The inbound light is bounced horizontally in the phone in order to physically be able to reach that level of optical zoom.
Neat. Has anyone fit a tiny little telescoping lens into that horizontal space to offer fluid intermediate zoom settings (without resorting to lossy/digital tricks)?
Zoom lens takes more space, has worse f stop, and/or has worse quality like you see on full frame or aps c cameras. (Compare the size of a 50mm f/1.8 vs a 24-70mm f/2.8)