Which is the best Samsung Camera phone?

January 31, 2025

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If you’re thinking about getting a new Samsung phone, and want to know which has the best camera, we can answer that for you – it’s the Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra.

Why? Because when Samsung releases a new series of smartphones – the most recent being the Galaxy S25 Series – they always put the best camera tech in the Ultra model.  

The Ultra model is larger, so there’s more room to include additional lenses, allowing you to take higher quality photos and to zoom in much closer.

And maybe that’s the phone you want – the one with the best camera, full stop. But the Galaxy S25 Ultra is a large, premium phone. And do you really need all the enhanced specs and features? 

In this article, we’ll go through all the key Samsung camera phone features, so you can decide whether you want to go all-in with a Galaxy S25 Ultra or choose one of their other great camera phones. 

Megapixels

Megapixels aren’t everything. But broadly speaking, the higher the megapixel count, the more beautiful detail your photographs will have. And the detail really counts if you want to zoom in, crop, and edit your photos. 

The Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra has a 200MP main camera. That seems pretty epic compared to the standard Samsung Galaxy S25, which has a 50MP main camera. But the thing is, you might not need all that detail.

If you mostly share pics over social media, a lot of that extra detail isn’t going to get seen when your followers scroll and tap your pics. A 50MP camera – which is common for smartphones – is more than enough. 

If, however, you want to snap high quality, professional pics that you can edit, enlarge, print and more afterwards, then a big megapixel count is worth it. 

Samsung camera set-ups – wide-angle lenses

Most Samsung phones come with a triple camera system, except for their Ultra phones, which have a quad camera system (more on those in the next section).

This means that each phone comes with multiple lenses. Having more lenses gives you more flexibility to take different types of shot, whether it’s a wide panoramic shot or an intense close-up. 

Almost all Samsung Galaxy phones come with a wide-angle lens and an ultra-wide lens. The wide-angle lens – this is the main camera – allows you to capture a wider image, so you can include more scenery or more people in larger group shots. An ultra-wide lens helps you to capture even more, so it’s a good choice if you really want to get stunning panoramic views.

The Samsung Galaxy Ultra S25 and the Galaxy S24 Ultra can deliver more detail in these shots. They have a 50MP ultra-wide camera, while many other Samsung phones have a 12MP ultra-wide camera. 

Samsung camera set-ups – zooms and telephoto lenses

An optical zoom brings you closer to your subject. You’re focusing in on a particular spot and getting a close-up, without capturing much of the background and the surroundings. 

A telephoto lens brings everything closer. So you’re not only focusing in on one particular thing, you’re able to catch more of the surrounding scene, as if you were literally standing closer to it. 

How far these lenses can zoom in is given in multiples. So, if you have a 20x zoom and you were to take a picture of something that was 20 feet away, your camera can make it appear only 1 foot away.

Most Samsung cameras come with a telephoto lens and an optical zoom lens. But with the quad camera system on the Galaxy S25 Ultra and Galaxy S24 Ultra, you get an additional telephoto lens and an additional zoom lens – with higher megapixel counts. You can not only capture pictures at a greater distance, but also pictures that are of much higher quality.  

What’s a Space Zoom?

Space Zoom is a feature of Samsung Galaxy S Series phones that uses AI and digital zoom to enhance the distance of their optical zoom, effectively making it a 100x zoom. 

With Space Zoom, your phone takes around 20 shots of an image and then combines them to make an improved composite shot. While a 100x zoom sounds incredible, the picture quality isn’t generally as high as with a standard optical zoom.

Nightography

One feature that’s available on most Samsung phones is Nightography, their improved Night Mode setting.

It works in a similar way to Space Zoom by taking a number of different images in rapid succession and combining them to create one shot that optimises the light and colour. This allows you to take vivid shots in the dark that aren’t washed out or blurry. 

AI editing

Samsung AI photo editing features were launched on the Galaxy S24 Series phones. They’re now available on older phones, thanks to recent software updates.

Galaxy AI can analyse your pictures and suggest ways to edit and perfect them. New Generative Edit even allows you to shift or delete objects from your pictures, so you can move things you don’t want out of the picture – or even add things in – and create a better image. 

And for your selfies, there’s Portrait Studio. When you take a selfie, generative AI can create a range of digital portraits in a variety of different styles for you to use. 

Choosing your phone

Hopefully that’s made Samsung’s camera tech a bit easier to understand. If you think that the Galaxy S25 Ultra extra camera features make it the best Samsung camera phone for you, then we have a range of Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra deals for you to choose from.

But if you want to take a look at some of the other Samsung phones on offer, check out the Samsung Galaxy S Series, the Samsung Galaxy A Series, and the Samsung Galaxy Z Series.

And if you want to save a little money, you can also find some excellent deals from our refurbished Like New Samsung phones range too.