What is your smartphone camera of choice?

Oppo Find X6 pro. Don't own it though.

I was Apple user for many years. 2 years ago I switched to Samsung S20 FE. S20 FE's main camera is pretty good for landscape, but not portrait. And telephoto is horrible.

I can upgrade my phone in 1 month. I'm debating between the following:

• Samsung S23 Ultra. Based on YouTube examples (see below), I like S23 Ultra the best. And it is great all around phone. If I have to pick today, I'd go with S23 Ultra.

• iPhone 14 Pro Max (or possibly wait for 15). What I like about Apple is the workflow. Apple Photos just make it so easy to manage and edit photos on iPhone, iPad, or Mac. Apple doesn't have a lot of added features, but it just works well.

• Google Pixel 7 Pro. It has some pros but also some big drawbacks. Portrait on Pixel 7 is horrible, because it uses the wide angle lens. And besides the camera, Pixel 7 Pro phone (such as battery life and processing power) is not comparable to competition. Good news is Pixel 7 Pro is $400-500 cheaper.

Check out this comparison between the 3 phones. You can make your own judgement which resulting photos you like.

youtu.be/h8zrU7KJzbM

For me, I don't care for night mode. Around 50% of the samples at the end are night mode. So ignoring the night mode, here is my result:

• Samsung S23 Ultra: 11 (1st place), 5 (2nd place), and 2 (3rd place)

• Apple 14 Pro Max: 4 (1st place), 8 (2nd place), and 6 (3rd place)

• Google Pixel 7 Pro: 2 (1st place), 5 (2nd place), and 10 (3rd place)

Although not a recommended purchase, my vote goes to S23Ultra. Great phone.
Current line across all brands looks like poor price/value ratio.

After doing a bunch of research, I got Samsung S23 Ultra. The most important factors for me are camera and battery life. I ruled out Pixel 7 or 7 Pro, because of poor battery life. Then between S23 Ultra and Apple 14 Pro Max, it just depends on what OS you prefer or need. I have been using Samsung and Apple concurrently for past 2 years. Samsung for my daily use. Then I keep old Apple phone on wifi for Screen Time (family members), Find My (check location of family members), FaceTime (with my parents), and iMessage.

S23 Ultra camera has good hardware. Has 4 cameras: UW, Normal (Wide), 3x, and 10x telephoto cameras. But it has couple additional features that are marketing gimmicks: 200 mpix main sensor and 100x digital telephoto. Technically these do work, but result is not really usable.

S23 Ultra does have some quirks. Samsung has these additional modes (Pro and Expert RAW) that are supposedly for photographers. RAW output is fine. Users can edit these however they like. But the Expert mode JPEG output is completely over the top (overly bright and super saturated), which is opposite of what photographers typically want.

I posted my comparison of the different modes on reddit: www.reddit.com/r/GalaxyS23/comments/138anr8/s23_ultra_standard_pro_and_expert_raw_comparison/

Poco F3
( Xiaomi family - bought on offer the 256G version for 220€ )

Not bad, not impressive as a camera > no Manual mode <
Really good pictures as a camera phone

3 cameras
- 3) Macro
- 2) Wide
- 1) Tele

The Poco F3
1) a 48MP primary camera relying on the Sony IMX 582 Quad-Bayer 1/2" sensor with 0.8µm pixels, 25mm f/1.8 lens, and PDAF. Night Mode is supported on this camera.
2) an 8MP 1/4" Sony IMX355 snapper with an ultrawide-angle 15mm f/2.2 lens. The focus is fixed; Night Mode is present here, too.
3) a macro shooter with a 5MP Samsung S5K5E8 sensor with 1.75µm pixels and 49mm f/2.4 telemacro lens with autofocus that works between 3cm and 7cm distance.
-The selfie camera has a 20MP Samsung S5K3T2 ISOCELL Plus 1/3.4" Tetra-pixel sensor behind a 26mm f/2.2 lens. The focus is fixed.

Not too bad, and easy to handle, I'd have fun with it...
.... but when I reached the limit, I happily bought my Z30

You need three zoom lenses to have the same focals
( total 1.200€ against 220€ /\ 2.1Kg against 209gr )

Macro shot:

I had the Samsung Galaxy series for years ... pretty good:

I got sick and tired of the poor battery performance and replaced it with a Sonim flip-open with real keys and no camera ...

Similar story for me, although I went with a Fairphone 4 for my unconventional alternative - these have comparable battery capacity to the Galaxy series, but you can swap them in the field if you carry spares. The camera on it is pretty underwhelming, but since I only ever use it for digital note-taking, the massive oversharpening that it applies isn't much of a negative.

That’s interesting. I’ve been playing with files from the 48mp sensor on the 14 and am truly amazed. Announcements for the 15…or any updates…normally come in September, correct?

What I have: Samsung Note 20, likely to upgrade to an S23 +/Ultra since they are great phones with long software support. Both models have excellent cameras too.

However. If camera was the main motivation, I'd get a Sony Xperia PRO-I. Proper shutter button and a dedicated normal 50mm equivalent module.

iPhone 12 Pro Max here. I’m in the Apple ecosystem with laptop, iPad etc. but the phone is my least worry. I tend to upgrade my phone about every 5 years.

Answering the question, as asked, makes it seem as if I would purchase a mobile telephone based on what the camera performance is. For a photographer like me, that's just rubbish. I have cameras for photography and keep, at least, one with me at all times. My PHONE of choice is Apple - currently the 13 Pro. I use it because, I feel, Apple is the best manufacturer at what they do - computers phones, OS. I would never buy a phone for the camera any more than I would purchase a camera for its phone. That said, when buying an expensive (too expensive to me) phone, I expect it to bring with it the best camera. Apple has never let me down.

Adding another data point... I currently have the Samsung S20FE, and it is... okay, for a phone, in good light.

It's a bit noisy, becoming a lot noisy in low light situations. Its "night mode" seems pretty hit and miss, though I admit I've only dabbled with it a little out of curiosity, since it makes all the processing decisions and spits out a JPG. If you don't like its choices, pretty much too bad. I usually use the Lightroom camera app rather than the Samsung one because it gives me access to the RAW files and it generally seems to do a decent job. I think the default app's "pro" mode also lets you get the raws, but it always shoots both raw and jpg if I remember, which is more clutter than I need.

At the moment I'm not planning to upgrade though, because the cost for top end phones is pretty crazy, and I often bring another camera anyway -- for me this is a camera of last resort, really.

I currently use a Pixel 7.
I previously had an Iphone X, which I found good enough for travel photo. I wanted to buy a 13 pro, but it was too expensive.
The Pixel 7 was a bargain, and, I think, gives similar results.
Image quality is very good for travel, that's why I'm starting to take only the phone when travelling. It's so convenient!
I'm pleased with the results, but I sometimes have to correct excessive sharpening.
But I miss the telephoto of the pro model. I'd like more reach, but not a bigger size. The Pixel 7 size is OK, as was the Iphone X.
The pro model looks too big for me. I'm waiting for the next generation, to see if I can have the best compromise between image quality, reach, size and price.
André

Yes. I had a Nexus and then Google Pixels and then a Huawei P30 pro. The took wonderful photos but that was the problem. They took the photo. Other than framing the shot, I was just along for the ride. With my Xperia 5III and the Photography Pro interface that is much like the Sony Alpha camera interface I am involved in taking the photo again with a shutter-priority mode and a manual mode and a Program Mode. It's a hoot if you enjoy actually taking photos. If I want an outstanding photo with none of my input I'll buy a print.

I discover that I have an iPhone SE3; but I only use it to take snaps in an emergency. I dont see the point in my spending money on a Canon R6 and lenses, plus a Sony RX100, if I am going to prefer to use the phone instead. Mobile phones are both over-rated and over-priced in my opinion.

David

Oppo make great phones. Really really good. Tough, long lasting, great battery life, & not too much crOppo make great phones. Really really good. Tough, long lasting, great battery life, & not too much cr@p bloatware in their OS. I don't buy them for the camera though. On a scale of 1-10 for camera performance, the camera rates at about minus 964. For me.

Realme X3 Superzoom

1/1.7 sensor, ultrawide, wide, 5x stabilised periscope, 2-day battery, low noise, low distortion, low or no PF and most importantly: bright, attractive exposure and colour that is uniform across lenses. And it's under $300 now.

Haven't found a better balanced and easy to use setup, and I go through a lot of phones.

Excessive sharpening is probably one of the worst issues with mobile photography. What do you usually do to counteract it?