Samsung's Galaxy S22 Ultra comes with a dressed-up quad-camera setup, but an evaluation of its imaging abilities by DxOMark has thrown up very unexpected results. Samsung on Feb. 9 unveiled its Galaxy S22-series smartphones, which comprises the Galaxy S22, S22+ and the S22 Ultra.

While the standard S22 and the S22+ have also been getting rave reviews, the S22 Ultra is the most talked-about device in the lineup with top-of-the-line specs and the built-in S Pen stylus. It also has a pretty decent camera setup on paper, but the latest report from DxOMark now suggests that its imaging chops may not be quite as impressive as initially expected.

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DxOmark has released the camera evaluation score of the Galaxy S22 Ultra, and the results are far from what Samsung would have hoped for. According to the report, the device not only failed to dislodge the top smartphones from their perch but even came up short against two-year-old devices, like the Huawei P40 Pro and the Xiaomi Mi 10 Ultra, both of which were launched back in 2020. Overall, the S22 Ultra notched up only 131 points, claiming the 13th spot with the Oppo Find X3 Pro, the Vivo X70 Pro and the Vivo X50 Pro. Breaking down the S22 Ultra camera scores, the device got 134 for photos and 114 for videos, while the zoom score was 86.

DxOMark Tested The Exynos Variant

Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra

The S22 Ultra's score falls short of many of its peers, such as the iPhone 13 Pro and Pro Max, both of which scored 137 points in DxOmark's test. Google's Pixel 6 Pro notched up 135 points, while Xiaomi's Mi 11 Ultra sits pretty at the top of the heap with 143 points. However, it is worth noting that the S22 Ultra tested by DxOMark is the Exynos variant (powered by the Exynos 2200, to be precise), but whether that made much of a difference remains to be seen. Both the Exynos and the Snapdragon models ship with identical camera hardware, so the ISP is a major differentiating factor between the two.

Overall, DxOMark praises the Galaxy S22 Ultra's white balance and color accuracy, as well as exposure levels and white balance. The natural bokeh effects also come in for praise, as does the fast and smooth autofocus in video. In addition, the report says that the natural skin tones, color accuracy, and stabilization in videos are also praiseworthy. On the negative side, the report cites slow autofocus for photos in most lighting conditions, occasional loss of detail in dark areas in HDR images, luminance noise, artifacts, shadow clipping and unstable white balance in low-light videos, inconsistent sharpness between video frames with a moving camera in low-light, and texture artifacts in high-contrast videos. Overall, notwithstanding the unimpressive evaluation by DxOMark, Samsung's Galaxy S22 Ultra likely remains one of the best Android smartphones on offer, especially for folks wanting the stylus functionality.

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Source: DxOMark