The iPhone Comparison Problem

I've been thinking about the Galaxy Z Fold 7 and cameras in general. Don't get me wrong, Samsung cameras are fine, I just don't think they're good enough for a £1,700 phone. I don't think they're good enough for a £1,000 phone. Samsung cameras have never hit the right quality mark for me, and some of the issue here is comparison.

Apple realised a long time ago that the cameras in their devices are so important to their users. They worked hard to make sure you get a good standard photo every time you click the button. Think about the number of people who buy a phone purely for it to be their reference point for the world. These devices we carry in our pockets are memory makers. For so many people, millions of people, it's the only thing they rely on to capture the world around them.

I take a load of photos and can be overly critical of smartphone cameras. Most modern smartphones are fine and you can't really pick fault with them. But when I think about trusting the Z Fold 7 sensors, or even the S25 Ultra sensors, to pull the phone out of my pocket and take a good enough photo, I don't have that level of trust. Eight or nine times out of ten it would get a photo that's fine, but I don't want to risk those memories being ruined by a smudgy, blurry, not-focused image.

I used an Oppo Find X9 Pro recently and it has an absolutely stunning camera that I would trust to capture the world around me. I know people rely on their smartphone cameras for all their memories, so it's not just the iPhone. I think it's Samsung's attitude towards their cameras.

Some people will swear by Samsung cameras and I just don't see it. They say comparison is the thief of all joy and I think there's something at play here. If I'd solely used Samsung phones, perhaps I would be happier with the cameras. If you're moving between Samsung phone to Samsung phone, just buying the newly upgraded one, you'll be perfectly happy with each iteration. The cameras are consistently okay and fall down in the same areas every time — low light, focus speeds and capturing detail.

Could I take good photos with them? Yes. Could I take brilliant photos? No. It loses too much detail and isn't reliable enough without messing around with too many things. Expert RAW, different apps or whatever, all to get a great photo out of it. And even then I don't think it would be great. I spend too much of my time thinking my iPhone would have captured this miles better And maybe that's the problem.