OnePlus 11 vs iPhone 14 Pro vs Galaxy S23 Ultra vs Pixel 7 Pro: low light camera comparison
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Low light photography — an absolute challenge even for the big mirrorless cameras and their expensive lenses. What's a tiny smartphone with its little sensor to do?
Well, with the power of AI and post-processing, recent flagships have achieved some awesome results. Don't get us wrong, night photography hasn't been "solved", but has definitely been improved over the past years.
So, today we have four of the most recent big-name flagships. The OnePlus 11 is the newest, but it enters a market that has already been taken over by the iPhone 14 Pro, Galaxy S23 Ultra, and Pixel 7 Pro. All of them — absolute giants with huge camera modules and at least 3 lenses each (the S23 Ultra has 4), and each one of them tackles night shots slightly differently.
So, let's go out into the chilly night and see how they perform!
Read more:
- Camera comparison: Galaxy S23 vs iPhone 14 vs Pixel 7, the entry level dukes it out!
- Blind camera comparison: iPhone 14 Pro Max BEATS OnePlus 11, Galaxy S23 Ultra, and Pixel 7 Pro!
- Vivo X90 Pro Plus vs iPhone 14 Pro Max vs Pixel 7 Pro Camera Comparison: is the new 1-inch camera sensor that revolutionary?
Camera Specs:
The great results we get are a mixture of physical specs and software wizardry. That said, here are the cameras these phones are working with:
| OnePlus 11 | iPhone 14 Pro | Galaxy S23 Ultra | Pixel 7 Pro | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Main camera | 50MP, 24mm, f/1.8 | 48MP, 24mm, f/1.8 | 200MP, 24mm, f/1.7 | 50MP, 25mm, f/1.9 |
| Ultra-wide | 48MP, 14mm, f/2.2 | 12MP, 13mm, f/2.2 | 12MP, 13mm, f/2.2 | 12MP, 13mm, f/2.2 |
| Telephoto | 32MP, 48mm (2x), f/2.0 | 12MP, 77mm (3x), f/2.8 | 10MP, 69mm (3x), f/2.4 10MP, 230mm (10x), f/4.9 | 48MP, 120mm (5x), f/3.5 |
| Front | 16MP | 12MP | 12MP | 10.8MP |
Each one of these has wide-angle, ultrawide-angle, and telephoto lenses to pick from. And each offers a slightly different set of focal lengths — the OnePlus 11's telephoto will zoom in at 2x, the iPhone and Galaxy will have 3x zoom, and the Pixel 7 Pro has a 5x magnification lens. Any zoom levels in-between or beyond are handled by cropping into the sensor image.
Main Camera night photos
Out of the first group, we can see the most striking colors and sharpness coming from the Galaxy S23 Ultra photo. The Pixel 7 Pro and the OnePlus 11 handled dynamics great, taming the highlights and light sources. However, the details and colors of the OnePlus 11 photo look most washed-out in this scene. Plus, the OnePlus 11 introduced the most noise, while all others did pretty well in smoothing the picture out.
Quite the challenging scene, with so many light sources in the background and complete darkness in the foreground. The OnePlus 11 and Galaxy S23 Ultra tried to combat the shadows and boost them up. The result is a fairly flat picture, which looks a bit artificial. However, the S23 Ultra's colors do look pleasantly vibrant. Though, commendably, the OnePlus 11's colors look closer to reality.
The Pixel 7 Pro and iPhone 14 Pro surrendered to the darkness, allowing for more natural-looking dynamics. But their colors are off in their own way — the Pixel 7 Pro going towards colder hues, and the iPhone resorting to its signature yellow-ish warmth.
Moving on to a better-lit photo with a lot of texture and shadows and — of course — high dynamics due to it being night time.
Surprisingly, the OnePlus 11 did fantastically at preserving the shapes and forms in the light sources, yet it couldn't handle the highlights of the statue that is the subject of the photo — it looks somewhat washed out and too pale. The iPhone did a fantastic job at capturing striking dynamics with a wide range, but the more time you spend on the photo, the more you see how details have gotten jagged due to a bit too much oversharpening.
The Galaxy S23 Ultra photo looks flatter, as it tamed the highlights even more, but its details look the best of all — super-fine, yet without looking too overtuned. Its colors are also very pleasantly warm and close to reality. The Pixel 7 Pro photo is also great in terms of details, somewhat a step back in terms of dynamics, and definitely not great with colors — it came out as the coldest and most washed-out photo in this test.
An attempt at an artsy photo, capturing the lights and mood that these benches cast on the dark alley. The iPhone 14 Pro and Galaxy S23 Ultra kind of ruined it, with an overall dark tone and a green/yellowish cast on the photo.
The Pixel 7 Pro and OnePlus 11 did great here with slight differences in mood and focal depth. It's up to you whether you prefer the colder look of the OnePlus 11 photo or the warmer tone of the Pixel 7 Pro photo, we like both.
Ultra-wide night photos
Ultra-wide lenses help you capture landscapes or more epic angles. Let's see how they perform when the sun is down, though.
The OnePlus 11 here did a great job at taming the highlights and keeping the shapes of light sources visible. The statue also looks well-detailed if only a bit darker than it should be. The iPhone 14 Pro, again, did great with the wide dynamics, giving the photo a good "pop", but it gave us the softest details.
The Galaxy S23 Ultra and Pixel 7 Pro both did a great job with dynamics and details, though they sacrificed the shapes of the light sources to achieve it. Again, temperature is slightly different, with the Galaxy going for a warmer look, while the Pixel has a cold-ish, slightly magenta cast.
An ultra-wide shot of a landscape that's mostly cast in shadow — we decided to push these phones to their limits. And, very obviously, none of them could do much with the light available.
Still, it's interesting to see how each one handled light sources and distant details. For example — the bench on the left, side, in the distance. The Pixel 7 Pro did the best job at preserving its shape and color, even though the phone did the worst with the blooming light sources. The details of the branches in the center look best on the Galaxy S23 Ultra — the reason they are super blurry in most photos is because all phones applied heavy noise-reduction due to the lack of light.
Time to give the cameras a better chance with a more well-lit landscape shot.
The OnePlus 11 did fantastic here — great dynamics, great work around the light sources. We would complain that the details look a bit oversharpened, but that would be nitpicking. The iPhone 14 Pro, on the other hand, did not do well. The photo is underexposed, highlights are blown out, and there's a greenish cast over the scene.
The Galaxy S23 Ultra also kept the colors lively and the dynamics at bay, but we'd say it's a step behind the OnePlus 11's ultra-wide camera. The details are also noticeably softer.
The Pixel 7 Pro ultra-wide gave us a well-balanced, bright photo and its details look great — not as overtuned as on the OnePlus 11, yet not soft. Again, the colors here are a matter of preference — the OnePlus 11 went a bit too magenta, the Pixel 7 Pro went a bit too green-ish. After all, it was a dark shot.
Telephoto & Portraits
These zoom cameras are great when you want to get closer to something or when you want to take a portrait photo that doesn't distort the subject's features. Since each of these phones offers a different level of zoom, we decided to test them at 2x and 5x.
The OnePlus 11 does have a telephoto lens for 2x zoom, but at this light — it chose to crop in digitally with its main sensor. The results — soft details and lots of blur in the branches due to noise reduction. And the colors are a bit too tame, too. At least, the photo is well exposed.
The iPhone's telephoto lens is a 3x one, so — again — we are looking at a digital crop here. However, it did a much better job at preserving details and colors and dynamics are vibrant and quite striking. However, the sky is a bit realistic and the details — while not blurred out — do appear jagged when compared to the S23 Ultra sample.
The Galaxy photo looks sharp, fine, vibrant, and well exposed. Winner here — we are looking at a digital crop, but that 200 MP sensor is doing the work!
The Pixel 7 Pro photo looks well exposed, but colors are a bit washed out and details are a bit too jagged. Still, it's a better shot than what the OnePlus 11 gave us, though. Again, this is a digital crop, since the Pixel's telephoto camera is at 5x zoom.
At 5x, the OnePlus 11 is still using its main lens to zoom in and, again, the image is deteriorating. Washed-out details and too much noise reduction give away the digital nature of the zoom. Then, the iPhone 14 Pro did choose to use its 3x lens here and digitally enhance it to get to 5x. But the results aren't much better.
The Galaxy S23 Ultra also chose to use its 3x telephoto camera as a basis for the 5x zoom. And it seems it held it together the best here, out of all 4 contestants. Details look OK and colors are vibrant, despite the fact that the phone threw a cold cast on the shot. The Pixel 7 Pro did not switch to the 5x telephoto camera for the 5x shot and the result is a very soft digital zoom with overly warm yellow hues.
A zoomed Portrait Mode shot is what you want when looking to separate subject from background and capture your model's features.
At night, it's a tall order — the phones need to use a camera with a smaller sensor and a smaller aperture to capture enough light and apply a faux bokeh for that creamy effect.
Here, the Galaxy S23 Ultra did a fantastic job. Details, separation, bokeh, colors — excellently done the challenge. The iPhone image looks a bit too soft and washed out, but not as much as the OnePlus 11, which gave us a portrait that is out of focus, soft, blurry (good dynamics and colors, though). The Pixel 7 Pro does not use its telephoto camera for Portrait Mode — it crops into the main sensor. And the results are... not great.
The OnePlus 11 had a second chance here, but again — the photo is soft and out of focus. The iPhone and Galaxy did a good job here at subject separation and focus, though chose different color temperatures. The iPhone 14 Pro applied some more noise reduction, while the Galaxy S23 Ultra let some grain in — both are fine, but ultimately, both did not get sharp details.
The Pixel 7 Pro did much better than last time around, but you can still see a lot of oversharpening going on. By itself, the photo could work for sharing on social media, but compared to the competitors — it's behind the iPhone and Galaxy.
Conclusion
Priced at $699, the OnePlus 11 is still in the race (Image credit - PhoneArena)
All things considered, these phones did a fantastic job shooting photos in low light — pictures that, if we were to take with a DSLR camera, we'd have to spend considerable time in post-editing to actually make pretty to look at.
When you try to do something more fancy, like zoom in, take a portrait shot, or an ultra-wide angle — then you may get less than desirable results. Most models still held it together.
In general, we feel like the Galaxy S23 Ultra did a great job in most scenes. The OnePlus 11 did surprisingly well, especially with the ultra-wide challenges. However it and the Pixel 7 Pro weren't great when it comes to portraits.
The iPhone 14 Pro mostly had issues with details being a bit jagged and colors being yellowish. It's a phone camera that's dependable in most scenarios but does not take the risk to try and take the best photo.
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