GSMArena Labs: Updating the Photo and Video quality comparison tool

We have updated our Photo and Video quality comparison tools with a new setup and a bit of extra functionality. Those two were launched five years ago, but given the improvement smartphone cameras have achieved since, we felt it's about time for an update.

For one, over the years our color charts started to fade (they were losing color so we had to swap them). Also, smartphone cameras became so good they surpassed the limits of the print in those two (they were printed at a certain DPI, it turns out it was too low for a modern high-end camera).

So we added a new setup to the testing procedure, you'll find it in the comparison tools as "Studio setup." It is located in a photo studio, where the sun won't damage it for years, and it's made up of physical objects with very fine texture. As cameras continue to get better, they will resolve more detail in the objects, but they will never hit an upper limit (there's no DPI here, just real detail).

We've already started re-building the database with phones available in the office and we'll add more as time goes on. If you're interested in a phone that hasn’t been updated with the new setup, you can view the old charts by clicking the gray buttons on the right (the ones marked "old").

You may notice that the Scaling option has changed – we replaced the clunky dropdown menu with a slider. This feels more familiar (it's like the zoom slider on your camera) and it's now available in the Video comparison tool. Back in 2010 we didn’t think we needed it, but these days cameras shoot videos with over 8MP per frame!

If you have any questions or suggestions or experience any bugs, leave us a comment below.