Camera Comparison: iPhone 13 Pro Max vs. Pixel 6 Pro

[w5jck]

The Pixel has better color accuracy. The iPhone 13 has better light gathering. Neither look very good when compared to an Full Frame, APS-C, or even a 1” camera though. The iPhone is way over processing and turning up saturation too high and pushing a gawd awful blue tint. The Pixel looks washed out and dim. And this is why I rarely take anything but throw-away photos with my iPhone! A tiny camera is always going to be a crappy camera. If you want keeper photos, buy a good camera without a phone attached to it.

 

[hagjohn]

Look at how terrible 13 pro front facing cam is. His face looks like pudding

Honestly, neither one looks good.

 

[GtrDude]

Nothing new here. Since iPhone XS the Google phones have had better and much more natural looking cameras.
Shame....but only once it starts affecting Apple's bottom line will they be interested in doing something about it.

 

[kjvmartin]

The Pixel has always done better pictures of people doing normal things, like a birthday dinner indoors, or at a school event. Apple does a great job find someone to travel to Africa and take a picture of a lion at sunrise with great lighting. That's great, better than Pixel probably, but for day to day, Pixel stuff is preferable.

 

[jimbobb24]

Sony just released a pro level phone with 1 inch sensor… that could destroy iphone or pixel

Sony makes amazing phones but no one buys them. Not me.

 

[ksec]

Starting from iPhone X Apple started migrating their old iPhone colour grading and style from True to Life to High Dynamic Instagram Ready Photo mode.

Do they look better? Yes,

Do they look realistic to what you see? No.

 

[Johnny907]

Yeah that night shot looks a lot better on the Pixel. That you claim otherwise shows a clear bias. More details on iPhone? Yeah look at the trees, and tell me again how the 13 shows more details than the Pixel.
I have not interest moving away from iOS but this video is nonsense.

 

[BrentD]

Disregarding the differences in focal length and other exposure settings... The Pixel photos generally look much more accurate in capturing the natural lighting and the iPhone shots look abnormally brightened and saturated/adjusted. The Pixel photos, though, seem a bit muddy when it comes to contrast. If you're talking "Insta-ready" photos, then sure, the iPhone does a decent job at that. But if you're talking accurate photos, the Pixel is probably doing a better job at that.

 

[TheDailyApple]

The first and last comparisons seem opposite. In the first, the pixel is clearly better (and the iphone is to cool); however in the last, the iphone is better (and the pixel is too cool).

I don’t take camera too heavily into account when buying phone, because they aren’t good for more than snapshots anyway.

 

[Moonlight]

I want to see comparisons at the pixel level (no pun intended) and see how they handle noise and noise reduction.

 

[QCassidy352]

It’s weird that the article claims the iPhone wins at night, as that’s the one comparison where it’s very clear to me that the Pixel created the better image. I prefer the iPhone for the other 3 companions, but it’s pretty subjective.

 

[now i see it]

No question, iPhone photos look more fake. Super real. That’s what happens when engineers can tweak every pixel in camera with computational photography — they crank settings so every picture punches (which I personally don’t like). iPhone pictures don’t look natural. It’s like they’re on steroids or something.

 

[wigby]

Shortly after the launch of the new iPhone 13 models in September, Google came out with the Pixel 6 and the Pixel 6 Pro, its latest flagship devices, which are feature rich and priced at $599 and $899 respectively. We picked up the Pixel 6 Pro, which has the most advanced lens system, and thought we'd compare it to the iPhone 13 Pro Max to see the similarities and differences between the two smartphone cameras.

Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos.​

The iPhone 13 Pro Max includes a 12-megapixel Wide, Ultra Wide, and Telephoto lenses for a total of three lens options, which is similar to the lens setup offered by the Pixel 6 Pro. It features a 50-megapixel wide angle camera, a 12-megapixel ultra wide angle lens and a 48-megapixel telephoto lens that supports 4x optical zoom, a wider range than the 3x optical zoom offered by the iPhone 13 Pro Max.

With smartphone cameras this advanced, both the iPhone 13 Pro Max and the Pixel 6 Pro take incredible photos and there's often not a lot of difference in quality just because they're both offering excellent camera options. There are some small differences that might make you prefer one over another, but even from image to image, these differences can vary.

You'll notice that at times, the Pixel 6 Pro is warmer and more natural looking than the iPhone, which primarily factors in with the sky. Apple tends to make the sky very blue, which looks striking, but not always true to life. There are also differences in the highlights and the shadows, with the iPhone tending to lose a bit of the black tones and the Pixel trending towards higher exposure for the highlights.

There's not a lot of difference with the ultra wide lenses, and for the telephoto, Google's Pixel 6 Pro can be a bit sharper (and it can zoom in further), but it does not let in as much light as the iPhone 13 Pro Max's telephoto lens so when taking photos of light sources, there's too much flare.

The iPhone wins out when it comes to Night Mode photos, and in our testing, it was just much better at preserving detail and accurately recreating color. It also didn't have quite as much of a light source flare issue as the Pixel 6 Pro.

As for Portrait mode, the Pixel 6 Pro is producing better photos. Subjects are sharper and more in focus, with more detail preserved, and it produces great bokeh. That's not to say that iPhone Portrait mode images aren't nice, but Google still seems to have better software algorithms for edge detection.

Apple's iPhones almost always have superior video compared to Pixel smartphones, and that's still true, but Google has made improvements to image quality and stabilization. The Pixel 6 Pro can take decent video, but the iPhone 13 Pro Max is better, especially with Cinematic Mode and ProRes support.

Google also built in some neat little features to its Pixel 6 Pro camera. There's a Magic Eraser that can use the Tensor chip inside to erase objects that you don't want from a photo, and it works super well so it's a great option to have available natively.

So both the Pixel 6 Pro and the iPhone 13 Pro Max have their pros and cons when it comes to camera quality, and realistically, the differences are minor. These are incredibly advanced smartphone cameras and you're not going to be disappointed by either one. Make sure to watch the video up above for our full comparison, and let us know which images you preferred in the comments below.

Article Link: Camera Comparison: iPhone 13 Pro Max vs. Pixel 6 Pro

Aren't we all tired of these comparisons by now? Not only are they the definition of confirmation bias, but they are too similar to really make any difference to anyone who either doesn't care about the phone at all or is too entangled in the phone's ecosystem to ever consider leaving. They prove nothing except that some people prefer to see a little more detail or warmth in their photos while other people prefer to see a little more coolness or contrast applied in the darks. All phones have software to create these looks long after the photo is taken but we still go through this charade every year anyway.

 

[jz0309]

Really hard to tell, photos on the web are downsized and even more compressed, and it depends on the screen you’re actually looking at.
Both phones do a lot of “in phone processing” to those pics, comparing actual RAW might be more insightful but I get why that isn’t done.
I’m perfectly happy with iPhone capabilities but also glad to see that Google is now offering a true competitive phone, competition is a good thing

 

[d686546s]

Both are really good cameras. My 13 Mini has a really good camera. The Pixel 5 I had before had a really good camera.

I think we're in a good place where your choice of phone really doesn't have a massive impact for most people's camera needs.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

Regarding the colour temperature - wouldn't it be nice if they let you select a default for this in settings?

You can set “styles” yes, and there’s a lot of flexibility. It essentially takes those few settings you ALWAYS do when taking pictures anyway an makes them for every photo you take. Always prefer warmer photos? You set that.

 

[MrTemple]

I have noticed that it doesn't seem to swap lenses any more. It means I have to stop the video and start a new recording.

Hopefully an iOS point release will fix this. 🤞

 

[agmmac]

They are different, but both good enough. More of a personal preference, although iPhone might win overall with better video.

Go Browns!

 

[creediddy]

I understand that these are default, non-touched photos, but these camera comparisons make no sense. Depending on the look and color we are going for we can adjust the picture temperature to warm or coolest look as well as build shadow details and sharpness. All camera phone apps give us the ability to adjust the picture. I think the comparison should be zooming capabilities and night mode shots. This is where the iPhone struggles with zooming.

 

[Orange Bat]

Looking at these photos, I generally liked the Pixel 6 photos more. However, I watched a video earlier where I chose all iPhone 13 Pro photos. This tells me that they are fairly equal and that what’s going to matter most is the person taking the photos. For me it’s a balance between photos and videos. Not only that, but it’s being tied to Google’s ecosystem vs. Apple’s, and I’ll pick Apple’s pretty much every time.

Coming from a Pixel 3, either of these cameras would be a massive upgrade, especially with video. Also, the audio in the video was about 10 times better on iPhone. In the end, it’s good to have competition as consumers win no matter which phone they buy.

 

[kepler20b]

Pixel... by a significant margin based on these photos

 

[dba415]

It's always been the case that Pixel takes better photos than the iPhone, but the software features make the gap even bigger. Things like face un-blur and magic eraser are amazing useful features, which the iPhone won't have until 2 years down the line. Video the iPhone wins.

 

[macjoshua]

I have the 13 Pro Max, and have been underwhelmed by the cameras to say the least.

 

[GuruZac]

I mean, this is just splitting hairs to be honest.

Your choice of phone purchase these days is mostly based on which ecosystem you're invested in; there's a device for everyone, and comparisons like this aren't the reasons people switch phones.

Still nice to see the difference in approach to 'default' post-processing though.

This. All the flagship phones have good cameras. To me, however, the trick to the iPhone is it is consistently good at everything, not just photos, but videos, speed, etc.

 

[XXPP]

iPhone much better.