Samsung Galaxy A25 review

A familiar triple camera setup now with a higher res ultrawide

The Galaxy A25 mostly carries forward the camera setup of its Galaxy A24 predecessor.

This includes the main 50MP snapper with OIS, the 2MP macro cam on the back and a 13MP fixed-focus selfie camera. The one upgrade here is the move to a higher resolution 8MP ultrawide camera on the back, up from the 5MP unit inside the Galaxy A24.

Samsung Galaxy A25 camera specs

• Wide (main): 50 MP Samsung ISOCELL (S5K)JN1, f/1.8, 27mm, 1/2.76", 0.64µm, PDAF, OIS; 2160p@30fps
• Ultra wide angle: 8 MP Samsung ISOCELL (S5K)4HA, f/2.2, 120-degree, 1/4", 1.12µm, fixed focus; 1080p@30fps
• Macro: 2 MP GalaxyCore GC02M1, f/2.4, fixed focus.
• Front camera: 13 MP Hynix Hi-1339, f/2.2, 1/3.06", 1.12µm, fixed focus; 1080p@30fps

Overall, you can tell that Samsung hasn't changed the camera all that much from the Galaxy A24. One new addition to the SuperSteady mode, which is available when video recording.

The camera app is the same as you'd find on every Samsung phone these days. You only get Pro mode on the main camera, while night mode can be used across the main, ultrawide and selfie cams.

Daylight camera quality

The main camera saves 12.5MP photos by default. We've already seen this particular camera do a great job on other devices like last year's Galaxy A24.

The resolved detail is okay, the noise reduction did a great job, the contrast is great, and the dynamic range is wide. In typical Samsung fashion, colors have a bit of an extra "pop" to them. However, overall, the photos don't look overprocessed or over-sharpened, which is great.

Unfortunately, if you look closely, the photos appear quite soft.

Samsung Galaxy A25: 12.5MP main camera samples

Even in the absence of a dedicated depth sensor, the main camera captures quite decent portrait shots. Subjects look detailed with pleasant skin tones. Subject detection and separation are quite accurate, and the quality of the background blur is excellent.

Samsung Galaxy A25: 12.5MP main camera samples

Samsung Galaxy A25: 12.5MP main camera portrait samples

The Galaxy A25 lacks a dedicated telephoto camera, but it can still capture 2x zoom shots with its main camera. These are very comparable to 1x shots quality-wise, which means they look good if you don't zoom in too closely.

Samsung Galaxy A25: 12.5MP main camera 2x zoom samples

The new 8MP ultrawide camera offers a decent little upgrade over last year's 5MP unit but is nothing to phone home about. Contrast and dynamic range are all right. We like how the color rendition looks. It is far from natural but is well-matched to the slightly saturated look that the main camera offers.

Details are an imperfect mix of washed-out and over-sharpened. The quality of photos reminds us of what good-grade surveillance cameras produce, meaning it will capture the scene, but the quality is not great by phone camera standards.

Samsung Galaxy A25: 8MP ultrawide camera samples

The 2MP macro camera has its focus fixed at 4cm away, and it may take a few attempts to get it right. Once you do, you can save some usable closeups you can post on your Instagram. Their colors and dynamic range are good, but the resolved detail is rather unimpressive.

Samsung Galaxy A25: 2MP macro camera samples

The 13MP selfies we took on the Galaxy A25 are excellent - there is plenty of resolved detail and balanced overall rendition, accurate colors, and wide dynamic range. We've seen worse selfies from more еxpensive phones, so we do commend Samsung for making a good selfie camera on such an affordable device.

Samsung Galaxy A25: 13MP selfie camera samples

Low-light camera quality

The main camera on the Galaxy A25 captures decent, but largely unimpressive low-light photos. While there is quite a bit of detail, most surfaces look soft and a bit noisy. Both shadows and highlights are well-developed, and light sources are contained decently, though still not perfectly. Dynamic range and contrast are good. The colors are a bit cold but generally alright.

Samsung Galaxy A25: 12.5MP main camera low-light samples

The Galaxy A25 applies some automatic night mode procession on its own, but there is a dedicated manual Night mode as well, which has longer exposure times and does more image stacking. The resulting images are a bit sharper, with less noise and cleaner surfaces. Light sources are handled notably better, too.

Samsung Galaxy A25: 12.5MP main camera night mode samples

2x zoom shots from the main camera expectedly look noisier and softer than 1x ones. They are still very much usable, though.

Samsung Galaxy A25: 12.5MP main camera 2x zoom low-light samples

Night mode doesn't seem to do a lot for these shots. The exposure is higher, which can lead to some clipped highlights and doesn't help shadows all that much, and that's about it.

Samsung Galaxy A25: 12.5MP main camera 2x night mode samples

We didn't expect much from the new 8MP ultrawide in low-light given its lackluster performance in daylight. The low light photos are decidedly soft and noisy without that much detail. The dynamic range, however, is quite alright for this sort of camera.

Samsung Galaxy A25: 8MP ultrawide camera low-light samples

Night mode boosts exposure a bit and lightens everything up, but it doesn't really help develop darker areas or light sources any better. The amount of captured detail remains about the same, with a bit of extra sharpening applied to what is already there. This does make for an overall cleaner look, but it is quite artificial.

Samsung Galaxy A25: 8MP ultrawide camera night mode samples

The selfie camera fails to impress in low light conditions as well. Faces come out looking soft and muddy most of the time, even if you pretty much nail the fixed focal plane. On a more positive note, at least skin tones look believable most of the time.

Samsung Galaxy A25: 13MP selfie camera low-light samples

Video capture quality

One upgrade afforded by the Exynos 1280 chipset over the Mediatek Helio G99 in last year's Galaxy A24 is the ability to capture 4K@30fps video. The Galaxy A25 can do that on its main camera and only in 1x mode. The 2x zoom mode from the main camera, the ultrawide, and the selfie camera are all limited to 1080p.

By default, video gets saved in an h.264/AVC stream at around 49 Mbps in 4K and 17 Mbps in FullHD. Audio is also standard 48 kHz stereo AAC, and both get bundled together inside a standard MP4 container. There is also the option the save on some space and capture in h.265/HEVC instead.

4K video from the main camera looks great with plenty of detail, practically no noise, good contrast and dynamic range. Colors, just like with stills, are a bit on the saturated side, but not excessively so. The contrast is cranked a bit as well to get that extra "poppy" look.

As mentioned, 2x zoom video is limited to 1080p and looks pretty unimpressive in comparison. It's not bad, but the level of detail definitely isn't there. The same can generally be said about the ultrawide camera and its 1080p videos. While definitely usable, these are soft, especially around the edges of the frame. We do like that the colors reasonably match the main camera.

Breaking away from the trend, 1080p videos from the selfie camera look great. The detail is there with excellent skin texture. Skin tones look great as well. The contrast is pleasant, and so are the slightly saturated colors. Overall, a great showing.

Another new addition to the Galaxy A25 mix is gyro-based Electronic image stabilization (EIS). It comes in two flavors or levels. One is basic stabilization, which is toggled through the camera settings menu. It caps the resolution to 1080p but can work on all cameras (except for the 2MP macro) and does a pretty decent job of smoothing out small shakes and bumps. Then there is Super Steady, which only works at 1080p and on the ultrawide camera. It is meant for sports and other action shots and offers better overall stabilization at the expense of cropping away more from the frame.

Low-light video from the main camera is surprisingly clean and detailed. The detail is there, and colors look nice as well. Dynamic range could be better, though, with blown-out light sources and mostly crushed shadows. 2x zoom video from the main camera is worse with less detail due to its 1080p resolution also softer and slightly noisy. 1080p video from the ultrawide is very disappointing. It is dark, muddy and noisy.