upon what it needs in terms of resolution and size.

The issue is apps are apparently just asking for access to the camera rather than properly following the specified API to ask the phone which cameras are available and selecting the one with the shortest possible minimum focus distance.

That is a technique that was recommended with the release of iOS 15, but apparently app authors just got away with not doing it on iPhone 13 and it's biting them now.

What’s new in camera capture - WWDC21 - Videos - Apple Developer