iQOO 9 review

Premium triple camera setup with gimbal stabilization

The iQOO 9 has a similar camera setup as the iQOO 9 Pro - a high-res primary shooter with gimbal stabilization, an ultrawide camera with autofocus, and a telephoto shooter. But the sensors and some of the lenses are different.

So, the iQOO 9 has a 48MP main camera with optional gimbal stabilization. Then comes a 13MP telephoto camera with 2x optical zoom. And last is another 13MP camera for wide-angle photos and macro shots. It does not support fisheye-view as the one on the iQOO 9 Pro.

The primary camera on the iQOO 9 Pro uses a 48MP Sony IMX598 1/2" sensor with 0.8µm pixels and a Quad-Bayer filter. This sensor is paired with a 25mm f/1.79 lens. There is 5-axis gimbal stabilization available on this camera, and it can be turned on/off in videos.

The ultrawide camera relies on a 13MP Samsung ISOCELL (S5K)3L6 1/3" sensor with 1.12µm pixels. It sits behind a 16mm f/2.2 lens. Autofocus is available here, and because of that, you can shoot closeups from about 3-4cm away.

Last is the zoom camera with the same 13MP Samsung ISOCELL (S5K)3L6 1/3" sensor with 1.12µm pixels. It uses a 50mm f/2.46 lens and allows for 2x optical zoom over the main camera.

The selfie camera uses the a 16MP Samsung S5K3P9 1/3.1" sensor as the telephoto shooter. The lens is 27mm f/2.45, and the focus is fixed.

No major changes were made to the default Funtouch camera app since the vivo X70 series. There's a straightforward zoom selector with a planet (fisheye), 0.6x, 1x and 2x shortcuts. Accessing the Super Macro mode is done from the flower icon next to the hamburger menu, but it has an auto-on option too that kicks in when you get very close to a subject.

Camera app

The main modes are arranged in carousel formation, and you can switch between them by swiping. The More tab lists the rest of the modes, and from there, you can also customize the modes you have available in the viewfinder.

The Pro mode gives you all the freedom to adjust the autofocus, white balance, shutter speed, ISO and exposure. You can do so on all of the three cameras, too. There's helpful information explaining all of the options above in case you are just getting into photography. Shooting in RAW is also an option.

Photo quality

All photos from all cameras were taken with HDR set on Auto, though we saw it fire once or twice.

The main camera on the iQOO 9 saves 12MP photos by default and those are excellent even if they are not ideal. There is enough resolved detail for a sharp image, the colors are lively and punchy, the dynamic is balanced and realistic, and the contrast is high. The noise is incredibly low in these daylight photos.

The colors are a slightly over-saturated, but in a good Samsung way. There is also an AI scene trigger, which may saturate them even more, so we'd suggest that you stay away from it.

Main camera, 12MP

You can shoot in 48MP and the photos are alright. There is no advanced processing here, you get a photo with somewhat average resolved detail, less than ideal dynamic range, but the benefits could be worth it, too - accurate colors and realistic balanced look. Plus, if you resize these photos down to 12MP, there is a good chance you will get a minor boost in the detail and overall sharpness without anything being actually over-sharpened.

Main camera, 48MP

The 13MP photos from the ultrawide camera are quite nice, too. They are sharp around the center with okay resolved detail, even if a bit oversharpened.

The corners have been proficiently straightened, but there is some purple fringing still visible there.

The dynamic range is once again balanced, and we like the contrast. The colors are punchy and a bit over-saturated, but we don't mind that. And the noise is kept low, if any.

These ultrawide photos are not the best we've seen from a flagship but are still among the better ones and we do like what we shot with this camera.

Ultrawide camera, 13MP

The ultrawide camera supports autofocus and that is why it can also do macro photos. The automatic macro mode switches between the main and the ultrawide cameras with priority to the latter. Note that the macro mode saves cropped and upscaled images from the ultrawide camera, so for the sake of quality inspections we shot most of the closeups by using the 0.6x mode and just getting the phone close enough to the subject.

So, the 13MP macro photos we took with the ultrawide camera are great - they are contrasty, with excellent colors and good sharpness so you can see the tiny details on those flower petals or bugs. The detail is not that impressive and looks like an oil-painting at times, but these photos have enough resolution so when you publish them in 3MP-5MP - they will beat any 2MP or 5MP cheap macro cam you see on most mid-rangers.

Macro photos from UW camera, 13MP

And these two macro photos were taken with the automatic macro mode and for some reason the app chose to shoot them with the primary camera.

Macro from main cam, 13MP

The zoom camera has no optical stabilization, and this could explain the average resolved detail. The photos exhibit excellent contrast and balanced look, the noise is low, and we like the colors. But their detail is only average, and you can tell that. Still, it is better than doing digital zoom over the main camera and we will take a dedicated zoom camera anytime over whatever version of digital zoom.

The camera serves its purpose - it zooms more than the main camera and you can clearly see what's there, and with such a lively look at that.

Telephoto camera, 13MP

There is a dedicated portrait mode, where you control the blur intensity, plus you can choose from various portrait effect. The portrait mode supports shooting with the main and the zoom cameras.

The portraits shot on the zoom camera have less than ideal subject separation, but other than that - they have excellent detail and sharpness, linkable colors and contrast, and low noise. The blur is nice, too.

Portraits 2x, 13MP

The portraits shot with the main camera are even better - they subject separation is more proficient, while everything else - blur, exposure, detail, colors - simply great.

Portraits 1x, 12MP

The low-light photos from the main and ultrawide camera at night are always heavily processed, no matter whether you opt for Night Mode or not. There is a minor difference between the regular and night modes and that's because the standard mode has faster simulated exposure.

So, the regular photos taken at night with the main camera of the iQOO 9 are okay - they are incredibly bright, with wide dynamic range, preserved color saturation, low noise, and okay contrast. The noise reduction takes a heavy toll on the detail and the photos are soft and not as detailed as we would have liked them.

Oddly, if you are shooting during the sunset or shortly after, the noise reduction is more gentle and leaves a lot of noise but also a lot of detail (the last photo).

Main camera, 12MP

You can manually shoot in Night Mode, and you will see there is barely a difference. We got brighter skies for some scenes, and some slightly brighter objects here and there, but nothing major. You may as well avoid shooting with Night Mode, unless you are into unrealistically bright night photos.

Night Mode main cam, 12MP

The low-light photos from the ultrawide camera are less processed than the ones from the primary, but still processed enough not to need the Night Mode. The images have realistic exposure and true to life colors, excellent contrast and good dynamic range. The noise is low for such type of camera and lens, and we can safely say these are some of the better ultrawide photos we've seen in quite a while.

Ultrawide camera, 13MP

There is one noticeable difference between the default and the Night Mode ultrawide photos - the Night Mode cleans the noise visible in the standard shooting mode photos. However, the dedicated Night mode also takes noticeably longer time to shoot each photo so we are not sure that the tradeoff is worth it, especially since there are no other visible improvements in these photos.

Ultrawide cam Night Mode, 13MP

The 2x toggle on the viewfinder yields digitally zoomed photo at night. They are cropped and upscaled from the primary photos and you can tell if you pixel peep in those - the resolved detail is halved. Still, some of them are not only usable, but looking pretty good even if soft and we think if the scene requires it, you can rely on this digital zoom for a good photo.

2x digital zoom, 12MP

You can force the telecamera from the Pro mode and take low-light photo with everything on Auto, but we are not sure it's worth it. The photos are particularly noisy and dark, with a ton of noise and poor in detail.

2x telephoto cam, 13MP

There are various low-light shooting modes like Long Exposure (with Flow of Traffic, Night Graffiti, Fireworks and Star Trails options), Night Mode Panorama, Astro mode for out-of-town shooting, and Double Exposure for some artsy shots.

More camera modes

You can play with those and enjoy various creative photos, though don't expect these to be sharp. They will do for Facebook, of course.

Flow of traffic

And here are photos of our usual posters taken with the iQOO 9. You can see how it stacks up against the competition. Feel free to browse around and pit it against other phones from our extensive database.

iQOO 9 against Poco F4 GT and the Realme GT2 in our Photo compare tool

Selfies

The 16MP selfies from the selfie camera are excellent and among the best you can get with a front shooter with fixed focus. The selfies are rich in detail and sharp, with well-exposed subjects and excellent colors. The dynamic range is good, and it can be great when the Auto HDR decides to get involved. The photos are not as sharp when HDR has fired, and properly sharp when HDR was not involved.

Selfies, 16MP

You can shoot selfie portraits too, and they are okay if you don't have complex hair and/or clothing. Otherwise, clipped or blurred parts are expected and you won't be that happy with the results.

The portraits from the front camera are good and should do for the social networks.

Selfie portraits, 16MP

Video capturing

The iQOO 9 captures videos with all cameras. The main camera records video up to 4K at 60fps, 1080p at 60fps is also supported. The ultrawide, the telephoto and the selfie shooters are limited to 1080p at 30fps videos.

Gimbal stabilization is naturally available on the primary camera, and it includes electronic stabilization as well. Electronic stabilization is available to all other cameras. And you can turn EIS/gimbal on/off for any of them.

Video recording UI

iQOO stabilization options are a bit awkward - there is Standard, Ultra, and Off. Standard means Gimbal+EIS for the main camera, and EIS for the ultrawide/tele/selfie cameras. Ultra uses the main camera and 1080p@60fps mode to capture an action camera-like video. And Off, well, it means no stabilization, obviously.

Our advice is not to turn off the stabilization unless you are using a tripod. Stabilization on all cameras works brilliantly. We found the videos to be incredibly steady, and most users will be happy with them.

The camcorder is incredibly generous with the bit rates - 4K footage gets 50-60Mbps, while 1080p/30fps is allocated a similarly about 20Mbps. The audio bitrate is 128Kbps, the sound is stereo.

The not stabilized 4K footage from the main camera is outstanding. The resolved detail is plenty, and everything seems sharp, there is no visible noise, the contrast is great, and the dynamic range is alright. We can also praise the color presentation.

The stabilized 4K videos have a narrower field of view and while they share the same quality as the not stabilized ones, their detail is not as impressive but still pretty good.

The 4K low-light videos from the main camera are good with realistic exposure, contrast and true to life colors, and the detail is okay. The footage is quite noisy though and may not be everyone's cup of tea.

There is also this Super Night video option that shoots in 1080p and brightens the video, plus it cleans noise, but it also smears fine detail and blurs the moving objects like cars.

The 1080p videos from the ultrawide and the telephoto cameras are excellent. They are incredibly sharp, with excellent dynamic range, accurate colors and no visible noise whatsoever. These are some of the best Full HD videos, we'd say.

The stabilized videos from the ultrawide and the tele cameras are also excellent. They have a bit narrower field of view because of the EIS crop, and maybe if we look closely we can also see a minor drop in the sharpness, but it is far less evident as it was on the main camera (probably due to the lower resolution).

Finally, here is the iQOO 9 in our video tool so you can make your own comparisons.

iQOO 9 against Poco F4 GT and the Realme GT2 in our Video compare tool