Bringing your electronics closer to magnets can be scary. After all, if magnets can pull on other metal objects, they can be expected to damage your smartphone’s internal components as well. We’ve seen this with past technology, where placing a magnet near your old TV would distort the picture or completely magnetically erase the data on your hard drive. Fortunately, most modern consumer devices are very resistant to small, everyday magnets and can function properly even with a magnet directly affecting them.
Apple has a support page covering the effect of magnetic accessories on your iPhone’s camera. The page only states that bringing a strong magnet close to the phone’s camera may temporarily cause closed-loop OIS (optical image stabilization) and AF (autofocus) to malfunction. This can cause photos taken to be blurry or fuzzy, but only with a magnet near the camera.
The page doesn’t mention anything about long-term negative effects on your iPhone’s camera from having a magnet nearby. Even more promising, the support page is archived, meaning Apple no longer updates it, suggesting it’s not a big deal. Even if your camera isn’t working properly with a magnet nearby, removing the magnet and waiting a bit will return it to normal. It’s important to note that it’s certainly possible for a strong enough magnet to permanently damage your phone, but this is unlikely with smaller magnets, such as those found in the MagSafe accessories you use every day.
Why do you get blurry photos on your iPhone when a magnet is nearby?
Apple is doing a lot of engineering to let you take professional photos with your iPhone’s camera, including an upcoming addition that will revolutionize your iPhone’s camera with a custom image sensor. One of the best iPhone camera features that already exists in current phones is OIS, which adjusts your camera’s lens or sensor to counteract any sudden movements or shakes when you take a photo or record a video. Unlike digital stabilization, OIS uses magnets inside the phone to physically change the position of the lens or sensor in real time based on how you move your phone.
Similarly, Apple uses a technology called closed-loop AF that uses magnets to calculate the forces the camera is subjected to, such as gravity and vibration, and adjusts focus based on those calculations. Since OIS and closed-loop AF use magnets, external magnetic fields stronger than those used for MagSafe accessories can potentially interfere with the camera’s performance, preventing it from functioning as intended. This is usually only a temporary problem, as both functions return to normal once they escape the magnetic field.
