Xiaomi 13 Ultra review

28 April 2023


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Anonymous, 08 May 2023What phone are you using now? bought in to the hype of the S22 Ultra 😭

FR THO, I just use gcam, the stock camera app sucks when it comes to the zoom cams but the main and ultrawide cams are fine, just barely tho. Video recording ain't half bad tho. What I love about the stock app is the flexibility enabled by the Camera Assistant. I can choose to reduce sharpening, can choose between speed vs quality and even turn off auto lens switching. I am a sucker for choice/options and I respect samsung for that. Samsung even allows high bitrate videos now and you can choose between SDR and HDR10+ Videos as well tho it's a labs feature. The problem is that this phone gives choices but the base quality isn't that great 😭.
Gcam tho, when using it this phone is a BEAST in terms of photography.
The processing is damn good and there's loads of options. I can even choose the exposure time manually whilst having HDR, which is super sweet. The photos are quite big and have noise in them, which I prefer. I'd rather have slightly compressed images with little denoising done and even low amounts of sharpening. I DO NOT use night mode, I just bump up the exposure time and lower the brightness slider in the Auto mode. I don't like how Night Mode usually has overprocessing in the stock app so yeahhh.

I just wish Xiaomi, Oppo or Vivo had better availability and gave us more choices. For example, Xiaomi's phones could use stronger HDR, Oppo could use dialed down processing in terms of color, sharpening and denoising and Vivo could just use dialed down processing in general or better processing tbh. I think Vivo's "Zeiss Natural" is the best natural photo mode on phones rn, Xiaomi's Leica Authentic needs some work to be useful. Wish these camera phones gave us more power to tweak the results instead of having to go full pro mode, like these phones NEED computational photography so I just want to be able to dial in the amount of processing yk, that'd be the next step imo. We're reaching the peak in terms of what the manufacturers are giving to the consumers and now all we need is giving the power to the consumers to select what type of processing they want. It's more work but that's what would TRULY differentiate a camera phone from a regular phone imo

    If only it had a headphone jack...

      jiyen235, 07 May 2023I'd have understood the 4.8 star rating if the camera ... moreIt's just that good

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        • Anonymous
        • tZ4
        • 08 May 2023

        jiyen235, 07 May 2023I'd have understood the 4.8 star rating if the camera ... moreWhat phone are you using now?

          jiyen235, 07 May 2023I'd have understood the 4.8 star rating if the camera ... moreI'd suggest just reading the review and ignoring the overall score. You can learn from what is said in the review but the overall score is pretty meaningless. Gsmarena has never published how they calculate their scores. My guess is they don't have a system and just give an overall score based on their 'impression'. This type of approach can't be very consistent as it will depend on various factors e.g. who is giving the score (some reviewers can be harsher or more generous than others); different reviewers will also have different opinions; the company's relationship with the brand (they will want to maintain good relationships with brands as it's good for business and it is a business after all so this is perfectly understandable). These are just a few factors. Some phones get far more detailed reviews that others which is further evidence that there is no standard protocol for the scoring system.

          For this reason, I think the overall score is meaningless. It would be more meaningful and transparent if they had a set protocol and scoring system and published an article about it on their website explaining how the scores are calculated. However, maybe that is not what they want. It offers less ‘flexibility’ with the scoring and would also create more work. Anyway, basically all the top android flagships are at a similar level this year. If they were all the same price I think it would be difficult to choose between them (at least for those that aren't 'loyal' to a certain brand. They are always going to choose the same brand anyway so it doesn't matter).

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            • Anonymous
            • uJA
            • 08 May 2023

            Super Android 22, 07 May 2023Not every flagship is huge though (iphone 13 mini, iphone 1... moreMany don't consider these non-pro/ultra as flagship due to crippled performance/camera. But they forget that with good camera comes huge physical package and has to be on a huge phone. Just look at tear down of the 13U, almost the top half is occupied by the camera modules and some sensor/speaker while the bottom half is largely the battery, there is no way if will fit anything smaller than 6.5" with significantly sacrificing either the battery, the cameras or misc modules (IR/vibration etc).

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              • Anonymous
              • uJA
              • 08 May 2023

              Sohrab, 07 May 2023Horrible design. I prefer Xiaomi 13 Pro over it. Also, I am... moreand you do know that 13pro has the same screen size as the ultra?

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                • Anonymous
                • uJA
                • 08 May 2023

                Anonymous, 06 May 2023You sound like someone that's never held a camera befo... moreNo, i actually agreed with him, dslr/mirrorless has been really stagnant in the past few years. I had done side by side comparison with a d650 and Mi Note 10 few years ago, on day light the difference is barely noticeable on a 27" even with a good lens stopped down to f8. Advantage is only slight on the night, but you need proper setup(tripod) on a good camera otherwise the photo just end up blurry due to the slow shutter whereas with phone they tend to do more processing but give you are more "handheld-able" shot in most cases. There difference might be pulling apart more after all these years. Those who have used dslr/mirrorless will know how easy it is to get a blurred or not perfectly sharp image in anything other than perfect lighting.

                The only advantage of a full camera now is the ability to have more settings on different glasses, faster response (shutter lag and rate) and more accurate focusing especially at night, vital for anyone doing events. Better RAW details for post-production etc, but again you will need to spend at least 3-5x more time doing post production. But on daily street or random photography, phone have definitely caught up.

                And lastly, no, im not saying phone camera quality is better in absolute term, but it is a more suitable and better device for the average consumers usage.

                  jiyen235, 07 May 2023I'd have understood the 4.8 star rating if the camera ... moreThe aforementioned phone already had 2 camera updates

                    I'd have understood the 4.8 star rating if the camera were great all around but a mid selfie cam and video recording problems mean it's gotta be 4.7 or 4.6, why's it ranked so highly then? The Leica Authentic preset is also half baked with vignetting and improper HDR processing. The Night mode shots look overprocessed. The HDR is good but the sharpening and noise reduction are a tad bit too much. Then the Night mode off shots lack stronger HDR.
                    Kind of a bummer that this is the best we're getting rn because it looked really promising. I wouldn't spend my money on a phone like this which is a bit wacky from the start and has no proper future in terms of updates. Who knows how long each update will take? Will these problems even be fixed? At least the Oppo has better updates.

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                      • Anonymous
                      • xjH
                      • 07 May 2023

                      Anonymous, 07 May 2023"one of a kind design" are you kidding me ? All ... moreiPhone looks like coffins.

                        Sohrab, 07 May 2023Horrible design. I prefer Xiaomi 13 Pro over it. Also, I am... moreNot every flagship is huge though (iphone 13 mini, iphone 14, galaxy s22/23 just to name a few). I mean the real facts are 6.1-6.3 inch phones now are smaller than flagships from pre 2017/16:9 devices with 5.5 inch screens. S23u is barely any bigger than the note 3 (note 3 is actually wider and pretty much same depth). 6.5 inch phones usually thinner and not as thick as 5.3-5.7 inch phones.

                        Never got that false "why are phones so big now", they really arent, 6.1-6.3 inch phones are generally smaller than old flagships with way more screen real estate with bigger batteries too. (if you're buying 6.8 inch screens you should know the full dimensions, thats your fault not the phones lol).

                        Also im sorry you own a pixel 6 pro, made the same mistake, never again.

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                          • Anonymous
                          • tZ4
                          • 07 May 2023

                          Luka, 07 May 2023So, camera is 4,8 stars, but the phone is avarage junk... OK. So, you think opinion from someone with no credential like yours actually matter...OK

                            Horrible design. I prefer Xiaomi 13 Pro over it. Also, I am not a fan of display size of more than 6.1" at all. I have pixel 6 pro. I am sticking with it because I have spent money over it. But in the future I will never buy a big phone. It is not manageable. Its so ridiculous to see that every flagship is huge.

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                              • Luka
                              • JFk
                              • 07 May 2023

                              So, camera is 4,8 stars, but the phone is avarage junk... OK.

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                                • Anonymous
                                • uH$
                                • 07 May 2023

                                "one of a kind design"
                                are you kidding me ? All china phone looks like a washing machine now.

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                                  • Soulearth
                                  • mwV
                                  • 06 May 2023

                                  W, 02 May 2023Can the 3.2x do tele macro like 13pro?Hello,
                                  no, it isn't the same lens and also not the same special type of lens.
                                  The macro capabilities are average on the main lens, and far from the great expected macro on the tele.

                                    Anonymous, 06 May 2023Btw another problem of phones are colors. Photos from phone... moreColors - yes, but DR? Photos in smartphones are composites of many frames, and DR on them in better than from a single frame from a regular camera. DR from RAWs from smartphones is a different thing, and yes, if we are not talking about ExpertRAW, PRORaw or how each brand name stacked RAWs the DR is lower than in the camera.

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                                      • Anonymous
                                      • 3p7
                                      • 06 May 2023

                                      Btw another problem of phones are colors. Photos from phones are everytime ugly, unreal colors and small dynamic range.

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                                        • Anonymous
                                        • 6k%
                                        • 06 May 2023

                                        But from what I've noticed many people love taking photos and i do as well, but I've come across people who don't know how to set up the cameras on their smartphones, in order to get some good results while snapping pictures. So I set up the cameras for some people on some occasions, and they were really surprised what beautiful results they had

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