Samsung Galaxy S23 long-term review

Camera samples

The S23 has the same cameras on the rear as its predecessor, the Galaxy S22, which may not be a great sign - sure, these were perfectly adequate sensors for the last generation, but Samsung's competitors keep innovating in the camera hardware space and the Korean company feels like it's just coasting here, riding the coattails of its higher brand awareness. We won't judge the S23's cameras simply based on this, however - the samples will tell the full story. Can software improvements make this phone perform better than the recycled hardware would imply? We sure hope so.

Let's take a look, starting with the main 50 MP snapper, which saves 12 MP shots after pixel binning. It was the same situation last time around, even though these should be 12.5 MP. But we assume the 23mm width has something to do with that - maybe some cropping occurs.

Anyway, the shots it produces during daytime come with high contrast, good dynamic range, high levels of resolved detail, and a sharpness level that's high but probably not too high for most people's liking. It's a similar story with colors - they are overly saturated, but you get that 'Samsung look' as a consequence, which most people seem to love. No one will accuse this processing of being natural, but then again - if 9 out of 10 people pick livelier colors and higher contrast and sharpness, does it really matter?

Daytime samples from the main camera

The weird but not unexpected thing about these is that they're practically identical to what the Galaxy S22 produced. So the software didn't do any magic tricks in the end, we got the same main camera with the same processing and thus the same results. Whether or not that's acceptable at the high end in this day and age is up to you.

The ultrawide is excellent for an ultrawide, delivering detailed photos with well looked after noise, good contrast and dynamic range. The only weirdness is the fact that its colors are, a lot of times, different from those of the main camera and the zoom camera, and while that's par for the course in the mid-range, for a flagship it's not great to see.

Daytime samples from the ultrawide

The 3x zoom camera saves 12 MP even though it has a 10 MP sensor - again, just like in the S22. The upscaling is done really well, however, so much so that no untrained eye is going to notice it at all. The shots are all very detailed, with decent contrast, great dynamic range, and punchy colors of course. There is still some visible noise here and there, which you will notice if you go looking for it, but it's not enough that it would be problematic.

Daytime zoom samples

At night there's an Auto Night Mode which triggers when the phone thinks it's dark enough around you that the pictures you take could benefit from it. When this triggers, a small moon icon shows up in the viewfinder, and if you tap it then you'll disable the Auto Night Mode, although we don't know why anyone would want to. Auto Night Mode shots are among the quickest we've ever seen, each capture takes barely a second or two on the main camera, and the improvements compared to turning it off are pretty visible.

We shot the images below with Auto Night Mode on, since that's the default and how 90% of S23 owners will end up using their phone - barely anyone goes into the Camera app's settings to begin with, and even fewer would tinker with something like this. Auto Night Mode didn't always trigger in these shots, however.

The resulting photos from the main camera are very, very good. They have plenty of resolved detail, high contrast, good dynamic range, and very good noise reduction. Colors still pop, but a little bit less than during daytime - this makes them more realistic, but only comparatively. Still, these are images that most people will really like.

Nighttime samples from the main camera

The manual Night Mode takes about a second longer to capture each image than the Auto Night Mode, and the differences are minute. So much so that we'd recommend skipping manual Night Mode entirely if you leave Auto Night Mode on. The only real use it has is for scenes where Auto Night Mode didn't trigger, but you want a Night Mode look to the photo in question. Sure, if you really pixel peep, you'll notice a tiny bit of improvement in highlights in the manual Night Mode, but we're not sure that in itself is worth the extra second of capture time.

Night Mode samples from the main camera

Interestingly, Auto Night Mode and manual Night Mode shot-to-shot times have improved compared to the Galaxy S22, by about one second each. That doesn't sound like much, but it's very useful since the longer the capture time, the more blurriness could in theory be introduced. We had no such issues here, no blurry shots whatsoever.

The ultrawide does a decent job at night, with okay levels of resolved detail, good dynamic range, and low noise levels. This is one of the better ultrawides out there - clearly not the best, but very good. During nighttime shots the color weirdness we mentioned for daytime ones can become much more pronounced - at times it feels like different teams were in charge of the color science, one team handling the main and zoom cameras, and an entirely different one working on the ultrawide. Needless to say, these imaginary teams didn't talk to each other at all.

Nighttime samples from the ultrawide

The manual Night Mode's speed is improved too compared to the S22, by about two seconds, and perhaps unsurprisingly it's the one that takes the most time to shoot and process. Shot-to-shot time varies based on conditions, but it's never under four seconds and can go up to six - this was just our experience, mind you. Again, with manual Night Mode there are minute improvements compared to Auto Night Mode shots. Compared to those where Auto Night Mode didn't trigger, these are way better.

Night Mode samples from the ultrawide

The 3x zoom camera by default comes up with decent levels of detail, saturated colors (of course), good contrast, and decent dynamic range. It's a step below the main camera, and noticeably so, but it's definitely still pretty good generally. That said, noise has a tendency to creep in, and if there isn't a lot of light around you, it will do so to a pretty dramatic extent.

Nighttime zoom samples

If you introduce manual Night Mode into the equation, the delta compared to Auto mode for this camera is the highest, as you'll get the most improvements, especially in lowering noise. So for the zoom camera we'd recommend always going the manual Night Mode route if that's convenient for you in terms of shooting time.

Night Mode zoom samples

On the front there's a new, higher-res selfie snapper. You get 2 extra MP, now 12 instead of 10, in a move that was way overdue. During daytime, the selfies are amazing. They have excellent detail levels, minimal noise, great color rendition and dynamic range, and most importantly - the subject is always well exposed. They are sharp, but not over the top.

Like with many other Samsungs, you get two field-of-view options - a full one and a cropped (closer) one. The quality is the same, the latter is just cropping. At night things obviously go down in quality the less light you have around, but this is still one of the best selfie cameras on the market right now. The lesson here seems to be that Samsung may rarely update camera hardware, but when it does, it's definitely a true upgrade.

Selfie samples, day and night, both FoV options, Portrait Mode off/on

We used the screen flash to capture the nighttime selfie samples, and we recommend you do the same for all conditions save for the brightest of artificial lighting surrounding you. Your face will nicely pop against the background if you do. Nighttime selfie quality, while not the same as during daytime, is still acceptable, and these are undoubtedly usable for social media or sharing with friends.

Overall then, the S23 presents a weird but good camera package. Weird in that the rear snappers are reused from its predecessor, but they still deliver very good quality images and Night Mode processing is now faster across the board. In fact, the S23 has some of the fastest Night Mode-ing that we've ever seen, which is a boon for those who like to shoot in low light conditions.

That said, while the rear cameras here are very good, none of them is actually the best in its field, which for a high-end smartphone like this is, let's say it again, rather weird. We can smell some artificial differentiation going on to make the S23 Ultra stand out more, can't you? Anyway, the selfie camera's upgrade is definitely observable in the quality of the shots it takes.