Is the glass camera lens on your Note 5 fatally cracked? If you are confident enough to replace only the lens without just replacing the entire lens housing panel, try this repair yourself. After you finish this article, watch the accompanying video:
and follow along to JerryRigEverything!
Follow this link for the Note 5 WHITE lens complete housing.
Follow this link for the Note 5 GOLD lens complete housing.
Follow this link for the Note 5 BLUE lens complete housing.
Follow this link for the Note 5 lens GLASS ONLY.
Replacing the camera lens on the Note 5 is the same process you could use for the Galaxy S6, the 6 Edge, and the 6 Edge plus; basically all of Samsung’s glass-backed phones. The safest way to accomplish this repair is to replace the entire back lens panel which will include a new glass camera lens. The method discussed here is a riskier one because if you slip a shard of glass into the camera unit, you could kill the ability of your Note 5 camera to focus.
Gather these tools for the job: a razor blade and a pair of tweezers. Before you begin, as with most other repairs, make sure you have turned your phone off completely. Additionally, place clear tape over the broken lens of your Note 5 to keep it together and prevent shards from falling into the camera unit.
A glass replacement lens from Bonafide Hardware is important because some businesses are selling plastic lenses which are of significantly lower quality than glass lenses. Before the repair takes place, let’s talk about Optical Image Stabilization (OIS). The YouTube video will show you OIS in action. OIS is the camera unit itself twisting and tilting to make sure your pictures are in focus. If you get shards of glass around the edges of the unit, on the lens itself, or in any other spaces in that region, it will stop the image from stabilizing and the lens from focusing, rendering your camera virtually useless.
Now, to remove the glass use the razor blade and tweezers to take away glass, trying to keep the pieces as big as possible. Do this carefully and slowly; the more shards and dust that falls into the camera unit, the higher the chance is that your camera will stop focusing the way it should. Make sure that every shard and all the leftover glue is gone before you start to replace the lens. If your replacement lens is dirty take a cloth, not tissue or paper towels because these would scratch the lens, and wipe away the dust or dirt. Next, gently place the new lens into the unit. If your camera stops focusing after the repair, wait 24 to 48 hours because sometimes it will just start working again on its own.
Share this post and the accompanying video with friends and family whose Note 5 lenses are compromising picture quality.