S24 Ultra after Feb 2024 update: I am considering returning it

[Slavvd]

Just got the February 2024 update on my S24 Ultra.

This update promised a lot of improvements in the cameras department. 

I have to admit updating it improved the camera quality a little (emphasis on little). 

However, I also happen to own an iPhone 15 (cheapest one), currently used as a work device. 

After comparing the two phone's cameras I can honestly say: There is no competition, iPhone wins hands down. 

I took the same pictures with the phones side by side and using default camera camera apps settings. Then compared them on the same device (iPhone) to avoid display bias. I can summarise it as:

- Colors are better after the update but still not quite to the iPhone level

- IPhone takes 24MP shots by default, resulting in much more detail than the default 12MP Galaxy shots

- Switching to the Expert Raw mode on galaxy and taking 24MP shots (otherwise default settings) results in severely oversharpened and overall way worse photos than the standard 12MP ones.

- Switching the iPhone to take 12MP shots makes makes them about even in the details department but not colors. 

- The IPhone is much better in preserving details when a photo has both very lit and very dim areas. (think a light bulb in a dim room that **bleep** one side of your face and casts a shadow on the other) 

I just can't stand the fact that a £650 device can just blow a £1300 device to pieces when it comes to camera. 

For this reason I am seriously considering returning my S24U and using the iPhone full time. What's the point of spending £1300 extra and having to live with 2 phones when I can't even take a decent picture with the S24U?

I love android but this phone is a disappointment. 

[Slavvd]

Stop saying "subjectively". You can clearly see the difference in the photos and if you don't trust me when I say how it was taken you are welcome to repeat the experiment yourself.

We can argue all day but at the end of the day the fact remains.

I am not the biggest fan of IOS, I have only had androids, starting with my first smartphone in 2011-2012.

But now that I have an iPhone for work that I can compare against - I can't deny the obvious.

IOS has lots of drawbacks and limitations but given the fact the most frequent thing I do on my personal phone is taking pictures and the fact I cannot get rid of the iPhone anyway, I just don't see a point of spending 1300 on a second phone that is also worse at taking pictures.

[Slavvd]

It is hard to be objective when you see only one side of the story. 

I recommend visiting an Apple store or borrowing a friend's iPhone and making the comparison yourself.  

I can guarantee you - you will see the difference. 

For example, take a photo of a person from a few feet away. First you will notice the difference in color - iPhone picture will have much more natural and real-life looking colors. Then zoom in/crop on a particular area - you will notice the lack of detail on the Samsung in comparison with the iPhone.

[Donker]

The front camera is so bad in S24 ultra. It doesn't come out/look the same as what you see before clicking. 

[T0rIIGa]

After the long awaited update I'm also disappointed. On top of the camera not getting what it needed, comparing my S21U's screen to the S24U, it's clear that the whites are nowhere near as bright and that the colors are not as vibrant. To top it off the speaker on the s24U sounds flat. I'm just confused. Did I thought I was purchasing an upgrade, but it looks like Samsung decided to downgrade everyone this year.

[DrMips]

I took some photos in the park today of my daughter and they looked just as good or better than my old S23U Ultra.

I've taken some shots on an iPhone 15 (24mp) and my S24 Ultra (12mp) using the main 1x sensors in my daughter's playroom. Can you guess which is which?

Edit : It looks like the forum is reducing the size of the photos to about 2mp so it's harder to see detail so I have links to bigger images.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/AwPJ4XPWKhgKF9TY9

https://photos.app.goo.gl/ckonSkPmtVAddxmBA

https://photos.app.goo.gl/DTzRqF3kHKHJwW1w6

[Slavvd]

I would guess the top ones are the iPhone ones.

The reason I believe this is the case is:
- The colors are generally warmer on the top pictures. I believe those colors to be closer to how it would look like in real life. Most noticeable with the 3rd picture that has the headphones on the wall.
- Zooming in reveals more details. Especially noticeable if you zoom in on the framed picture to the bottom left of the window in the second picture.
- Shadows are better preserved on the top pictures. Especially noticeable with the toy car next to the desk on the first picture.

Did I guess right?

[DrMips]

The first two photos, the iPhone is top, S24U bottom. The 3rd photo, S24U top, iPhone bottom.

[Slavvd]

Ah I was so on the fence about that last one. There are no shadows to look at and most of the objects are close or not complex enough to make the detail difference visible. I also kind of convinced myself it must be the top one again since I was sure about the other two.

But anyway I think the pictures you posted show what I described in my original post. The iPhone just manages to capture more detail both in terms of raw MP count and in terms of more realistic colors and shadows.

I'm not sure if it's a hardware problem with the galaxy or it just does too much post-processing (I have seen other people complain about this in the community forums). For better or for worse the iPhone just captures what I see in real life. Every time without skipping a beat. The galaxy on the other hand falls short of this 9/10 times.

I started trying to live with just my iPhone. It was a definitely a challenge as I had to re-learn how to do a lot of stuff, but ultimately I got used to everything in about 2 days. I've installed all of the Google apps and services I have been using on Android, including the password manager (via Chrome), contacts, calendar, mail, Google home, etc. I found you don't really need to use most of the Apple apps (unless you want to), which is good as I want avoid vendor locking myself to them as much as possible.

I am keeping the Galaxy for a few more days just to give it another chance but at this point I'm pretty much sold on the iPhone. I am even thinking of buying the Pro Max and using that instead of the regular 15. Hopefully I will be able to return to Android next year.

[RELKady]

What about the over  yellow  after processing the taken Pic? Especially the 5x zoom and inside lighting 

[DrMips]

The colours are actually more accurate on the first 2 pictures on the S24 Ultra. It's a very bright room and mostly white. The iPhone has added a yellow tint and underexposed the interior as it tried getting the outside exposed correctly. On the first image, the S24U (bottom) brings out much more detail in the shadow area (which were not as bad as the iPhone made them look due to under existing the interior).

Neither phone got the colour correct on the 3rd image. It was in-between the two images. The iPhone made it too white (The notice board and wallpaper background are a light cream).

Out of the 3 shots I think the S24U did a better job overall than the iPhone, especially considering that the iPhone was shooting in 24mp mode and the S24U 12mp.

Crop from first image. iPhone first (dark and under exposed) and S24U second, exposed correctly.