<P> On June 11, 1997, Philippe Kahn instantly shared the first pictures from the maternity ward where his daughter Sophie was born . He wirelessly transmitted his cell phone pictures to more than 2,000 family, friends and associates around the world . Kahn's wireless sharing software and camera integrated into his cell phone augured the birth of instant visual communications . Kahn's cell phone transmission is the first known publicly shared picture via a cell phone . </P> <P> Cameras on cell phones proved popular right from the start, as indicated by the J - Phone in Japan having had more than half of its subscribers using cell phone cameras in two years . The world soon followed . In 2003, more camera phones were sold worldwide than stand - alone digital cameras largely due to growth in Japan and Korea . In 2005, Nokia became the world's most sold digital camera brand . In 2006, half of the world's mobile phones had a built - in camera . In 2006, Thuraya released the first satellite phone with an integrated camera . The Thuraya SG - 2520 was manufactured by Korean company APSI and ran Windows CE . In 2008, Nokia sold more camera phones than Kodak sold film - based simple cameras, thus becoming the biggest manufacturer of any kind of camera . In 2010, the worldwide number of camera phones totaled more than a billion . Since 2010, most mobile phones, even cheapest ones, are being sold with a camera . High - end camera phones usually had a relatively good lens and high resolution . </P> <P> Higher resolution camera phones started to appear in 2010s. 12 - megapixel camera phones have been produced by at least two companies . To highlight the capabilities of the Nokia N8 (Big CMOS Sensor) camera, Nokia created a short film, The Commuter, in October 2010 . The seven - minute film was shot entirely on the phone's 720p camera . A 14 - megapixel smartphone with 3 × optical zoom was announced in late 2010 . Apple's iPhone started including a 12 - megapixel camera with the iPhone 6S and 6S Plus in 2015 (it had been 8 - megapixel on models released in previous years), and continues to do so with iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus, that were introduced in 2016, while the latter includes a dual - lens camera and includes a 2 × optical zoom . In 2012, Nokia announced Nokia 808 PureView . It features a 41 - megapixel 1 / 1.2 - inch sensor and a high - resolution f / 2.4 Zeiss all - aspherical one - group lens . It also features Nokia's PureView Pro technology, a pixel oversampling technique that reduces an image taken at full resolution into a lower resolution picture, thus achieving higher definition and light sensitivity, and enables lossless zoom . In mid-2013, Nokia announced the Nokia Lumia 1020 . It had an improved version of the 41 - megapixel sensor . In mid-2018, Sharp released Sharp A Click, smartphone with dual cameras in the back of the smartphone and also dual cameras in the front of the smartphone . Main camera has standard lens and second camera has wide angle lens, both cameras can give standard to wide angle photo with bokeh . </P> <P> Major manufacturers of cameras for phones include Toshiba, ST Micro, Sharp, Omnivision, and Aptina (Now part of ON Semiconductor). </P>

What is a rear camera on a phone