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With comically large lenses and crowded camera systems becoming the norm, it's no surprise that smartphone photography and videography have come a long way. Camera-centric phones like the Oppo Find X7 Ultra or the Vivo X200 Pro come with 1-inch sensors and multiple optical zoom options, allowing for detailed photography even in poorly lit environments. Of course, the more common flagships like the iPhone 17 Pro and Galaxy S25 Ultra sport industry-leading cameras as well.
In fact, it's difficult to capture bad images with capable modern hardware — but you can always strive to produce better-looking photos with your smartphone. Apart from finding the right settings and adopting composition guidelines, you can improve your phone camera's output by using external accessories. We're talking gadgets like tripods, ring lights, or external microphones that stretch the quality of production beyond what a smartphone on its own can accomplish.
There are various add-ons you can pair with your phone, but sticking to gear of high quality will ensure that it is complementing your phone's hardware and not working against it. Based on reviews by experts in the industry, here are five smartphone accessories that can level up your camera game. You can find more about our methodology at the end of this read.
Moment Lenses
Moment
One of the most popular categories of smartphone photography accessories is camera lenses. These are tiny attachments that snap onto your smartphone's camera and alter its field of view or magnification. A quick search on Amazon will fetch you plenty of options, but it's best to stick with lenses that have been tried and tested. Poor fit or low-quality optics can actually do more harm than good. Moment manufactures some of the best smartphone lens attachments in the market.
For instance, the Moment 14mm Fisheye Lens can get you super wide-angle shots, making it the perfect add-on when filming in tight spaces. On the other end, you have the Moment 58mm Tele Lens, which provides 2x optical zoom without any quality loss. Lenses of these focal lengths are often best suited for portrait photography. Moment sells lenses of other magnification levels as well, with different mounting systems.
To make mounting simpler, Moment also sells phone cases that are designed to accommodate its lenses. While the company covers all modern iPhone models, case options for Android devices are quite limited. Fortunately, Moment sells a universal mount that can be used on any smartphone that's not officially compatible with a Moment case. Tom's Guide reviewed Moment's lenses and praised their build quality and ease of attachment — albeit at a cost. Lenses start at $99, and you also need to factor in the cost of buying the phone case.
DJI RS 4 Mini
Andy Zahn/SlashGear
It's often said that the biggest external factor that directly affects the quality of photos and videos a camera can capture is lighting. Relying on natural light or picking up a video light can easily address this. However, another huge aspect that plays a prominent role is stability. Smartphones have gotten impressively good at reducing camera shake thanks to features like OIS (Optical Image Stabilization), but if you're getting serious about your videography skills, you're gonna have to rely on more than just in-built stabilization features.
Tripods are an excellent and inexpensive way to add stability, but they're largely only useful for stationary camera setups that require minimal pan and tilt movement. If you're looking to vlog or capture more dynamic videos, a camera gimbal can make a huge difference. We reviewed the DJI RS 4 Mini and gave it a rating of 9/10. It's designed for smaller cameras or smartphones and features an automatic locking mechanism for the motors.
We noted excellent results when it comes to stabilization — especially when paired with smartphones. You also get automatic subject tracking with the DJI RS 4 Mini, which can substantially help when you're filming yourself. There's Bluetooth support so you can start or stop the recording on your phone using the gimbal's record button. The gimbal is priced at $370 and has a 4.4-star rating on Amazon, based on 2,000 reviews.
Dockcase MagSafe SSD Enclosure
Dockcase
Modern flagship iPhone models support ProRes video recording at 4K, which preserves more color information but uses more storage than regular formats. Unless you've splurged for a 1TB storage configuration, you likely will run into storage constraints when shooting with your smartphone. Using cloud platforms to offload older recordings is always an option, but not only does this take time, it requires an active internet connection. The solution? Hook up an external SSD to your phone.
Newer iPhones and the Galaxy S25 series allow you to record videos directly to external storage drives. Depending on your video settings, you will need to ensure you get one of those fast portable SSDs. The specific accessory we're recommending, however, is slightly different, in that it's an SSD enclosure. You will still need to buy a compatible M.2 NVMe SSD, but in return, you get a storage solution that can snap onto the back of your phone via MagSafe.
It comes with a high-speed 10Gbps USB-C connector and cable in the box, and can also facilitate pass-through charging up to 90W. The digital display shows real-time charging and data transfer speeds too. The Dockcase MagSafe SSD Enclosure earned a 4/5 rating in Macworld's review, which praised it for the convenience it offers thanks to its upgradable nature. It's priced at $60 on Amazon, but you need to factor in the extra cost of a compatible NVMe SSD, as well.
Sharge Icemag 2
Jowi Morales/SlashGear
Aside from storage, another metric to keep in mind during long recording sessions is your phone's battery life. Capturing high-resolution footage continuously takes a toll on your phone's battery, which is further amplified if you're outdoors and your screen's maximum brightness has to kick in. Charging your phone in short bursts is an option, but isn't ideal if you're recording something you can't miss — say, pictures of the northern lights or time-lapses of the sunset. This is where power banks come in handy.
There's absolutely no shortage of power banks. You can grab one as beefy as you can and simply use a really long charging cable, but that's not the most elegant solution. The $70 Sharge Icemag 2 is a perfect accessory in this case. It comes with 10000mAh of juice and supports Qi2 wireless charging, meaning you can snap it on the back of compatible iPhone or Android devices. This also unlocks up to 15W of wireless charging, or up to 30W in wired mode.
Long recording sessions can make your phone toasty, and trying to charge it at the same time becomes a challenge. This is where the Icemag 2's built-in cooling fan comes in. In our review of the Sharge Icemag 2, we concluded that it's a rather affordable purchase given everything it has to offer. In the context of smartphone photography, its compact form factor and MagSafe wireless charging make even more sense.
Moment SuperCage
Moment
We saved the most exciting accessory for last. One quick look at the Moment SuperCage and you can tell it's designed for those who mean serious business. If you're unfamiliar with the concept of camera cages, they're essentially enclosure frames that wrap around a camera and offer mounting points so you can hook up other accessories like microphones, lights, or external batteries. The Moment SuperCage is one of the beefiest options that can accommodate smartphones.
You can mount your phone in the middle using the spring-loaded clamp, which can slide around to fit other accessories more freely. The cage uses an open rail system, which is why you can spot mounting points basically everywhere. The base uses the Arca system, which makes the cage compatible with most tripods. Priced at $200, the Moment SuperCage is undoubtedly more expensive than other smartphone cages, but it packs a feature that just might justify the premium — a built-in USB hub.
The cage connects to your smartphone via a USB-C cable and, in return, gives you a 6-port hub that can be used to connect accessories. There's support for up to 100W of Power Delivery pass-through charging. You can slot in an SD card or connect a high-speed external SSD to one of the USB-C ports. You get 3.5mm input and output ports for monitoring audio via headphones or connecting microphones. AppleInsider covered the Moment SuperCage in good depth and rated it 4.5 out of 5 stars.
How we selected these smartphone accessories
LightField Studios/Shutterstock
By picking accessories that aid in different aspects of smartphone photography and videography, our goal for this piece was to cover a wide range of use cases. Products like the Sharge IceMag 2 and the Dockcase SSD Enclosure may seem unconventional, but they can be lifesavers during long periods of filming. On the other hand, accessories like Moment's lenses or the SuperCage can completely change the way you capture footage on your smartphone in the first place.
We recommend products that have been tested thoroughly, either by verified customers or experts in the industry. For this list, we based recommendations on in-depth reviews carried out by reputable publications like Tom's Guide, Macworld, and AppleInsider. We ourselves test many such products and carefully evaluate performance, build quality, and overall value.
You're not limited to the exact accessories we've listed, either. For instance, if you're unable to find a Moment lens for your device, it's worth exploring other options. Referring to customer reviews is a great way to gauge how well any given product is going to fare.