Retro camera · iPhone · Coming soon
Kilobyte
The cameras you remember, 1997 to 2007.
Your phone takes perfect photos. Kilobyte takes the ones you remember. Pick one of thirteen cameras from 1997 to 2007 and see its look live in the viewfinder: a 640×480 digicam on a bright day, a flip phone's hinge lens, direct flash on a night out, a black-and-white floppy-disk camera, a cardboard disposable, an instant print, a tape camcorder, a desk webcam. Each one is a small simulation of the real hardware, not a filter laid on top.
Cameras, not filters.
Kilobyte recreates the cameras people actually carried between 1997 and 2007: VGA phones, flip phones, disposables, instant film, camcorders, desk webcams. Each camera is a simulation of the hardware: its tiny sensor, its plastic lens, its wrong white balance, its grain, and a real JPEG encoder throwing detail away. The damage looks genuine because it is.
You see it all live in the viewfinder before you shoot, so you frame the photo you're actually going to get.
Thirteen cameras, ten years.
- VGA 03 · Free640 by 480, bright day, too much sharpening.
- Flip Phone · Free352 pixels across, the little lens on the hinge.
- Night Out · FreeDirect flash, everything behind you goes black.
- Mono 98 · FreeBlack and white digicam, floppy disk storage.
- DisposableCardboard camera, one hour developing.
- InstantShake it, wait, watch the colours come up.
- CamcorderTape era, soft highlights, warm roll off.
- Swivel 05Held at arm's length in a bedroom mirror.
- Webcam 99320 square, desk lamp, dial-up upload.
- Handset 07The good one. Five megapixels, still not great.
- ToycamCross-processed slide film, dark corners.
- Mall BoothCurtain, flash, four frames at the shopping centre.
- MeltdownSaved, sent, saved again, until it fell apart.
VGA 03, Flip Phone, Night Out and Mono 98 are free. Every other camera gives you three free shots before asking.
Four ways to shoot.
Photo, of course. Booth: four shots on a countdown, printed down a strip. GIF: two-second loops that drop straight into Messages. And Clip: up to 15 seconds of video with sound, the date burnt in.
Everything is kept together in your Roll, each shot with its original.
Every camera is its own device.
Each camera has its own screen: an olive digicam LCD, a blue-backlit phone, a glowing camcorder display with a tape counter, a CRT webcam window. Each has its own shutter sound, synthesised in code, and its own date stamp.
Turn on "Stamp the camera's year" and a 2003 camera stamps today in 2003.
Change your mind later.
Every shot is kept with its original, so you can re-develop it through any other camera, any time. Hold to compare, then re-date it, fade it, frame it or scratch it up.
Built for iPhone, too: the volume buttons and Camera Control fire the shutter, and on iPhone 16 and later the thirteen cameras sit on Camera Control itself, so you can flick between decades without touching the screen.
Pick your pixel camera.
Kilobyte is free with four cameras and Photo mode, and every other camera gives you three free shots before asking. Kilobyte Pro is one purchase, never a subscription: all nine other cameras, booth strips, GIFs and clips, light leaks, dust and frames, and four alternative app icons.
Private by design: no account, no ads, no tracking and no third-party code. Your photos are processed and kept on your iPhone, and Kilobyte never adds your location.
