Optical vs. digital zoom is what many people are interested in today. It's very simple, digital zoom is really a lie and it's very easy to answer the question: "Which is better, digital zoom or optical?". I'll explain.

The reason why answering the question about optical vs. digital zoom is so easy is that the digital zoom is actually not a real zoom. Optical zoom actually enables you to see things as if you were standing closer to them and keeps the image quality at maximum. All that digital zoom does is stretching the existing image you have thus making it appear larger.

Look at these pictures to get a clearer picture:

As you can see, all that digital zoom does is make grains on your photo.

Don't be fooled by the following. Sometimes digital zoom will not give grains or bad quality, but that is only because the resolution of your image/video taken is lower than the maximum resolution your camcorder/camera i capable of making. It just takes the picture/video of the area you want to zoom into, and ignores the rest thus making the illusion of zooming into the picture. Maybe this part is a bit hard to understand, but all you have to do is compare the two pictures I provided in this article and you will fully understand what's the problem.

Companies that make cameras and camcorders often use the trick of digital zoom to convince you that their cameras can do insane zooms. They state huge numbers like 120x etc., so it's important that you understand the real nature of digital and optical zoom.

Remember - optical zoom is real zoom, digital zoom is artificial. The winner in optical vs. digital zoom battle is clear. Good luck and have fun!