With each passing 12 months, the cameras on a smartphone turn out to be virtually as essential because the smartphone itself. Folks know that just about any telephone can do the “telephone” issues they want, however not simply any gadget might be the very best digital camera telephone available on the market. As such, within the overwhelming majority of instances, the explanation you’re paying a sure worth for a telephone is closely influenced by the digital camera {hardware} you’ll discover there.

However actually, how far does this go? Is a telephone that prices $1,300 actually so significantly better than one which prices lower than $300? Is there a $1,000+ distinction between the photographs you’ll get on one versus the opposite?

I made a decision to check to search out out. I’ve pitted two very totally different telephones bought at very totally different worth factors towards each other to see how you actually really feel concerning the flagship vs budget telephone digital camera debate.

The Galaxy S25 Extremely is among the finest digital camera telephones you can at present purchase. It has a huge digital camera system, together with a 200MP major sensor, two telephotos (a 10MP 3x optical and a 50MP 5x optical), and a 50MP ultrawide. It additionally has a high-end 12MP selfie digital camera.

In the meantime, the CMF Cellphone 2 Professional has a a lot weaker {hardware} system. Its 50MP major digital camera is smaller and decrease decision than the Galaxy S25 Extremely’s. Likewise, its tiny 8MP ultrawide digital camera can’t examine on paper, and its 16MP selfie digital camera is undoubtedly a cheaper little bit of {hardware} than the one on Samsung’s flagship. Notably, although, the CMF Cellphone 2 Professional has a 50MP telephoto lens (2x optical), which is not often seen on a telephone this cheap.

For the exams beneath, I attempted to make every shot match the opposite as intently as doable. I used out-of-the-box settings and targeted on the usual options between each gadgets. For instance, I didn’t do a macro shot check as a result of the CMF Cellphone 2 Professional’s software program doesn’t help this function. I additionally didn’t do a lot setup. I held the telephones in my hand (no tripods) and captured every photo with minimal tweaking. I didn’t do any reshoots, both — the primary photo from every setup is the one I went with. I really feel this finest displays real-world utilization.

In every part, the 2 photographs are unlabeled and in a totally different order. As you scroll by, choose which photo in every pair you suppose did the higher job. When you get to the top of the article, I’ll tell you which telephone produced every photo, and you can see which telephone you actually favor.

One closing observe: all of the photographs listed below are compressed for website loading velocity. If you wish to see them in an uncompressed state, take a look at this Drive folder. Simply don’t use that to cheat!

This is probably the most fundamental shot conceivable. The solar was behind me, and I simply took a fast snap of the park utilizing the first lens. Notice how totally different these are by way of publicity. The Digicam 2 shot additionally has rather more pronounced grass coloring, and shadows are a lot much less distinct. This is particularly obvious within the park bench behind the tree on the decrease left. The gazebo (decrease proper) additionally has a bizarre blue tinge within the Digicam 2 shot that isn’t obvious in actual life, nor within the Digicam 1 photo.

This isn’t a macro shot, but it surely provides an concept of how every digital camera captures smaller particulars. Digicam 2 did a significantly better job of stabilizing the picture, lowering the blur you see across the lettering within the Digicam 1 picture. Nevertheless, the Digicam 2 picture has some bizarre artifacts across the wooden grain, which aren’t obvious within the Digicam 1 picture.

This session produced probably the most important distinction between the 2 cameras. The coloring of Digicam 1 seems very washed out, however the synthetic bokeh appears fairly sensible. In the meantime, the Digicam 2 picture has some good coloring on the flowers, however the bokeh is flat-out horrible. I virtually canned each of those and did a re-shoot, however I made a decision to stay to my rule and never do this.

In the end, it’s all concerning the particulars with this selfie instance. Digicam 1 exhibits a lot extra pores and skin particulars than Digicam 2. However Digicam 1 additionally pushed the colours of the crops within the background manner an excessive amount of. Nonetheless, the intense daylight on my face was dealt with significantly better with Digicam 1 than the washed-out, off-coloring produced with Digicam 2.

Digicam 1 did a fairly good job right here, particularly with the bokeh on the proper facet of my face. You may see the bokeh having some hassle round my hair within the higher left, but it surely nonetheless seems fairly good. In the meantime, Digicam 2’s bokeh simply seems like grain within the background, with no blurry softness that you would anticipate from a shot like this. The world round my hair within the higher left is additionally weird — it seems prefer it was simply cropped out utilizing Photoshop or one thing.

We’re beginning to see some developments right here. The Digicam 1 picture has some extraordinarily pushed colours from its HDR impact, with shadows principally being non-existent. Take a look at the distinction in shadowing on the slide — it’s just like the photographs have been taken at two totally different instances of day (they weren’t). The sky does look a lot higher within the Digicam 1 shot, although, at the very least in my view.

This was a powerful name to make as a result of the 2 telephones don’t have the identical zoom capabilities. The CMF Cellphone 2 Professional has a 2x optical zoom whereas the Galaxy S25 Extremely makes use of digital cropping for 2x pictures. I may have pushed the CMF Cellphone 2 Professional to 3x — which might have had it utilizing a digital crop — and seen the Galaxy S25 Extremely’s optical picture, however I figured I ought to give this one to the CMF Cellphone 2 Professional because it’s the budget telephone. Anyway, one in all these pictures is 2x optical and the opposite is 2x digital — can you tell which is which?

This one is the alternative of the final one, with the Galaxy S25 Extremely having a distinct benefit because it makes use of a 5x optical zoom lens to create a 10x digital crop, whereas the CMF Cellphone 2 Professional creates a 10x digital crop primarily based on a 2x lens. As such, this ought to be the best one to suss out of the entire bunch.

It’s not within the shot, however the solar is straight above the gazebo, shining brightly over the California city of Novato. This may be a troublesome shot for any telephone digital camera, as a result of all that daylight could make it powerful for even the very best sensor to steadiness publicity appropriately. There are some distinct, apparent variations between these two pictures, but it surely is fairly unimaginable that the CMF Cellphone 2 Professional didn’t buckle underneath the strain. Which one do you suppose seems finest?

Essentially the most evident distinction between these two photographs is that one has real-life colours and the opposite seems like Technicolor-levels of coloring. Nevertheless, wanting on the grass on either side of the Digicam 1 picture, you’ll additionally see some blurry artifacts there. The tree half within the body on the left facet is significantly poor within the Digicam 1 shot, too. Which one in all these comes from the $1,300 digital camera?

Just like the Portrait mode instance, one of many cameras flat-out failed this check. This room was fairly darkish — not blackout darkish, however gentle was scarce. My try and get Digicam 1 to give attention to something was unimaginable, however Digicam 2 additionally confronted focus points. I feel each photographs are poor, however one is clearly higher than the opposite — however which telephone made them?

OK, I hope you have your scorecard prepared, as a result of you’re about to spoil the solutions for your self if you don’t. Listed below are the cameras that shot every of the photographs above:

• 1x in daylight: Digicam 1 is Galaxy S25 Extremely; Digicam 2 is Cellphone 2 Professional
• 1x texture closeup: Digicam 1 is Cellphone 2 Professional; Digicam 2 is Galaxy S25 Extremely
• Portrait mode: Digicam 1 is Cellphone 2 Professional; Digicam 2 is Galaxy S25 Extremely
• Commonplace selfie: Digicam 1 is Galaxy S25 Extremely; Digicam 2 is Cellphone 2 Professional
• Portrait mode selfie: Digicam 1 is Galaxy S25 Extremely; Digicam 2 is Cellphone 2 Professional
• 1x exhibiting colour: Digicam 1 is Cellphone 2 Professional; Digicam 2 is Galaxy S25 Extremely
• 2x in daylight: Digicam 1 is Galaxy S25 Extremely; Digicam 2 is Cellphone 2 Professional
• 10x in daylight: Digicam 1 is Cellphone 2 Professional; Digicam 2 is Galaxy S25 Extremely
• HDR instance in direct daylight: Digicam 1 is Cellphone 2 Professional; Digicam 2 is Galaxy S25 Extremely
• 0.6x in daylight: Digicam 1 is Galaxy S25 Extremely; Digicam 2 is Cellphone 2 Professional
• Evening mode: Digicam 1 is Cellphone 2 Professional; Digicam 2 is Galaxy S25 Extremely

If you sum up all the very best photographs — and by “finest,” I imply those which are objectively superior in high quality, coloring, focus, and so on. — the Galaxy S25 Extremely is the clear winner on my scorecard. Nevertheless, that wasn’t the case 100% of the time. The Galaxy S25 Extremely’s portrait mode fail was particularly egregious. Sure, I may have stood there and re-focused the shot and tried to enhance it, however the truth that I had to do this with a $1,300 telephone and never a $280 telephone is fairly ridiculous.

What’s additionally outstanding to me is that the CMF Cellphone 2 Professional clearly can’t match the Galaxy S25 Extremely, but it surely nonetheless holds its personal moderately nicely. Sure, it failed the night time mode shot dismally, and I wouldn’t use the ultrawide digital camera for something ever, however every thing else was greater than nice. Simply have a look at the HDR instance shot. Sure, the Galaxy S25 Extremely’s photo is higher, however is it $1,000 higher? I don’t suppose so.

In different phrases, the Galaxy S25 Extremely wins, however the CMF Cellphone 2 Professional proves that you don’t have to spend over $1,000 to get a digital camera that may ship sufficient outcomes, at the very least in good lighting.

What do you suppose? Had been you stunned by the end result of any of those examples? Let me know your ideas within the feedback, and remember to select one thing within the ballot above!