Samsung Galaxy S9 test

A 12MP variable aperture camera

The Samsung Galaxy S9 comes with a single camera setup containing a 12MP sensor (a

ISOCELL sensor

The camera supports image stacking and is capable of the new noise reduction procedure with 4-frame stacking. Samsung promises 30% less noise across all frames, which is an impressive feat. Reducing noise would mean less artificial noise reduction and should help retain finer detail in low-light images. And the bright f/1.5 aperture should be a big help too.

Just like the Note8, the S9 does multi-frame image processing, which HDR+ does on the Pixels. And now, with improved noise reduction, we expect even better shots than the Note8 phablet produced last fall.

The camera app's UI has changed since the Note8 - but we're not sure that's for the better. Now it's like Apple's iOS camera app, but with advanced settings - meaning everything is laid out on a rolodex of available modes.

Samsung camera app

There's still no dedicated video recording mode and therefore a video viewfinder. This shouldn't be a problem for most real-world scenarios, but precise framing is immensely more difficult without seeing the correct viewfinder before you start recording. You can press and hold the REC button to see the actual video viewfinder, however, and a hint for that would have been appreciated as we found it by pure accident.

However, Samsung has an abundance of powerful features it needs to fit inside the UI, and we won't hold that against the Galaxy S9.

So all the important shooting modes are available on the viewfinder, and you switch between those with swipes. The resolution and stabilization options are naturally found in the advanced settings.

F/1.5 vs. F/2.4

How does the variable aperture camera work? That's probably the million dollar question, so we'll start there. This means a brighter aperture versus a darker aperture. But it is not about that in itself. Depth of field also changes, something we rarely pay attention to on phone cameras. But having a variable aperture opens up new possibilities, and we'll try to explain the differences without going into full tech mode.

Until now, the bright aperture of a mobile camera has meant better low-light shots with less noise and more detail. But F/1.5 is bright enough, and daylight shots can eventually suffer in quality - with blown highlights in particular. The Galaxy S9 can increase shutter speed up to 1/24000s, which means it should avoid blowing out those highlights, at least theoretically.

But there is also the shallow depth of field, which can lead to turns. smoothness and overall smoother images with less intricate detail.

On the other hand, low-light samples should turn out to be best in class - F/1.5 will allow for low ISO shooting, which will result in less noise, more detail, and the image should remain bright enough.

Then there's F/2.4, which will produce noisy images in low light, but more balanced samples in daylight with better dynamics, contrast, more detail and more sharpness thanks to its deeper depth of field. focus.

As you can see, having the best of both worlds opens up the Galaxy S9 camera to an advanced photographic experience and gives more creative freedom. But even if you don't care about any of those things, the Galaxy S9 Auto mode is fully capable of choosing all the settings for the scenes, including the right aperture. Most daytime photos will be taken at F/2.4, while all low-light images are taken at F/1.5. And it'll give you some of the best samples we've seen take on a smartphone. So, let's see these, shall we?

Daylight image quality

The samples we took with the S9 outdoors on a sunny day turned out to be excellent, if not unmatched. Detail is abundant, dynamic range is excellent, and there's hardly any smearing or noise cancellation.

One thing that's changed since the Note8 is less excessive sharpness. We immediately noticed the absence of excessive sharpness halos, which were present in most of the Note8's photos.

We also took some side-by-side shots with the iPhone X and Note8, and you can use our built-in comparison tool to see how that fare next to each other. Spoiler - the Galaxy S9 is the best in detail resolution, sharpness and dynamic range.

Samsung Galaxy S9 12MP Camera Samples

These are the iPhone X samples.

Apple iPhone X 12MP Camera Samples

And these were shot with the Note8. You can click the compare icon below and select the images you want to view side by side.

Samsung Galaxy Note8 12MP Camera Samples

Low light image quality

Where most current flagships with F/1.7 -F/1.8 and OIS shoot at ISO 400 and, say, a shutter speed of 1/4s, the Galaxy S9 chooses and ISO between 250 and 320, and a shutter speed of 1/10s shutter. The result: superb low-light images with lots of detail, little noise and no blurring.

Samsung Galaxy S9 12MP low light samples

We also took a few long shutter samples using both F/2.4 and F/1.5 apertures.

F/2.4, ISO 50, 4s. shutter • F/1.5, ISO 50, 4s. shutter

Selective focus

Selective Focus captures a pair of shots and lets you readjust the effect afterwards (blurred background, blurred foreground, no blur). Here you can simulate bokeh, for lack of a better wording, as the Galaxy S9 only has one sensor on the back. The subject should be much closer than on the S9+ and its telephoto lens, and it should also be still for a few seconds.

Selective focus

Bokeh photos are quite impressive, indeed, but they are harder to take and can quickly become irritating because of it. We don't see many people using it regularly.

Samsung Galaxy S9 selective focus samples

Selfies

The selfie camera is borrowed from the S8 series without change. It has an 8MP sensor with f/1.7 aperture, variable focus and Auto HDR. The front camera has its own mode dial.

Our samples turned out to be very good both outdoors and in the office. There is no lack of detail and no apparent softness, even near the corners. Be aware though that Selfie comes with a modest level of skin tone correction enabled right out of the box. This may require some adjustment to suit your tastes.

There's also the case with the hit and miss autofocus, which occasionally focused on the wrong thing, i.e. the background. We recommend tapping on the subject to avoid ruined selfies.

Samsung Galaxy S9 8MP selfies

Selective focus wasn't very good as there is no second camera to work with. The software is pretty much on its own to determine the depth of a given scene. The effect is overall nice, but pixel-peeping quickly reveals a lot of imperfections. These photos would probably do for quick sharing on social apps, but that's it.

Samsung Galaxy S9 8MP selfies with bokeh

Panorama

The S9 captures stunning panoramas with plenty of detail. Dynamic range is good, as are colors. Sewing artifacts are virtually non-existent.

Panorama Samsung Galaxy S9

Image comparison tool

You can check the Galaxy S9 12MP camera performance in our comparison tool.

Samsung Galaxy S9 vs. Galaxy S8 vs. Apple iPhone X in our photo comparison tool