Let's start with a few specs:
| Lumia 950 XL (2015) | iPhone 12 Pro Max (2020) running iOS 14.6 |
Pixel 4a 5G/Pixel 5 (2020) running Android 12 |
|
Dedicated two-stage shutter button/launch key 20 MP (oversampled to 8MP here), f/1.9, 1/2.4", PDAF, OIS |
12 MP, f/1.6, 1/1.9" (estimated), |
12.2 MP, f/1.7, 1/2.55", dual pixel PDAF, OIS |
Notes:
- I've shot at 8MP on the Lumia 950 XL (leaving headroom for some lossless 'PureView' zoom into the sensor and also getting the advantages of oversampling and noise reduction).
- All photos were taken on full auto and handheld, as a regular user would do. No tripods or RAW editing sessions needed!
- The iPhone was deliberately NOT in 'ProRAW' mode - yes, this produces purer and better photos, but at the expense of a little hassle when getting the photos off the phone as-is, plus I always get accused of not comparing 'like with like'. So this is with the iPhone 12 Pro Max in full 'auto' mode. Yes, with sharpening and edge enhancement. But it's what most owners use...
- The iPhone original files are in HEIC format. Most platforms will read these. Windows users can add support from the Microsoft Store for free.
Test 1: Landscape in full sun
Yes, yes, perfect conditions, but it's a data point that has to be included. A picturesque house on the river. Here's the full scene, for context:
You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL, Pixel 4a 5G, and iPhone 12 Pro Max for your own analysis. And here are 1:1 crops, in order to look at actual image quality. From top to bottom, from the Lumia 950 XL, Pixel 4a 5G, and iPhone 12 Pro Max:
In fairness, we've seen most of this before - the Lumia producing natural detail but with a yellow cast; the Pixel producing murky landscapes (I still blame Google using cheaper optics); the iPhone getting close to the Lumia but with slightly too much edge enhancement. The latter is the interesting one here though, since Apple has dialled it back (here on the default 'auto' setting) in updates since the 12 Pro Max was launched.
Lumia 950 XL: 9 pts; Pixel 4a 5G: 7 pts, iPhone 12 Pro Max: 9 pts
Test 2: The same scene, zoomed
With part digital, part PureView zoom on the Lumia, pure digital on the Pixel, and pure optical on the iPhone. You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL, Pixel 4a 5G, and iPhone 12 Pro Max for your own analysis. And here are 1:1 crops, in order to look at actual image quality. From top to bottom, from the Lumia 950 XL, Pixel 4a 5G, and iPhone 12 Pro Max:
The Pixel is the disappointment here. It does seem as though Android 12 hasn't helped the Camera image processing algorithms at all, including the 'Super res' zoom system. This looks fine on the screen, but you can see the imprecision here at 1:1. The Lumia's part digital zoom is as blockily awful as ever, while the iPhone's genuine 2.5x optical gets closer and with more genuine detail. Zoomed here, you can still see edge enhancement, mind you, so Apple still has some work to do (and in real world photos I'd still typically toggle on ProRAW for this sort of shot, to get purer output).
Lumia 950 XL: 7 pts; Pixel 4a 5G: 6 pts, iPhone 12 Pro Max: 9 pts
Test 3: Ultra-wide house
Nice and sunny again, this time with a river-side house that I couldn't shoot further away since I'd be stepping back into the water(!) The perfect use case for an ultra-wide camera, present on the Pixel and iPhone of course.
There's no point in 1:1 pixel analysis here, since we're only talking about a lower-grade, smaller-sensored, fixed focus ultra-wide, so my methodology here is to take the final photo, reduce it to 'web' size here and then crop out the central section to give you an idea of the angle and detail from each phone camera.
You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL, Pixel 4a 5G, and iPhone 12 Pro Max for your own analysis. And here are 1:1 crops, in order to look at actual image quality. From top to bottom, from the Lumia 950 XL, Pixel 4a 5G, and iPhone 12 Pro Max:
In terms of the comparisons here, the Pixel achieves a rare win - its frame correction is better than the iPhone's, and its ultra-wide camera is perfectly fine, admittedly here under perfect lighting conditions. The Lumia's main camera is fairly wide, but can't compete here, obviously. This is 2021 and every smartphone needs an ultra-wide, it seems. (And a telephoto, I'd argue, with the rumoured Pixel 6 series coming with a triple camera setup, happily.)
Lumia 950 XL: 7 pts; Pixel 4a 5G: 10 pts, iPhone 12 Pro Max: 9 pts
Test 4: Moving subjects
Dramatic lighting (shooting partly into the sun) and very fast moving water over a weir. Here's the full scene, for context:
You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL, Pixel 4a 5G, and iPhone 12 Pro Max for your own analysis. And here are 1:1 crops, in order to look at actual image quality. From top to bottom, from the Lumia 950 XL, Pixel 4a 5G, and iPhone 12 Pro Max:
Impressive freezing of action from the Lumia 950 XL, but spoilt very slightly by too much yellow in the water (grab the whole photo to see the full effects), while the iPhone matches this detail but captures the colours accurately across the scene. The Pixel again struggles - why is it sometimes so bad? A software bug? Poor optics? A faulty unit? Who knows? I can only test what I'm sent!
Lumia 950 XL: 9 pts; Pixel 4a 5G: 7 pts, iPhone 12 Pro Max: 10 pts
Test 5: Close up flower
In bright conditions, up close on a dramatic flower (no idea what it is!). Here's the full scene, for context:
You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL, Pixel 4a 5G, and iPhone 12 Pro Max for your own analysis. And here are 1:1 crops, in order to look at actual image quality. From top to bottom, from the Lumia 950 XL, Pixel 4a 5G, and iPhone 12 Pro Max:
Allowing for slight - and understandable - differences in focus, each of these shots is excellent and full marks all round. Interestingly, the Pixel even does well when looking at 1:1 detail, perhaps indicating that the poor landscape detail might be an issue in focussing at infinity? Curious. Anyway, I can't really split these.
Lumia 950 XL: 10 pts; Pixel 4a 5G: 10 pts, iPhone 12 Pro Max: 10 pts
Test 6: Zoom test no. 2
As I'm trying all subjects and angles, I think I should allow one more zoom test, but I'll skip the overall unzoomed landscape this time. Here's the full unzoomed scene, for context:
You can grab the original zoomed photos from the Lumia 950 XL, Pixel 4a 5G, and iPhone 12 Pro Max for your own analysis. And here are 1:1 crops, in order to look at actual image quality. From top to bottom, from the Lumia 950 XL, Pixel 4a 5G, and iPhone 12 Pro Max:
I do like zoom testing based on cellphone aerials because they usually are, by definition, hard to get close to, so you'd always have to zoom to some degree. Here, there's little contest, obviously, between the blocky Lumia zoom, the indistinct Pixel multi-frame digital zoom, and the clear and precise telephoto shot from the iPhone.
Lumia 950 XL: 6 pts; Pixel 4a 5G: 5 pts, iPhone 12 Pro Max: 9 pts
Test 7: Challenging still life
I wanted to pick something at medium distance indoors - typical of a casual shot without care and attention to lighting. And a subject with details, so one of my guitars against an illuminated (but not heated!) fire. Here's the full scene, for context - as usual with lower light levels, the phones make the scene look quite a bit lighter than it was to my eyes(!):
You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL, Pixel 4a 5G, and iPhone 12 Pro Max for your own analysis. And here are 1:1 crops, in order to look at actual image quality. From top to bottom, from the Lumia 950 XL, Pixel 4a 5G, and iPhone 12 Pro Max:
Sorry to sound a grump, but I'm not happy with any of the three photos. Oh, and don't worry about the different reflections in the glossy guitar face - it was just about impossible to get these to match for all three. The Lumia wins on purity but loses out on focus precision and resolution - so it gets the matt black face of the pickup right but can't deliver detail in the screw heads, manufacturer logo, or pickup left edge. The Pixel gives more detail but there's a lot of 'splodgy' artefacting (how about that - I made up two words out of two?). While the iPhone 12 Pro Max (again, here in populist default mode) gives the most immediately crisp image but it's trying too hard and most fine lines have jagged edges where edge enhancement has been applied. So no winner for this shot.
Lumia 950 XL: 8 pts; Pixel 4a 5G: 8 pts, iPhone 12 Pro Max: 8 pts
Test 8: Low light flowers
Very dim light, just after sunset (darker than it looks here, with a weak porch light off to the right), and a medium distance (60cm) hanging basket of flowers. Here's the full scene, for context:
You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL, Pixel 4a 5G, and iPhone 12 Pro Max for your own analysis. And here are 1:1 crops, in order to look at actual image quality. From top to bottom, from the Lumia 950 XL, Pixel 4a 5G, and iPhone 12 Pro Max:
In very low light, it's all about two things: controlling noise, and accurate focus. This is a Lumia weakness, with simple PDAF often getting focus wrong in low light. The Pixel and iPhone have Dual Pixel autofocus, meaning that they use the whole sensor to analyse 'phase' and establish focus, whereas the Lumia is only using a small number of special pixels in the sensor. You can see the differences in clarity above. The iPhone's shot is amazingly detailed - perhaps artificially so, as you can see a little noise and texture that isn't particularly there in real life. But I think the hierarchy is clear here, in terms of points.
Lumia 950 XL: 7 pts; Pixel 4a 5G: 8 pts, iPhone 12 Pro Max: 9 pts
Test 9: Dusk landscape
After sunset then, let's try a suburban low light landscape. Here's the full scene, for context:
You can grab the original photos from the Lumia 950 XL, Pixel 4a 5G, and iPhone 12 Pro Max for your own analysis. And here are 1:1 crops, in order to look at actual image quality. From top to bottom, from the Lumia 950 XL, Pixel 4a 5G, and iPhone 12 Pro Max:
Showing that the iPhone's default processing can still over-do it, I find plenty of its edges here artificially sharp and unnatural. The Pixel's definition is slightly more real, but neither can hold a candle to the single-frame quality shot from the Luia 950 XL, see its grass and wooden panels, for example - just amazing. When the Lumia gets focussing right, anyway! (I do have to add in the caveat that if this was me taking this shot on the iPhone 12 Pro Max for real then I'd again toggle on ProRAW mode and get even better naturalism than the Lumia and zero processing artefacts. But this feature is with the iPhone in default mode, so...)
Lumia 950 XL: 10 pts; Pixel 4a 5G: 8 pts, iPhone 12 Pro Max: 8 pts
Verdict
Adding up the points gives us an idea of the overall ranking:
- Apple iPhone 12 Pro Max (in default mode, on iOS 14.6.x): 81 pts
- Lumia 950 XL: 73 pts
- Google Pixel 4a 5G (with Android 12 beta 2): 69 pts
More data points for my overarching 'SteveMark' table, as I say. Despite winning here, I still say that the iPhone 12 Pro Max needs 'ProRAW' toggled on as needed for best results, plus I still say that the Pixel has disappointing optics.