iPhone six vs Galaxy S5: Camera Comparison
Samsung’s Galaxy S5 or Apple’s iPhone 6? Fanboy allegiances aside, there will be lots of people making that decision over the next year. Among the primary questions people ask when attempting to pick their next smartphone, “which has a better camera?” is among the top. In this comparison we put the devices head-to-head, taking almost identical pictures with each device across a range of environments, and hopefully helping you understand what to expect.
Our photographic evidence is below, but here are the main takeaways:
- Galaxy S5 takes some amazing pics, but has a tendency to produce some washed out photos
- iPhone six photos are solid and more consistent, but pictures sometimes lack detail
- The above visuals carry over to movie as well
- Galaxy S5 has superior audio playback in movies
- Galaxy S5 is better in lowlight
- Galaxy S5 has superior zoom
- Advantages in lowlight/zoom/audio make the Galaxy S5 more versatile
- iPhone six selfie cam is superior
- Both cameras are indeed good but not excellent… travelers will still want a point and shoot alternative or DSLR (of which I recommend the Samsung Galaxy Camera ).
In the below sets of photos, the very first picture is always from the Galaxy S5 and the 2nd is always from the iPhone 6.
Picture comparisons
Taken on a blaringly bright day with light and shadow weaving in and out of trees and buildings, we see one of the Galaxy S5’s flaws right off the bat: sometimes it does too much, super saturating colors and creating contrast where it’s unnecessary, washing out the picture in the process. Notice the bottom picture (the iPhone) maintains the blue sky.
But zooming in, you’ll find the S5 picture more crisp while the iPhone picture is fuzzy. The colors in the S5 photo are bright and joy while the iPhone picture shows up abate. The roll side of that argument: the S5 photos can seem artificial while the iPhone photos more natural.
This is a recurring theme with all Samsung devices, including their TVs, purposefully exaggerating colors to create the most beautiful practice possible. Sometimes it works flawlessly, sometimes it misses the mark.
I walked over to the Fells Point pier to snap some more outside pics, these of the Under Armour building across the harbor.
The iPhone again presents more accurate blues, but zooming into the Under Armour building, notice the S5’s 16MP camera is able to capture greater detail.
It’s possible that, from the above pictures, you choose the iPhone versions. That’s an understandable (matter of preference), but don’t think that Samsung is altering the saturation, brightness, and contrast needlessly. In many cases it helps create a much better scene, such as this nearby picture (see Under Armour in the background?) where the foreground is illuminated, making it much more interesting.
That affect is hit or miss, sometimes improving colors and lighting, other times washing them out or making them seem artificial. For example below, I choose the nice and vibrant Galaxy S5 beer picture yet choose the iPhone’s picture of the field itself, maintaining those deep, natural greens in the grass.
My gallery on both phones are packed with these situations: I like some photos on one phone and some photos from the other. It’s very hit or miss and which phone you generally accept as “better” for pictures is a matter of preference. However, some specific camera characteristics have clear cut winners.
Zoom Zoom Zoom
One place where the Galaxy S5 camera clearly wins: zooming. With a 16MP camera compared to the iPhone 6’s 8MP camera, users can put the total pic on their computer, crop a petite portion, and the photo will still be slew large to use for online purposes.
That’s exactly what you witnessed with he Under Armour photos above… but what about using the zoom on the camera itself, before you take the picture? Check out this picture of the Natty Boh man from the rooftops, taken without any zoom (note these were accidentally taken at different times of the day, hence the difference in lighting):
Now let’s see what happens if we use the phone itself to zoom.
And now, from the zoomed picture, let’s crop that nice little boy’s face.
Not even close… the Galaxy S5 runs away with it.
Selfies!
If there’s one place that the iPhone six runs away with a camera category, it’s selfies. Despite only having a 1.2MP shooter compared to the Two.1MP on the Galaxy S5, it consistently produced better pics from its front facing “FaceTime HD” camera. Here’s me and my sister pretending to be harsh (and another friend selfie bombing with his duckface).
Colors are much richer and the textures are more human. Given that 99% of the time the front cam will be used to capture a person’s face… it seems Apple may have optimized accordingly. Keep in mind that this camera will mostly be used for social media, messaging, and live movie talk, having a resolution over one thousand two hundred eighty x seven hundred twenty isn’t too important- that works just fine.
Macro and More
Some of my beloved pictures are closeups of random objects, whether that be food, flowers or something else. Both phones performed amazingly well with macro pictures, and albeit the noticeable difference inbetween the final photos remains, this category was too close to call. Once again, mostly a matter of preference. In the interest of time and bandwidth, I’ll include a handful of other comparison photos, and we’ll budge along.
iPhone six Galaxy S5 iPhone six
Galaxy S5 iPhone six Galaxy S5
iPhone six Galaxy S5 iPhone six
Galaxy S5 iPhone six Galaxy S5
iPhone six Galaxy S5 iPhone six
Galaxy S5 iPhone six Galaxy S5
iPhone six Galaxy S5 iPhone six
Galaxy S5 iPhone six
Movie Comparison
Analyzing the movies we find the same themes prevalent from the photo comparisons. Namely, the iPhone’s colors emerge more natural at the ballpark but in low light – in the music venue – the movie is grainy and fights to capture a good picture. The visual winner may be a tossup, but from an audio standpoint the Galaxy S5 absolutely crushes the iPhone in playback.
The Galaxy S5 sound is utter with a clear and flourishing bass while the iPhone playback lays vapid. Both movies were shakier than I’d hope, but that may be as much my fault as the camera’s, considering the musical nature of both movies. That being said, I specifically recall attempting to hold fairly still at the ballpark while recording.
The very first set of movies are from a bar called Waterfront in Fells Point. Live music all the time and some good food, too. The 2nd set are from the Orioles game at Camden Yards during the “Fan of the Game” selection. This hilarious man did the same exact cheer at every idle moment of the game, even during YMCA he was poking the program into the air, exactly like so. I never did find out what was on the front of that program, but I’m not sure I want to know… I’d rather preserve the legend.
The movie comparison would be close but the S5 audio sounds so far superior to the iPhone that it’s rendered a no-brainer.
The Shocking Part
Over the course of several days, when taking these pictures, I demonstrated friends and family some of the pictures I’d taken along the way. Almost everyone – including me – was shocked at how clearly Samsung’s Galaxy S5 predominated the iPhone in photo taking. It wasn’t even close. Runaway victory. Laughable.
Then I put them on the computer… and that outlook switched. Samsung is known for having the brightest and most vibrant displays on the planet. When reviewing the photos, we weren’t admiring the quality of the photos… we were admiring the quality of the Galaxy S5 screen. We just didn’t know it.
Once putting both photos on a neutral device and equal playing field, just the opposite seemed to occur: the iPhone six edged the S5 in many cases because of deeper colors with more contrast. I was absolutely shocked, because I was fully ready to write this article about the S5 demolishing the iPhone six camera… but that’s not the case.
On the other arm, this says a lot about the Galaxy S5 display. Simply put: it’s amazing. But that’s another story. The Galaxy S5 and iPhone six take different approaches to treating less-than-optimal lighting conditions and neither is ideal. There is no clear cut winner
The Verdict
As is the case with many flagship smartphone comparisons, you could lightly make the argument for either the Galaxy S5 or the iPhone six as having the better camera. There are some clear differences, advantages, and flaws of each, but all things considered the Galaxy S5 has more points in it’s favor.
The iPhone six does take more consistently well colored photos, but the advantage is marginal. Meantime, the Galaxy S5 is superior in low light, crushes with zoom, and is exponentially better at capturing rich audio. Unless your heart is determined to have the better selfie at every waking moment, I’d recommend the Galaxy S5 as the better smartphone camera for its versatility and feature set… but the iPhone six isn’t far behind.
These are still two of the best smartphone cameras on the market, but serious photo paramours who anticipate wanting a superb camera for trips and private projects will still want to buy a dedicated point and shoot camera or DSLR.