Photo credit: Gonzalo Baeza H

Ever wish your iPhone was a little more useful? Stop wishing and do something about it! For less than $20 in cash and with a little bit of time, you can actually turn your iPhone into a microscope. This is actually a lot easier than you might think, which goes to show how far technology has come in recent years. Even a decade ago, no one would’ve thought about using a phone to look at the microscopic world.

Why Turn Your iPhone into a Microscope?

Before we begin, we want to go over why you might want to do this. Granted, a lot of people have no interest in this little iPhone hack, but it’s one that a lot of students, scientists or geeks in general might like. For one thing, it’s really cool. Imagine being able to amaze your friends with what your smartphone can do. Additionally, it can actually be useful to have a microscope in your pocket at all times. You’ll have to carry around the accessory that makes this possible, but this isn’t too much of a problem for most people who are interested in this sort of thing.

Here’s How to Do It

You may want to read the entire instructions which are available online, but here’s a rundown of what you’re going to need to do in order to turn your iPhone into a microscope that actually works.

Basically, you’re going to be constructing a series of lenses made out of plexiglass. Then, using the camera that’s included on your smartphone, you’re going to be able to zoom in without the image getting blurry – at least up to a certain level of magnification.

You’re going to need a piece of plywood, some plexiglass – cut into small pieces – as well as nuts and bolts to hook it all together. The materials you need are really easy to find – you may even have most of them out in your garage or another workspace in your house. Once you have all the required materials, it’s just a matter of putting them together. The good news is that this is actually very easy. The Instructables website has a video that shows you everything you need to do to get the job done.

If you use two lenses, you can actually get a 375x magnification level, which is quite impressive when you consider it’s being done by a normal iPhone. What you do with the information above is up to you, but we’d like to hear from you if you’ve made a microscope with your iPhone. Leave a comment and let us know how it went for you and if you have any tips for people wanting to try this, leave that information too!

About the author: Gideon TakSen likes to look for Homes in Occoquan for sale online in his spare time. He’s also been looking for social media firms in NYC. Can you guess where he wants to move when he gets a chance?