Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra review

Triple camera like no other

The Galaxy S20 Ultra has a camera system that is entirely its own - the other S20s are sharing a setup that isn't quite as Ultra. Mind you, some bits on this spec sheet may resemble bits on other phones, but there's plenty that sets them apart and even then putting them together hasn't been done before.

Let's start with the main camera. It's based around Samsung's own Isocell Bright HM1 sensor, a nominally 108MP imager that Samsung calls Nonacell. 'Nona' comes from the Latin word for the number nine and signifies that the Bayer color filter array in front of the (otherwise color-agnostic) pixels groups nine adjoining ones together to capture the same primary color. Something like this.

This takes the prevailing Quad Bayer approach a step further and should offer extra benefits in terms of noise performance, as well as potentially superior HDR output.

The individual photosites are 0.8µm big, just like in the vast majority of Quad Bayers on the market, and bundling them in 3-by-3 squares makes for 2.4µm resulting pixels - that's the same pixel size you'd get on a 20MP 1" sensor like the one in the Sony RX100 VII compact camera.

The sensor is also physically large, which is the main premise for good light gathering capabilities. Another aspect of its size is that all other things being equal, larger sensors will offer a shallower depth of field, which is desirable for subject isolation. Couple that with the Ultra's bright f/1.8 lens and you're in for some pretty impressive natural bokeh, at least as far as phones go.

Now, on the flip side, you may want more depth of field - like in landscapes with sweeping vistas or in closeups where you want your entire subject to be in focus - not just the part you've focused on. With a real camera, that's where you'd close the aperture on your camera lens a bit. Samsung had a bit of that variable action going on for a couple of generations of flagships, which could switch between f/1.5 and f/2.4, but that capability is gone now. We can imagine it was a lot bigger of a technical challenge to fit on this particular camera module than it was on the tinier 1/2.6" units of olden days, so we're not complaining. But the bottom line is, with this phone, out of focus areas will be visibly more strongly out of focus than with any other phone camera.

Next in line of the Ultra's unique internals is the telephoto camera. It's got a periscope lens, and periscope lenses have been fitted into phones before - the Huawei P30 Pro easily comes to mind, and there's also the more obscure Oppo Reno 10x zoom (that's just the name of the phone, the periscope itself is around the 4x-ish zoom mark).

Periscope cameras in smartphones work by placing the sensor in a perpendicular plane to that of the phone while a prism refracting the incoming light 90-degrees to the side and into it. That way you get more space to spread a physically longer lens - no one wants a 2cm lens sticking out of their phones.

Where the Ultra's telephoto stands out from other periscopes is that there's a very large sensor tucked in there - an 1/2" 48MP Quad Bayer unit like the ones a lot of midrange phones use for primary cameras. The lens in front offers a 4x optical zoom if you're counting from the main cam FoV to an equivalent focal length of 103mm. While it's not nominally very bright at f/3.5, in combination with a sensor this large, it makes for a promising setup.

The ultra wide-angle module is the least groundbreaking of the three. We're bummed mostly about the persistent lack of autofocusing capability on Samsung ultra wides, though this aside, the specs are pretty neat. 1.4µm pixel size has to be first on an ultra-wide smartphone cam while the 13mm equivalent f/2.2 aperture lens is plenty wide and fast.

There's also a ToF pair, which is probably nice to have, but it doesn't bring anything tangible to your shooting experience. As in - you can't shoot with it directly. We'll look at some portraits later on to see if it helps with depth detection as is the promise.

Over on the front, we're getting another Ultra-exclusive. Where the S20s have a 10MP snapper, the Ultra uses a 40MP Quad Bayer one. Yes, its pixels are even tinier at 0.7µm each, but group 4 of them together QB-style, and now we're talking. Probably. The 26mm equivalent lens is just wide enough (though we have a beef with how it's utilized, more on that in the coming paragraphs) and decently bright at f/2.2. More importantly, it has autofocus.

Camera interface

The Galaxy S20 Ultra uses Samsung's latest camera app with some tweaks to account for this particular phone's specifics. The basics will be familiar though - 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.

Now, switching zoom levels is where it gets tricky. The tree designation is familiar - three trees for ultra-wide, two trees for main cam (moderately wide), and a single tree for telephoto. The problem is, hitting the one-tree button takes you to the 5x zoom level, and as we pointed out, the native zoom level of the lens is at 4x. Once you hit the one-tree toggle, an extra set of buttons shows up, with additional preset zoom levels at 2x, 4x, 10x, 30x, and 100x. That's where your native 4x hides, but you tap that, and the tree designation snaps into the two-tree position as if you're shooting with the main cam, which you aren't. WHAT?!

Camera UI: 1x • 5x • 4x • 108MP • Live focus • Single take

Samsung's bizarre handling of zoom levels continues into selfies, though this one we're familiar with. We're familiar with it because we've been bashing them about it since day one - why, oh why, does the selfie camera default to a cropped-in view instead of starting with whatever zoom setting was last used? And why would it go back to the crop if you're switching between Photo and Live focus modes, even though you've specifically zoomed out? It's infuriating, is what it is.

Perhaps to quiet down reviewers prone to ranting about little things like that, a new development on this front has made its way to the S20s - the phone now offers a toggle in settings to enable an automatic switch to wide mode if it detects more faces in the frame. It's something. And we confirmed it works.

Anyway, the viewfinder has the customary set of icons with the settings cog wheel located in the upper left corner of the screen. The usual stuff like video resolution, grid lines, location data, etc., can be found there, as well as the ultra-wide lens correction, tucked in under the 'Save options' category. You can also turn on and off the Scene optimizer on a global scale.

Auto HDR is handled in a new way on the Ultra - it's Auto HDR on or off, but it's missing a forced on setting.

Camera UI: More modes • Pro mode • Settings • Save options • More settings • Selfie tone adjustment

There's a Pro mode too, and those come in two different flavors on various Samsungs. The Ultra gets the full-featured real pro version. You can select ISO (50-3200), push shutter speed around (1/12000s-30s), focus manually (with peaking), and select the white balance (by light temperature, with icons next to the number corresponding to a common light source). Metering mode and AF area options are available too, as well as a set of picture controls for contrast, saturation, and whatnot. As usual, there's no live histogram.

A new feature this year is Single take, which gets its own mode. 'Essentially burst mode turned beast mode' (Samsung's words), it gives you up to 10s to make faces and do interesting stuff, from which AI picks out the best moments and outputs a bunch of short video clips (it adds music to them too) and stills with appropriate filters applied to them. We can appreciate how it could be fun to a non-grumpy-old-men demographic.