Samsung Galaxy A22 review

A familiar quad-camera setup

The Samsung Galaxy A22 has a quad-camera setup closer to that on the Galaxy A32 rather than the A22 5G. The latter saw its setup cut down to reduce costs and got a 48MP main cam and no dedicated macro cam, among other things. The A32, on the other hand, has a higher-res 64MP camera and higher-res 5MP macro and depth sensors.

The vanilla Galaxy A22 has a 48MP, Quad-Bayer, f/1.8 primary camera, which according to its software, could either be the Samsung S5KGM2, commonly known as the GM2 or the Sony IMX 582. Both with 0.8 µm pixels and a 1/2.0" total area and PDAF. Perhaps the most interesting bit here, however, is the addition of OIS, which is not a thing even on the Galaxy A32.

The 8MP ultrawide camera uses a Sony IMX355 sensor - 1/4.0", 1.12µm. It sits behind an f/2.2 lens. Nothing too fancy. No autofocus or anything of the sort. And last but not least - the 13MP, f/2.2 selfie cam is not particularly fancy either with a Sony IMX258, 1/3.1", 1.12µm sensor and also fixed focus.

The camera app on the A22 is the latest one you get with One UI 3.1, the biggest improvement being the relocation of the video resolution to the viewfinder. Other than that, it's the same as on any other Samsung pre-One UI 3.1, which is a good thing since it's straightforward and easy to use.

The basics are as usual - swiping left and right will switch between available modes, and there's an option to re-arrange, add or remove some of the modes from the viewfinder. Vertical swipes in either direction will switch between front and rear cameras.

The familiar tree designation for zoom control is here too, and with no telephoto on board, you get three trees for ultra-wide and two trees for the main cam. You could zoom in with a pinch gesture, at which point additional preset zoom levels appear at 2x, 4x, and 10x.

The viewfinder has the standard set of icons with the settings cogwheel located in the upper left corner of the screen. The usual stuff like grid lines, location data, etc., can be found in the menu.

Camera app and settings

There's a Pro mode, but it's the basic implementation that only lets you pick ISO (100-800) and white balance (by light temperature with icons for common light sources), as well as dial-in exposure compensation (-2EV to +2EV in 0.1EV increments). A metering mode selector also made the cut (center-weighted, matrix and spot). There's no manual focusing option, sadly. The Galaxy A72 and A52 have more Pro controls at their disposal, but the ones on the A22 are about on par with the A22 5G and A32 5G.

Pro photo mode

Speaking of missing things, Pro video also didn't make the cut. Neither did FUN MODE - Samsung's current collaboration with Snapchat that brings a rotating selection of Snapchat filters right into the default camera app. We can't say we miss it sorely, but we still felt we should mention its absence since it was such a big part of the marketing for the A72, A52 and A32. Interestingly enough, our Galaxy A22 doesn't even have the Deco Pic stamps and masks mode that the A22 5G had.

Daylight image quality

By default, the main 48MP camera captures binned 12MP photos. These are a mixed bag. In terms of positives - the colors look nice and natural, and there is a decent amount of resolved detail. Dynamic range is decent, too, especially considering the challenging lighting conditions we were forced to shoot in. However, these shots tend to come out looking too soft. Often times this is actually down to the Galaxy A22 missing focus. We found ourselves constantly tapping on the viewfinder to try and force it to refocus with varying levels of success.

Samsung Galaxy A22: 12MP main camera samples

We also had issues with automatic exposure consistency. Initially, we thought that Samsung's Scene optimiser, which is on by default, was the thing messing with autofocus and other metering, but we still managed to mess up shots with it disabled.

Samsung Galaxy A22: 12MP main camera samples; Scene optimiser OFF

Hence, it is actually pulling its own weight alongside Auto HDR, also on by default. You can also get a pretty good idea of just how much of a difference the extra computational processing is making by looking at shots captured in 48MP mode. Neither Auto HDR nor Scene optimizer is available in this mode, and it shows, especially in scenes with more complicated lighting. You can clearly see highlights and shadows look a lot better in the default 12MP auto mode in general.

Samsung Galaxy A22: 48MP main camera samples

48MP shots, however, definitely offer more resolved detail. If that is a priority for you and individual files of over 20MB in size are not a problem, then go for it. You do have to live with a bit more noise, as well. The extra detail, however, does not really combat the overall softness of the shots, which only further proves that misbehaving autofocus is to blame.

The Galaxy A22 lacks any dedicated telephoto or other hardware zoom. Still, you do get crops from the main 48MP sensor. You can pinch to start zooming, after which you can choose a zoom level that way up to 10x or use one of the convenient buttons for 2x, 4x, and 10x.

Seeing how they come from the same camera, the 2x shots are also plagued by the same focus and softness issues. If you get the autofocus to cooperate, though, you can get good enough results for social media.

Samsung Galaxy A22: 12MP 2x zoom main camera samples

The dedicated portrait mode works surprisingly well on the A22 and produces very competent shots for a budget device. The persistent autofocus issues notwithstanding. The background bokeh effect is particularly nice. You can adjust its intensity via a slider in the camera UI.

Samsung Galaxy A22: 12MP main camera portrait samples

Subject detection and separation are good but could be better. Stray hairs and busier backgrounds can trip it up. Auto HDR is available in portrait mode. And with enough patience, you can also get pretty decent portraits of non-human subjects. The detection algorithm just needs a bit longer to kick in at times.

Samsung Galaxy A22: 12MP main camera portrait samples, non-human subjects

Before we move past the main camera, here are our standardized posted shots from it in both its default 12MP and full-res 48MP modes.

Samsung Galaxy A22 against the Samsung Galaxy A12 and the Xiaomi Redmi 10 in our Photo compare tool

48MP: Samsung Galaxy A22 against the Samsung Galaxy A12 and the Xiaomi Redmi 10 in our Photo compare tool

The 8MP ultrawide camera on the Galaxy A22 is decent, but not spectacular in any way. It offers plenty of detail for what it is. Its color rendition is nice, but the photos have a bit too much contrast.

Samsung Galaxy A22: 8MP ultrawide camera samples

At least, unlike the main cam, the ultrawide is not plagued by autofocus issues because of its fixed focus. It produces pretty sharp still. Perhaps even a bit too sharp, with some obvious oversharpening artifacts here and there.

There doesn't seem to be any software distortion correction or at least the option to toggle any mild correction that might be present.

The dedicated 2MP macro camera is nothing to phone home about. It can get the job done with enough patience, but it only has a fixed focus set a bit further away than we would have liked and a focus plane that is not particularly forgiving. Plus, the tiny 2MP resolution is kind of a crutch.

Samsung Galaxy A22: 2MP macro camera samples

The Galaxy A22 has a 13MP, f/2.2 fixed-focus selfie camera. A bit better than the 8MP unit on the A22 5G but not quite the 20MP snapper on the Galaxy A32.

Considering the hardware at hand, we have to say that selfies still look quite decent. The focus plane is wide and forgiving, resolved detail is adequate, and even colors come out looking decent under moderate and favorable lighting conditions.

Samsung Galaxy A22: 13MP wide selfie camera samples

In typical Samsung fashion, the selfie cam has a narrow and wide mode. The wide mode outputs 4128 x 3096-pixel stills, or just under 13MP, whereas the narrow mode results in just shy of 9MP (3408 x 2556 pixels). This is how the Galaxy A32 hands its two selfie modes, but interestingly enough, not how the Galaxy A22 5G does things, with all of its selfies shot in 8MP. Just an interesting detail.

Samsung Galaxy A22: 9MP narrow selfie camera samples

The Galaxy A22 can actually automatically detect if there is more than one person in frame and switch to the wide selfie mode, which is kind of neat. You can also tell the camera app to remember your last choice between the two modes, which is handy. Though, we still don't get why Samsung insists on having the narrow mode be the default one out-of-the-box.

Video recording

The Galaxy A22 is unfortunately limited to 1080p@30fps for its video capture. That goes for all of its cameras - the main one, the ultrawide and the selfie. There isn't even a 60fps mode available. We aren't quite certain that this is a limitation of the Helio G80 since its encored claims it can do 2K@30fps and 1080p@60fps. We did try Open Camera just to be sure and were still capped at FullHD.

The Galaxy A22 5G is actually capable of an odd max video capture of 1152p@30fps thanks to its Dimensity 700 5G chipset. We wouldn't exactly call that a major jump up, though. Unfortunately, the Galaxy A32 is also limited to FullHD. If you want 4K, then you have to either look at the Galaxy A32 5G or jump up another level to the A52 and its variants.

You get the usual choice between h.264 and h.265 (HEVC) encoding on the Galaxy A22. The latter saves some space at the expense of some quality. The former results in MP4 files with a solid FullHD AVC video stream of around 17 Mbps and stereo, 48kHz AAC audio. Not too shabby at all.

FullHD video quality from the main camera is pretty decent, with respectable detail, mature color processing and low noise. The dynamic range is kind of disappointing, though, with plenty of blown-out highlights.

Videos from the ultrawide hold up surprisingly well. There is plenty of detail and colors look good, even if slightly different from the main cam. Exposure seems to be a bit more balanced here as well, though it is worth noting that the two snappers often tend to select vastly different exposures automatically in the same conditions.

The Galaxy A22 has OIS on its main camera, and while it's not the best we've seen by far, it does visibly smooth out smaller shakes in the viewfinder and create that familiar "floaty" effect while framing. There is additional electronic image stabilization available for both the main and the ultrawide cameras, without sacrificing on the FullHD resolution either.

It doesn't really work amazingly on either camera, though. On the main one, it does an alright job actually smoothing out shakes but introduces an annoying and persistent tiny amount of focus hinting. That's, unfortunately, a common artifact of EIS on lower-end devices.

On the ultrawide, EIS seems to greatly reduce most shakes but not remove them entirely, resulting in small but aggressive shaking.

There is no EIS for the selfie camera. Probably a good thing, too, since its field of view is already kind of uncomfortably narrow to get a face in the frame at arm's length and cropping away from the frame for stabilization would only make it worse.

Selfie videos look decent enough, but the limited dynamic range of the selfie cam is an almost constant hurdle.

Here is how the Galaxy A22 stacks up against competitors in our extensive video compare database. You can pixel-peep away.

Samsung Galaxy A22 against the Samsung Galaxy A12 and the Xiaomi Redmi 10 in our Video compare tool

Low-light camera quality

The Galaxy A22 expectedly struggles quite a bit in low-light conditions. Its main camera is quite unimpressive, though still quite decent for a budget device. There is a decent amount of detail. Noise is well subdued, and even dynamic range is not a major issue, with auto HDR and auto night mode clearly polling their own weight.

Samsung Galaxy A22: 12MP main camera low-light samples

The main issue here, just like with daylight shots, is misbehaving autofocus. The A22 would frequently just miss its focus outright and require quite a bit of fiddling on our end to even get close. Even when the A22 did focus properly, shots still came out looking a bit soft for our taste.

Going for 48MP shots in low-light can offer a nice boost in resolved datil, just like in good lightning. However, these shots still suffer from all of the same issues like misbehaving autofocus, as well as general softness. On top of that, you don't get Auto HDR and Scene optimizer while shooting in this mode. In our view, 48MP mode in low-light makes little sense.

Samsung Galaxy A22: 48MP main camera low-light samples

Zooming with the main camera quickly degrades overall sharpness and level of detail. We would say that past 2x, shots are more of a painting, courtesy of the sharpening and noise suppression systems, than anything else.

Samsung Galaxy A22 zoom samples: 2x • 4x • 10x • 2x • 4x • 10x • 2x • 4x • 10x • 2x • 4x • 10x

The ultrawide camera is quite messy in low-light as well. Noise is quite excessive, plus there are a lot of oversharpening artifacts. Dynamic range is expectedly limited, but honestly not as bad as we've seen with some other budget devices.

Samsung Galaxy A22: 8MP ultrawide camera low-light samples

The Galaxy A22 has a dedicated night mode that's a bit of a mixed bag. Overall it tends to fix up shots a bit, mostly by containing highlights a bit better, suppressing noise further and applying a bit more sharpening. It's not an incredibly stark difference compared to regular low-light shots, but night mode is also quite speedy on the Galaxy A22, making it more viable. We did notice that night mode shots tend to be a bit darker overall, but not by a lot.

Samsung Galaxy A22: 12MP main camera night mode samples

On another positive note, night mode on the Galaxy A22 is also available on the ultrawide camera. That's actually pretty nifty since it was not the case on the Galaxy A22 5G. Night mode has a rather subtle effect on low-light shots as well, but never managed to actually mess up a still in our testing, earning itself a recommendation.

Samsung Galaxy A22: 8MP ultrawide camera night mode samples

The 13MP selfie camera holds-up very well in low-light conditions. There is plenty of detail and very little noise. Even dynamic range is not that much of an issue.

Samsung Galaxy A22: selfie camera low-light sample

Interestingly enough, there is no night mode for the selfie cam, even though the Galaxy A22 5G does have the option.

Finally, we went out and captured a few low-light videos with the Galaxy A22, as well. The main camera holds up quite well. There is plenty of detail at 1080p, and noise is well kept at bay. Of course, dynamic range is far from ideal, and both shadows and highlights suffer. All low-light samples are in the following playlist.

Naturally, quality quickly deteriorates as you zoom. 2x low-light videos still look usable overall. Anything beyond that, though, we would avoid.