iPhone X vs iPhone 6s: camera comparison

Yesterday I bought an iPhone X after two years with an iPhone 6s, and today I decided to run some tests to compare both phones’ cameras.

Going by the first batch of eleven test shots, the iPhone X’s camera is fantastic! Sharper focus, less blur, less noise in shadow areas, and way better colours. This produces significantly more detail, and images that just pop, even though both phones sport 12 megapixels. My guess is that these improvements come down to the iPhone X’s brighter lens, optical image stabilisation, and to improvements in the image capture and processing technologies. The size, sensitivity, and light-capturing ability of the iPhone X’s new imaging sensor are also improved, from what I gather, so that also probably contributes. In any case, don’t take my word for it — see for yourself below. Don’t forget you can click on each image to see it in full resolution.

For these comparisons I’ve used the built-in Camera app, set it to HDR mode with colour balance set to automatic, each pair of photos is taken at the same time while holding both cameras side-by-side in my hands, and I’ve tried to point both cameras in roughly the same direction to frame the same scene. Once all photos were taken, I then transferred the 6s’s photos to the X using Airdrop, zoomed-in as far as I can go roughly onto the same area in each photo, and then I took a screen capture.

So that’s what’s shown below. Eleven pairs of zoomed-in piks to show how detail is captured by each camera. The first pik in each pair is the X, and the second is the 6s. Tomorrow or the next day I’ll snap some more test photos and add a few more images to the comparison.

Pair 1

Pair 2

Pair 3

Pair 4

Pair 5

Pair 6

Pair 7

Pair 8

Pair 9

Pair 10

Pair 11