iPhone X vs. Galaxy S9+: Which Smartphone Has a Better Camera?

[kingtj]

As a hobbyist photographer (not a pro -- but enjoy taking pictures and editing them) -- I'd say the Samsung photos look like they do a more accurate job of portraying the real lighting conditions, on an unedited photo.

The iPhone X looks like it opts to add a little more exposure adjustment to those relatively dim lighting situations. Thing is? That's probably the same kind of adjustment I'd tend to apply to one of the Samsung photos after the fact, in my photo editing package, before sharing the photo.

So "better" seems subjective here. Samsung probably has a slight edge at retaining the original look of things -- but the iPhone does a great job of producing a result that's closer to what many people would prefer to see.

My preference is for the iPhone X photos in all cases. The Samsung pics look a bit murky at times and—who knows—maybe the Samsung more accurately portrayed the reality, but the photos I would want to keep are the iPhone X.

 

[H3LL5P4WN]

Regardless of image quality (both phones have their strengths and weaknesses), I prefer the phone that doesn't limit my recording length due to a crappy, once again thermally throttled, SOC.

So iPhone X. All day, erry day. (Because it could theoretically shoot for that long, lol)

 

[Petawatt12]

I don't even think it's a comparison, the iPhone X has better pictures. Also I'm not looking at the RAW pics on a 4K monitor.

 

[jeff275]

Blowing out the highlights is a big no-no. Shame on Apple.

 

[sumsingwong]

So much hypocrisy here. When a Samsung phone takes more realistic, true to life photos, it’s too dull and boring and the iPhone X takes more exciting photos. But when a Samsung takes more vibrant photos, iPhone owners said it’s unrealistic and prefer true to life colors and contrast on there iPhone. The Fanboyism is strong in here. The could be said for when Android phones blew away the iPhone in benchmarks years ago and iPhone owners said who cares about benchmarks, it’s the day to day experience that matters. Now it’s the opposite.

 

[MacLoveMacHate]

The appeal of the 9 here for me is the detail in the brightest part of the sky, which the X blows out to near white. The 9 image is darker and hazier as it appears to be more of an HDR image, but for more artistic shots, I'd prefer this as I can lighten the image overall and retain that sky detail.

 

[marco114]

Photos look ok, but if I took the same photo with my Nikon D810 with a prime lens, you'd think these were all crap. Yeah, great pics for a phone with a 1/4" lens, but nothing compared to a pro DSLR Camera with lens and 77mm glass.

 

[LuckyBubba]

The last photo really shows my biggest complaint with iPhone photos that's been ongoing since iOS 7: the super aggressive noise-reduction that makes everything look like a painting.

Even in outdoors during the day, noise cancellation makes it all terribly blurry.

I sometimes feel that the engineering behind Apple and Samsung are very different and sense that Apple has adjusted the camera to what it's customers want to see and samsung delivers a photo for the trained photographer eye. In your photo and not having a trained eye, I would choose the photo to the right because it was brighter and makes me feel happier. The water color "seems" more real or at least that is how I would want to see and imagine the color of water.

 

[lwells]

I sometimes feel that the engineering behind Apple and Samsung are very different and sense that Apple has adjusted the camera to what it's customers want to see and samsung delivers a photo for the trained photographer eye.

I completely agree with this. The irony to me here is that the Samsung has a display that is saturated and has exaggerated contrast while the iPhone has a color corrected display. Go figure....

 

[H3LL5P4WN]

I sometimes feel that the engineering behind Apple and Samsung are very different and sense that Apple has adjusted the camera to what it's customers want to see and samsung delivers a photo for the trained photographer eye. In your photo and not having a trained eye, I would choose the photo to the right because it was brighter and makes me feel happier. The water color "seems" more real or at least that is how I would want to see and imagine the color of water.

Which is funny because most people who review cameras, cellphone cameras in particular, would say that Samsung pictures aren't true to life. At least all of the reviews I've read and watched over the years.

 

[Brandon916]

1. S9
2. pixel 2
3. IPhone X

Easy answer. The difference isn't that far apart since we're now at apoint of almost diminishing returns. S9 new changeable apperature is a great innovation added to the cell phone market which I hope Apple and goggle would copy. Everyone steal from one another anyways. Why not steal the best feature?
[doublepost=1521477772][/doublepost]

Do people really prefer shooting 720p 960fps for 0.2 seconds over 1080p 240fps for as long as you want? It really seems not very useful to me.

Its a cool feature to have. Recording sports event like a monster dunk would be awesome. That 0.2 is stretched over 6 seconds.
[doublepost=1521477924][/doublepost]

#1 Samsung S9
#2 Google Pixel 2
#3 Huawei Mate 10 Pro
#4 iPhone X

With that said Google has the best processing.

Finally, someone who's willing to be objective. I cant stand blinded fan boy of any side.

 

[9081094]

samsung S9 vs iPhone X meh ,
i honestly don't like the intentional or unintentional Samsung promo
how about comparing apple products vs apple products just for the fun of it
we can compare old version of iOS vs newer versions of iOS
the same for old hardware vs new hardware
anything just to get rid of Samsung in the front page
so people can see the evolution of apple products
how apple improved things and made them better
i think that is much better than having to be see all these Samsung articles lately
mac os tiger vs mac os high sierra
iOS v1 vs iOS v11
first iMac vs the iMac Pro
i know is not going to happen, but at least i got youtube and wikipedia
mac rumors
samsung rumors

I agree with you. But... when we do that we are out of writing in one page. These last 6 years haven’t been Apple’s most productive ones in contrast with earnings. Give me back the good old days of thinking different and products that gave higher pricing a sustainable reason.

 

[Brandon916]

I would have been nice to have a third set of pictures taken with a professional DSLR to compare. Both pics look good, but we can't tell which one is closer to reality.

That wouldn't help. Its no comparison to a professional DSLR. They take pictures in low light, outdoors, and it's fantastic. Absolutely fantastic. You would never ever pay an iPhone shooter to shoot for your wedding. 10 years from now, you still wouldn't. Zero contest vs DSLR.

 

[xpxp2002]

So who in Cleveland took these?

This was my first thought when I saw these photos. I didn't think there was anyone from MacRumors around Northeast Ohio.

 

[macduke]

I personally prefer Canon color science so I'll have to say the images off my 1DX Mark II

20MP? $5500? Sure, ok. I switched from Canon. I've read up on the color thing. It's gotten a lot better for Sony in recent sensor iterations and you can tweak things quite a bit in post if you need to. I think it's completely fine. Canon's lack of dynamic range and massive sensor noise was a huge turn off for me. And no IBIS, with a huge body? No thanks, lol. I like shooting on fast little primes. My everyday carry kit goes with me anywhere in my bag: a7R III, three lenses (portrait tele, mid-macro and wide), a Rode Mic, a filter set, extra batteries and cards, a charging battery bank for gadgets, an iPad Pro 10.5" with Apple Pencil, a 15" MacBook Pro 15" (which I'll often leave out if I'm not going to work to save on weight), 2TB SSD and various cables, adapters and accessories all in a bag that measures 15x10x4 for interior dimensions. I could never do that before. And when I was recently on vacation, I could easily pop a 100-400mm G-Master lens where my mic case went and have four lenses and my camera all stowed away in my bag as a carryon that fit under the seat in front of me. But to each their own…

 

[I7guy]

20MP? $5500? Sure, ok. I switched from Canon....But to each their own…

Quoted for truth. To each their own.

 

[jerryk]

Both phones are over processing the images. This is one reason many serious shooters use RAW and post process their images.

 

[bobmepp]

The Samsung shot is clearly the best in the first photo. The sky edited nicely in the Photoshop camera raw filter, whereas the iPhone shot is very blown out and not recoverable in the clouds. The iPhone shot is better in the sunset pair, with more saturated clouds and noticeably less chromatic aberration. The mutt mitts photo is also better in the iPhone version, with more sharpness and again less chromatic aberration. The city views shot is overall better in the Samsung version, again with less blow-out in the sky resulting in more recoverable information using the camera raw filter, but the water in the iPhone version is more luminous. So, overall close to a tie, with the caveat that blown out skies are pretty much impossible to fix even with Photoshop. The most important take away is that if you want a shot that will print nicely you need to use a DSLR or at least a camera that can capture a decent amount of dynamic range with relatively low distortion.

 

[9081094]

My iPhone also vacuums my house, books flights, schedules my limo, monitors my house environment, camera, alarms, and even powers up and lights my recording studios ....

That’s certainly not an iPhone.... Siri only ability for me is to set the alarm and timer.

 

[bobmepp]

20MP? $5500? Sure, ok. I switched from Canon. I've read up on the color thing. It's gotten a lot better for Sony in recent sensor iterations and you can tweak things quite a bit in post if you need to. I think it's completely fine. Canon's lack of dynamic range and massive sensor noise was a huge turn off for me. And no IBIS, with a huge body? No thanks, lol. I like shooting on fast little primes. My everyday carry kit goes with me anywhere in my bag: a7R III, three lenses (portrait tele, mid-macro and wide), a Rode Mic, a filter set, extra batteries and cards, a charging battery bank for gadgets, an iPad Pro 10.5" with Apple Pencil, a 15" MacBook Pro 15" (which I'll often leave out if I'm not going to work to save on weight), 2TB SSD and various cables, adapters and accessories all in a bag that measures 15x10x4 for interior dimensions. I could never do that before. And when I was recently on vacation, I could easily pop a 100-400mm G-Master lens where my mic case went and have four lenses and my camera all stowed away in my bag as a carryon that fit under the seat in front of me. But to each their own…

Certainly I agree re: to each his own. However, the "Canon lack of dynamic range" is a rather tired meme that has been beaten to death at dpreview.com and other places. My Canon 6D my have somewhat less dynamic range in comparison to certain cameras, possibly the Sony you speak of. However it is not a deal breaker. Watch your histograms, bracket where needed, print with care, and you will get all the dynamic range you need to recover all of the details you want in post with a Canon or most any camera, and in fact, I frequently do so with both my Canon and my plain old iPhone 8.

 

[macduke]

Certainly I agree re: to each his own. However, the "Canon lack of dynamic range" is a rather tired meme that has been beaten to death at dpreview.com and other places. My Canon 6D my have somewhat less dynamic range in comparison to certain cameras, possibly the Sony you speak of. However it is not a deal breaker. Watch your histograms, bracket where needed, print with care, and you will get all the dynamic range you need to recover all of the details you want in post with a Canon or most any camera, and in fact, I frequently do so with both my Canon and my plain old iPhone 8.

I shoot a lot of landscapes and nature stuff so dynamic range matters. On my Canons I would always bracket but now I just don't need to any more. I shot a Falcon 9 launch a couple weeks ago during the night launch and got the stars and the rocket all in one exposure setting. I was quite happy with the result. You can't bracket rockets! Well, maybe you could with a series of intervalometers and multiple cameras that are placed very close together and very carefully frame matched, but still. I ran out to the beach five minutes before and nailed the shot without having to think about it. Almost missed it, lol. The bottom part of the trail where it started on the ground towards the center ended up rather blown out in the low 250s but considering I was exposing for stars and it was a freaking rocket exhaust plume and I've never photographed a rocket launch before, it wasn't bad. The shot is on http://www.visitspacecoast.com in the photos section about halfway down the homepage, third image (as of now). Side note: I'm looking forward to Instagram someday not compressing the hell out of every photo, lol.

 

[bobmepp]

I shoot a lot of landscapes and nature stuff so dynamic range matters. On my Canons I would always bracket but now I just don't need to any more. I shot a Falcon 9 launch a couple weeks ago during the night launch and got the stars and the rocket all in one exposure setting. I was quite happy with the result. You can't bracket rockets! Well, maybe you could with a series of intervalometers and multiple cameras that are placed very close together and very carefully frame matched, but still. I ran out to the beach five minutes before and nailed the shot without having to think about it. Almost missed it, lol. The bottom part of the trail where it started on the ground towards the center ended up rather blown out in the low 250s but considering I was exposing for stars and it was a freaking rocket exhaust plume and I've never photographed a rocket launch before, it wasn't bad. The shot is on http://www.visitspacecoast.com in the photos section about halfway down the homepage, third image (as of now). Side note: I'm looking forward to Instagram someday not compressing the hell out of every photo, lol.

I looked at your shot of the rocket launch, nice job, congrats. The stars & the rocket plume were coexisting beautifully!

 

[macduke]

I looked at your shot of the rocket launch, nice job, congrats. The stars & the rocket plume were coexisting beautifully!

Thanks! Over the years I've gone down there a few times to visit my grandparents and could never quite get the photo right that I wanted over the ocean with the moon rise. With the Sony I got what I wanted first try. Maybe I should have bracketed this to resolve the moon better, but I like how it messes with people who at first think it's a sunrise but then are confused by the stars. This is scaled down massively so everything is softer (especially since it blows it up for the web so it looks really soft on my retina MBP) but gives you an idea and is better than Instagram.

 

[Applemaniac7]

I completely agree with this. The irony to me here is that the Samsung has a display that is saturated and has exaggerated contrast while the iPhone has a color corrected display. Go figure....

Or the same Samsung could also choose one of the 3 other display options. One of which is neutral.. stop listening to propaganda and quoting when you have no experience of the matter..

 

[dc455]

I'm stunned someone is taking pictures of my beloved Cleveland