Samsung S20 and iPhone 11 Pro Camera Comparison
I am getting quite hooked on mobile photography. It has so many positives and the technology is improving at the speed of light. The iPhone 11 is one of the leaders in HDR photography, and how does it compare to the new Samsung S20. There is one huge difference…
Lets begin…
By comparison, the Samsung S20 and iPhone 11 Pro both have triple rear camera setups, comprising of: a 13mm ultrawide (UW), a 26mm main camera and a telephoto lens. The tele lens is the polarising feature of the S20. On paper it’s merely just a 3x zoom instead of the iPhone’s 2x. But in reality it’s so much more, and I will explain why later.
Click on each image for the full resolution version (there is one image that takes you to Dropbox as it’s too large to upload here).
In the first image, both phones are so similar in terms of sharpness and image quality it’s hardly worth talking about. The iPhone opts for a very slightly flatter image, and it’s certainly warmer in colour temperature too. The Samsung show slightly more contrast and is cooler, but there’s no winner, just personal preference.
The ultrawide on both cameras are a similar story to the main camera; there’s no real winner, both give reasonably good images. The Samsung (or, more likely, me) slightly over-exposed the white horse, whilst the iPhone remains flatter and slightly duller. The Samsung is also slightly sharper in the corners while the iPhone 11’s 13mm lens tends to leave a little to be desired in the corners.
Another here from the main camera. Here the S20 seems to be the one with the warmer tones and is probably equal in saturation vs the iPhone 11 Pro. Again, it really isn’t worth picking a winner, it just comes down to preference.
That is the wonderful thing about flagship smartphones now, they all take really nice images at this resolution. The real test is when megapixels increase or when shooting in really dark conditions. The way phones can improve further though, is in the HDR department, where sometimes you see inconsistent results from both cameras.
Another UW shot. The one thing that holds true throughout, is that the Samsung opts for higher contrast and the iPhone opts for softer flatter images – this isn’t by a huge amount, but it’s noticable. I see a lot of reviewers commenting on how one device has more ‘high dynamic range’ (HDR) than another… Mostly they are just getting confused with the manufacturer’s choice in how it processes the image. Take this comparison as an example; the Samsung, with it’s much larger sensor will have better HDR capabilities but it choses to present the images with more contrast, making highlights brighter and shadows darker.
This shot is a great example of that. The iPhone shows a much flatter, more traditionally ‘HDR’ looking image, where as the Samsung goes for contrast but still retains the necessary details.
Samsung, however, hold a huge trump card over the iPhone. The S20 and S20+ both have a second main camera, which is in fact really the main camera. It is a large 1/1.7 inch, 64mp sensor with a 27-28mm lens in front of it. This is actually marketed as the ‘3x hybrid optical telephoto’ camera, but it’s really not. The way it get’s its ‘3x zoom’ is all digital with some clever sharpening.
The great thing about the S20, is the ability to use that ‘telephoto’ camera at its full 64 megapixel resolution. Better still, the images it produces are absolutely superb! I have used quite a lot of the high resolution smartphones now like the Huawei P20 Pro, Mi Note 10, Samsung S20 Ultra and have seen many full res- images from other high megapixel phones, but none come close to what I have seen from this one.
There’s two killer attributes of the Samsung S20 and S20+
- The images are beautifully sharp, corner to corner, with only the smallest drop off in resolution at the extreme edges.
- The HDR of the main 12mp camera is almost identical of the 64mp camera. Notably, my Mi Note 10 loses it’s HDR completely at full resolution.
Final Thoughts
Firstly, don’t go and buy an S20 if you already have an iPhone 11. There will be an iPhone 12 out this year, and rumours are that it’ll feature higher resolution cameras. It might be wise to wait a few months and see… But if you want the best high resolution camera phone, I have seen nothing better so far than this Samsung S20 or S20+
I beg of you Apple, please give us your own version of this sensor. Something even better would be great, to keep Apple fans such as myself invested!
Which one would I chose?
This is easy enough and considering I am an Apple user and I am heavily invested in Mac’s and MacBooks… I’d still pick the Samsung S20 over the iPhone 11 Pro, due to the 64mp camera, the iPhone has no comparison.
28mm is a wonderful landscape focal length, and shoving a sharp, 64mp sensor behind this, that captures HDR images perfectly, is a dream. More on the S20 soon…