 Most people don't know that the lenses on your phone aren't just lenses. They're more like completely separate cameras, each with their own image sensor. So if you've ever experienced lackluster performance from your phone's telephoto or ultra wide cameras, it's probably because they're equipped with smaller or lower resolution sensors with slower lenses that capture less light. That's where the idea of products like this come from. If you put an accessory lens over top of your main shooter, in theory, you get the best of all worlds, creative flexibility, and a higher quality image without the bulk of a traditional camera. But most people do know it's going to take a lot more to convince me that this can replace this. Origin PC laptops can now be customized with 11th gen Intel Core processors and Nvidia GeForce RTX 30 series graphics with Max-P design backed by a 24 seven customer support. Check out Origin PC at the link below. Accessory phone lenses are nothing new, and they've gotten a lot more refined over the years. These feel great, they're really quick to swap, and they're really conveniently sized compared to normal lenses. But there's a problem. At a cost of $120 each for these wide and telephoto lenses, they really need to outperform my phone's stock cameras. Can they be justified? Actually, yes, but it's complicated. Here's our first photo of downtime Vancouver's Olympic Village, starting with the ultra wide on the iPhone stock and the 18 millimeter moment lens on the iPhone's primary shooter. At first glance, they aren't that different. The field of view is different, which causes the perspective to change a little bit, like how the bridge looks shorter in this photo. Once we punch in though, the story changes a bit, and we start to see one of the benefits of an external lens setup like this. Our moment setup definitely delivered a better result. Dark parts of the scene demonstrate the better dynamic range of the main shooter, and the image isn't as soft as the iPhone stock ultra wide. It's particularly noticeable in the back buildings where the lines on the stock ultra wide start to become mushy, while they remain relatively defined on the moment lens setup. To see if this result can be replicated for cheaper, we also grabbed this $45 Zenvo lens from Amazon. For starters, it's really finicky to place compared to the phone's case twist system on the moment. No matter where I put it, I got heavy vignetting every single time, which gets old fast, and even if it fits your phone better, there's also a shocking amount of distortion towards the edges of the frame. To be clear, the moment lens isn't perfect in this regard either, but it's so much better than this generic clip-on. I'll focus just on stock versus moment for the rest of this video. On to the telephoto lenses. The first thing that stands out to me here is how amazing Apple's deep fusion has gotten. This 65 millimeter shot looks great. In comparison, the 58 millimeter moment setup is a touch wider at first glance and seems not as punchy. It's hard to tell exactly what's happening here until we zoom in and wow. The supports on the buildings look so much more defined on the stock telephoto, and I had to double check if the moment setup was out of focus. It wasn't. What a plot twist. Of course, this could be a one-off. Let's see how we do in an indoor scene. This is a very challenging shot due to the beam of sun coming through the window. And once again, the stock telephoto was clearly the better performer. I don't even have a good explanation for how much worse the moment setup is here, except to guess that maybe something about using an accessory lens interferes with Apple's auto exposure. Once again, multiple attempts didn't really improve the capture quality much at all. The moment ultra-wide lens on the other hand was a much stronger competitor, sort of. Linus and I both found the image noticeably warmer, which isn't a big problem. It's just something we noticed. And as for clarity, it's a little complicated. At the edge of the frame, this lobster sign above the cast register becomes illegible with the moment. But look at these nuts. In the center of the frame, Apple's AI sharpening is clearly compensating in the stock photo, while the moment setup retains a much more natural look. Up to this point, it feels like the moment lenses can deliver better results, but it can end up working against Apple's own multi-shot compositing and AI cleanup. Fascinating. For sanity then, we moved onto a Note 20 Ultra to compare the results. In this photo of a statue, our 12 megapixel stock ultra-wide did a pretty good job retaining detail in the shadows and has overall minimal fringing even on difficult objects like our flag poles. As for the moment, this is what it was made for. The main shooter on this phone is a whopping 108 megapixels. So when it face planted, I was shocked. I'm not trying to be mean, but this isn't great. This lens flare is one thing, but the fact that it's orange is another. And we got this weird blue fringing on the edge of our statue. Detail-wise, I can find places where it's a little sharper than the stock if I looked for them, but considering the 9X increase in pixel count and the fact that the object is optically closer, I'm not calling that a W. And here's the Note's telephoto versus the 58 millimeter moment lens attached to the main camera. I think the stock lens edges a win here. It's tighter to begin with, offers better detail, and has less ghosting overall. Some people might not like how noisy and processed it looks compared to the moment setup, but to my eye, it's worth the trade-off for the additional warmth that we've now confirmed comes from the moment lenses. And the bokeh here is not the most appealing. And yet, for some reason, this video is not over yet. That reason is video. Look at this. In this darker lit studio scene, you can see that the ultra-wide camera on the iPhone is significantly worse than the primary shooter with the 18 millimeter moment lens. The stock image has a lot of unpleasant looking noise and lacks sharpness, which is especially noticeable on the spinning globe and this clipboard at the back. LTTstar.com, get yours. And this same scene on the telephoto tells a similar story, with the noise and overall detail improving dramatically on the moment. This seems to confirm our theory about deep fusion or other multi-shot compositing techniques working against a clip-on lens setup like moments. The thing is, no lens setup, especially one for $130, is optically perfect, and no hand is perfectly steady. So when you've got multiple shots that need to be combined for better dynamic range or sharpness, the moments imperfections can end up multiplying themselves. Video, by nature, doesn't lean so heavily on these kind of processing techniques. Double-checking on the Note 20 Ultra, the ultra-wide and moment 18 millimeter are honestly very similar in performance here. There is a minor difference in the dynamic range of Taron's shirt on the Note's primary shooter with the moment lens, but even punched in 200%, noise and detail are very close. So I don't know if it's worth the price, but at least it's functioning as intended, giving me additional shooting options. On the telephoto end, the 58 millimeter on the primary camera is a bit wider than the Note stock telephoto. Detail-wise, they are, again, quite similar, but I will give the Edge the moment setup with a slightly more pleasing bokeh. It adds to the background of this shot. However, if range matters more to you, then the stock telephoto on the Note wins here. The last and most interesting lens moment makes for video is their anamorphic. This is the one I'd personally use the most out of the bunch because it's the one that you simply can't replicate from a stock camera on any phone. For those unfamiliar, anamorphic shooting allows you to shoot ultra wide cinematic footage with a standard aspect ratio sensor. See, I could shoot ultra wide like this, but then I'm giving up valuable resolution. So instead I could use a lens that squeezes the image while I'm shooting, then I can unsqueeze it in post, or if you're lazy or want the convenience, Moment has a $10 app that includes an on-the-fly de-squeeze so you can preview your work immediately. This lens is a little bit more expensive at $150, but this is exactly the kind of thing that can add a lot of cinematic fun for future JJ Abrams who want to play with lens flare. So in conclusion, if you're the kind of person who makes a lot of videos on your iPhone, I can see the Moment lenses or something similar potentially being very useful to you. But for everyone else, the stock ultra wide and telephoto on the iPhone and other phones in its class are likely all you need, unless you need more, in which case your money is probably better spent on a decent secondhand body and a basic lens, which this is not, even if it's less convenient to carry. Or you could spend your money on our sponsor, Pulseway. Pulseway is the real time remote monitoring and management software that allows you to manage systems and support users from anywhere. It helps you fix problems on the go by sending commands from any mobile device, and it's compatible with Windows, Mac, and Linux. Scan, install, backup, and update all your systems on the go from your phone. Try it for free today at pulseway.com or through our link in the video description. So thank you guys for watching. Let me know what in the comments down below what you think of the Moment lenses. Do you use them? Have they been useful to you in your life? And if you guys want more camera videos, I've actually done a bunch of them on Short Circuit. We have a video coming out on this camera, the Fuji GFX100S, very soon. Thank you for watching. Please subscribe.