The Samsung Galaxy S9’s 12MP camera has been put through its paces by DxOMark and the results crown it as having the best camera in a smartphone right now. Yes, the S9’s camera even bested the Google Pixel 2 in DxoMark’s testing.

Before we talk about the Galaxy S9’s camera performance, let’s talk about its camera specs. The handset comes with a 12MP shooter with Super Speed Dual Pixel AF, a variable aperture of f/1.5 – f/2.4, and a newer image sensor compared to the Galaxy S8. The bigger Galaxy S9+ also features a secondary 12MP f/2.4 telephoto lens that allows it to offer 2x optical zoom and take portrait photos.

Talking about the results, the Galaxy S9 scored a photo score of 104 points, the highest ever recorded by a smartphone camera. Overall, the handset scored 99 points though, which was brought down by its video score of 91 — a bit lower than usual.

DxOMark says that the Galaxy S9+ camera produces “excellent results in good light and sunny conditions”, and it “does not have any serious weaknesses.” The final images do show artifacts and purple fringing on high-contrast edges, with images being slightly softer towards the edges than the center. However, it calls them minor issues that are not a cause for concern. In low light, it says the Galaxy S9’s camera achieves an excellent balance between noise and details, though in certain scenarios it does lag behind that of Google Pixel 2. In the noise test though where sample shots were taken across a range of brightness, the Galaxy S9’s shooter performed better than that of the Google Pixel 2 and iPhone X and captured more details with cleaner and smoother lines.

The secondary telephoto lens on the Galaxy S9+ performs largely the same as the one on the Galaxy Note 8. And despite the iPhone X coming with a similar camera setup, it is the Galaxy S9+ which captured more details in DxOMark’s testing.

Overall, DxOMark says that the Galaxy S9+ camera is “without any real weaknesses.” That’s certainly high praise for the 12MP shooter found on the Galaxy S9.

Our Take

Interestingly, DxOMark’s testing does not mention anything or talk about the variable aperture of the Galaxy S9’s camera. Nonetheless, it is impressive to see Samsung surpass the imaging performance of the Pixel 2 with its latest flagship handset. If anything, it shows that despite smartphone hardware peaking, OEMs are still finding ways to improve camera performance on their devices every year with new technological or software breakthrough.