iPhone 18 Pro aperture control extends to Moment and Blackmagic apps

Moment Pro Camera II and Blackmagic Camera now let iPhone 18 Pro owners control its mechanical main-camera aperture inside their own shooting tools. Blackmagic added support in its September 18 version 3.5 release notes; Moment described its update on September 23. The change gives photographers and video makers more ways to coordinate aperture with exposure and recording settings. It does not mean Apple left aperture control out of its Camera app: Apple's Pro controls already let owners choose an aperture manually. The reason to try another app is the surrounding workflow, not access to a hidden lens.

What actually changes at the lens

Apple lists four manual positions for the iPhone 18 Pro's 48-megapixel main camera: f/1.48, f/1.8, f/2.8 and f/4. It also says a developer API can control the aperture across its range. These are physical changes to the opening in the lens, unlike adding blur later in Portrait or Cinematic modes. The main camera is the relevant lens; the ultra-wide and telephoto cameras have fixed apertures in Apple's specifications.

Opening toward f/1.48 admits more light and can separate a nearby subject from a distant background. Closing toward f/4 gives more depth of field for a group or a scene with objects at different distances, while admitting less light. In dim conditions, that narrower setting may require a slower shutter or higher ISO. It is a tradeoff to make for a particular shot, not a general image-quality upgrade. Apple has shown sample results, but the app release notes are not independent tests of sharpness, noise or video consistency.

Choose the app by the shot

Moment's September 23 update says an aperture control appears on the 1x camera in Pro Camera II. It starts in Auto; users can select and lock a value between f/1.48 and f/4. Moment also describes aperture-priority, shutter-priority and fully manual exposure modes. Those modes matter when a photographer wants to hold a chosen depth of field while letting the app solve the other exposure settings, or keep aperture, shutter and ISO fixed for a repeatable setup. Moment's own documentation limits the feature to the iPhone 18 Pro main camera. Its App Store version history confirms the variable-aperture update.

Blackmagic Camera's version 3.5 notes explicitly name the iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max and say users can control variable aperture on the 48MP Fusion Main camera. Its broader video interface includes shutter-angle, frame-rate, ISO and white-balance controls, according to Blackmagic's technical specifications. That makes aperture another exposure choice within a video-oriented workflow. The release notes establish support, not that the app makes better footage than Apple's camera or Moment's app. We have not independently shot comparison footage, so a creator should check their own codec, stabilization and storage workflow before committing a project.

An app update is not an upgrade mandate

For someone who already owns an iPhone 18 Pro, start with Apple's manual controls and try a third-party app only if its exposure modes or video interface solve a real shooting problem. A darker scene favors the wider opening; a group that needs more faces in focus may justify f/4 and its exposure cost. Because the change is on the main camera, it does not add aperture control to the other lenses.

An iPhone 17 Pro owner cannot obtain the mechanical feature through an app update. Apple specifies a fixed f/1.78 main-camera aperture on that model. Those owners can still use many manual photo and video controls, so aperture alone is a narrow reason to replace a working phone. The practical test is whether physical depth-of-field control on the main lens is valuable enough for the pictures or footage they actually make. These app announcements do not establish that answer for every shooter.