Cameras are an increasingly important part of smartphones, and as specs start to level out they’re one of the main ways that manufacturers try to make their handsets stand out.
That can mean more lenses, as with the triple-lens Samsung Galaxy S10 Plus, higher megapixel counts like you’ll find on the Huawei Mate 20 Pro, unusual features and gimmicks, or just a focus on making the best single-lens snapper possible, like has been done with the Google Pixel 3.
All of these and more can be found on our list below, highlighting the very best smartphone cameras available in 2019. And note also that while this guide focuses on their camera credentials, all of these handsets are great phones in other ways too.
Despite landing in early 2018, the Huawei P20 Pro still has one of the best cameras you’ll find on a smartphone. That’s how far ahead of the pack it was.
It has a triple-lens rear camera consisting of a 40MP f/1.8 wide-angle lens, a 20MP f/1.6 black and white wide-angle lens and an 8MP f/2.4 telephoto lens. That last lens allows for 3x optical zoom and 5x hybrid zoom, so you can get closer to distant subjects.
All three lenses also have AI image stabilisation, to keep your shots steady, and the AI skills extend beyond that too, optimising settings based on the scene so you can get the perfect shot.
The Huawei P20 Pro also excels at low light shooting and really at most other scenarios. There’s even a strong 24MP front-facing camera which is also reasonably adept at low light shots.
The Pixel 3 looks like a less exciting camera phone at first glance than the others on this list, as it has just a single 12.2MP f/1.8 lens.
But it, along with the Pixel 3 XL (which has the same camera setup) really goes for quality over quantity.
The lens has optical image stabilisation (OIS) to avoid blurry shots, but the real star is the Pixel Visual Core and machine learning skills, which help the phone process shots more effectively than most of the competition, resulting in more natural, life-like images.
It's arguably less versatile and certainly less fancy than rival camera setups, but if you just want to point, shoot and get the best-looking photos possible, then the Pixel 3 or Pixel 3 XL would be a fine choice.
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Apple’s phones always have good cameras and unsurprisingly the iPhone XS and iPhone XS Max have the company’s best snappers yet.
Both phones have a dual-lens rear camera with a 12MP f/1.8 wide-angle lens and a 12MP f/2.4 telephoto one. Both lenses have OIS and there are clever tools like an adjustable depth of field and Smart HDR – the latter of which can improve shadow details and bring out highlights.
Low light shots are also strong, and the camera is lightning fast as it’s powered by a neural engine that can perform five trillion operations per second.
There’s also a 7MP f/2.2 camera on the front and while that might not sound special, it includes depth-sensing tech, making it great at shooting selfies and creating animated avatars that respond to your movements, called Animoji.
The Huawei Mate 20 Pro has almost the same camera setup as the Huawei P20 Pro, meaning a 40MP f/1.8 main lens and an 8MP f/2.4 telephoto lens. But in place of the P20 Pro’s black and white lens, the third lens on the Mate 20 Pro is a 20MP f/2.2 ultra-wide-angle one.
So the combined megapixel count is very high, it also has AI image stabilisation and excels at night shots. Plus there’s 3x optical zoom and a highly capable 24MP front-facing camera.
So why is the Mate 20 Pro ranked higher than the Huawei P20 Pro? The switch to an ultra-wide lens makes it slightly more versatile, the new chipset improves the camera’s AI skills, and the Mate 20 Pro is a better phone in most other ways.
When it comes to photography, the Huawei Mate 20 Pro benefits from a larger, sharper 6.39-inch 1440 x 3120 screen, which helps both when framing a photo and when looking at photos you’ve previously shot.
The Mate 20 Pro also has more power, an in-screen fingerprint scanner, a bigger battery and other improvements.
The Samsung Galaxy S10 Plus is the only phone on this list to actually launch in 2019 so it’s no real surprise that it has last year’s phones beat.
It has a triple-lens rear camera, consisting of a 12MP f/2.4 telephoto lens, a 16MP f/2.2 ultra-wide lens, and a 12MP lens that can cleverly switch between apertures of f/1.5 and f/2.4. That combination ensures that – while the megapixel count isn’t as high here – the Samsung Galaxy S10 Plus has an arguably even more versatile camera than the Huawei Mate 20 Pro.
It has AI smarts, works reasonably well in low light, and in good light photos are usually vibrant and striking. The camera also supports 2x optical zoom.
But it’s not just the rear cameras that impress, as the Samsung Galaxy S10 Plus also has two front cameras, making for five lenses overall. You get both a 10MP f/1.9 lens and an 8MP f/2.2 one on the front, with the dual lenses helping with depth sensing for improved portrait shots.
The above phones are easily among the very best camera phones you can get at the time of writing. In our view the Samsung Galaxy S10 Plus is the very best, but it has got some steep competition and it’s not the winner in every category.
The Huawei Mate 20 Pro and P20 Pro are both better in low light for example, while the Pixel 3 and iPhone XS excel if you just want to point and shoot. So consider what you want to use the camera for before picking one. But for its sheer versatility the S10 Plus is arguably the best all-rounder.
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