Move over Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra – Leica just launched its first Android phone to kill off the camera phone competition

In 2026, there's a good chance that most of the images we see and take on a daily basis come from a phone. These pocket powerhouses have come on leaps and bound, with imaging solutions which are convenient and offer incredible quality.

Now, Leica has put its iconic red dot on an Android phone for the very first time. Dubbed the Leitzphone, the model is crafted in partnership with Xiaomi – a brand which Leica has a long-running history with.

Now obviously this phone is going to be pretty well-geared for photographic applications, but that's not the only area where Leica has made its mark. The brand's design ethos of reduction to the essential has been employed here, to help keep everything as simple as possible.

The defining part of the design is the mechanical camera ring, which sits around the camera. That's designed to make the experience of shooting with this phone similar to doing to with a camera, and can be customised to control things like zoom, exposure value, ISO and shutter speed.

The triple camera setup on the rear is also designed to meet the brand's impeccably high standards for image quality and and optical performance. That covers a total equivalent focal length range of 14-100mm, with apertures ranging from f/1.67-f/2.9.

The main camera uses a one-inch, 200MP sensor, complete with something called LOFIC, which significantly expands the dynamic range. The telephoto sensor is also a 200MP unit, meaning there's lots of resolution on offer.

Crucially, this model also makes use of the Content Authenticity Initiative, which is something we've seen on some of the brand's cameras like the Leica M11-D. That's a really important addition, which hard codes metadata into every image to prove it isn't the product of AI generation.

Now, all of that doesn't come cheap. Priced at £1,700 / €1,999 (approx. US$2,300 / AU$3,200) this is one of the most costly phones out there. Is it worth the cash? It's too early to say – watch this space for a fuller review in due course – but for those who really value phone photography, this certainly seems like an appealing offering.