Xiaomi 15 Ultra vs Apple iPhone 16 Pro Max: Quick camera comparison
The Xiaomi 15 Ultra is here with some pretty strong photography prowess that can easily challenge the dominance of the Galaxy S25 Ultra, the previous camera king in our custom PhoneArena Camera test. We already compared the duo, and it's a a tie.
How would it fare against a slightly less impressive from a photographic perspective, but still mildly popular device like the iPhone 16 Pro Max? Surely, with a more impressive camera hardware and a higher-res periscope, it's a phone that definitely appears victorious according to the results in our test––the Xiaomi 15 Ultra scores 158 points, while the iPhone achieves "just" 154 points.
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That's a small difference alright, but to put things into perspective, we need to take a look at some real-life camera samples.
First things first, however, let's refresh our knowledge about the camera setup of this story's protagonists:
| Xiaomi 15 Ultra | Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra |
|---|---|
Main camera 50MP F1.63 23mm OIS, Laser Sony LYT-900 Sensor size: 1-inch 3.2μm 4-in-1 Super Pixel | Main camera 48 MP, f/1.8, 24mm (wide) Dual pixel PDAF, sensor-shift OIS Sensor size: 1/1.28", 1.22µm New Photographic Styles Camera Control button |
Telephoto camera 50MP F1.8 70mm (3.0X optical zoom) OIS Sony IMX858 Telemacro photography | Telephoto camera - |
Periscope 200MP F2.6 100mm (4.3X optical zoom) OIS HP9 2.24µm pixels | Periscope 12 MP, f/2.8, 120mm (5X optical zoom) Sensor size: 1/3.06", 1.12µm, dual pixel PDAF, 3D sensor‑shift OIS |
-Ultrawide camera 50MP F2.2 14mm (23º FOV) ISOCELL JN5 sensor 1.28µm pixels | Ultrawide camera 48 MP, F2.2, 13mm, 0.7µm, PDAF, macro mode |
Front-facing camera 32MP F2.0 21mm (90º FOV) HDR, Portrait mode | Front-facing camera 12MP F/1.9 23mm 1/3.6", PDAF, OIS |
Main camera
Main camera - Low light
Portraits
Ultrawide
Zoom
Selfies
Conclusion
Overall, the win is clearly for the Xiaomi 15 Ultra. It's the more impressive camera phone both from a pure hardware aspect, but also considering the more varied options in the camera app, as well as the most important aspect of it all: the quality and versatility that simply make Xiaomi's latest phone the superior photography device.
That's not to say the iPhone 16 Pro Max takes bad photos, no; it's just slightly less impressive and limited in terms of what it can achieve. The strength of the iPhone lies in its consistency, as you almost always know you can reliably snap a great still photo or a video. Sure, you might find yourself not being able too zoom as much, or lose some detail in certain situations, but overall, an iPhone is a dependable camera to have.
There aer two big differentiators here. The first one is the very large 1-inch sensor of the Xiaomi 15 Ultra's main camera, which rivals many point-and-shoot cameras, some of which have smaller sensors aboard. The larger the sensor, the better the image quality, and even though we're in an age where software and AI can seemingly achieve everything, you can't really emulate the benefits of a large sensor.
The other factor that makes the Xiaomi 15 Ultra come up ahead is the 200MP periscope camera. Sure, through the years we've seen periscopes with much greater optical zoom, but most of them have been lower-res. Xiaomi's take on the matter puts a fairly short 4.3X optics in front of a massive 200MP sensor, which improves the overall zooming capabilities. As you zoom in, the periscope camera can crop in the sensor, achieving optically excellent results at much higher zoom levels, with lossless quality.
That's one of the main benefits of higher-megapixel cameras, and the Xiaomi 15 Ultra uses it perfectly. This approach seems like the more sensible one, and the industry should take heed of that.
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