BLIND TEST - Galaxy S21 Ultra vs iPhone 12 Pro Max

We are gonna have a showdown of the two most popular flagship devices on planet Earth

This is the brand new S21 Ultra from Samsung. It has Ultra in the name, so you know it's gotta be good

I have three extra ones, that's because I'm gonna be having a live giveaway very soon

Make sure to subscribe so you don't miss it. Also, I should mention, we have later cases for both of these devices

Both flagships fully covered. I sent both Moe and Kirk out with one of these rigs

One of these things right here. And they placed one of each flagship in this unit and went into the wilderness for some reason in order to test each of these two flagship level cameras without me knowing which is which

That's why I have a video right here of an A, B of both of these devices

And I'm going to have to try to tell the difference not knowing which is which. I'm going to examine each frame attempting to distinguish the attributes that I like on each of the two cameras

Samsung went for the massive sensor, 108 megapixels. They also have the periscope style zoom

So yes, there's some features on this side that are not exactly here. However, the iPhone approach is to have a lower megapixel count

and to do more work, I suppose, after the fact with the neural processing and all the rest of it

We have tons of RAM up to 16 gigabytes inside of the Ultra

The high-end model, 512 gigs of storage. So that's comparable across the two

We have a slightly bigger display on the Samsung side, 6.8 inches versus 6.7, and it's a slightly better screen-to-body ratio as well

IP rating is the same across both, but the Samsung device does have a much larger battery, at least on paper

On the iPhone side, you have arguably the best processor in a smartphone at the moment, in Apple's latest A14

And then over on the Samsung side, we have the latest Snapdragon, that's the AAA

So, without further ado, let's get into the video. You're going to watch it along with me, and we're going to discover the differences between the S21 Ultra and the iPhone 12 Pro Max

Or we're at least going to try to see if we can tell the difference. First up, we have the ultra-wide shot

And immediately we see a significant difference. We have way more black on the image on the left

definitely more contrast and a shift towards blue a cooler tone definitely warmer on the right i

already have my inclination as the witch is which i think the important thing about this test since

you're playing along is to know that each phone is going to stay on the same side the whole time

so whichever way your brain is trending then keep that in mind as you attempt to be a detective here

exposure I mean definitely the right hand side is trying to keep the shadows up to maintain some

level of detail both images are nice I think either is acceptable even in the foreground here

on the log on the snow I feel like I'm getting a little more detail on the image on the left

I'm gonna keep going here okay all right next up we have the wide image here it's a similar type of

frame. Now the right image has added a little bit of blue in the snow so it has interpreted this

frame a little differently. I mean if you look at the jacket that Kirk is wearing there it's

certainly darker and more black and more contrasty on the left hand side. Here we go with telephoto

So this photo is around 3x zoom. It's the first tap on the zoom. This white on the left looks more

accurate to me and there's more detail in the jacket huh that's quite interesting let's let's

proceed now we're into the video 4k 30 fps now here we're going to be looking at a couple things

obviously exposure somebody fell that's the second wipeout you took today But that kind of a good test I guess It looks quite a bit different The right one remains a little smoother through your fall

The green is more saturated on the image on the left. It's more muted in the image on the right. However

I've seen this jacket in real life and I feel like the right one is probably a

little more accurate than the left, but it's subtle. It's a subtle difference

both are really nice 4k video and even without the extra stabilization turned on okay now the

right one is far more stable than the left and this is with just default settings on the video

mode i see flickering in the snow a little bit there's an exposure thing happening

where the exposure is shifting a little bit it's struggling a little bit

4k 60 fps oh wow so what's interesting here is the footprints in the snow on the left hand side

it's tremendously more detail where it's a little bit blown out on the right or at least tougher to

pick up all the details in the snow the left one just looks a lot higher resolution i mean i know

that they're both 4K, but it just seems, I don't know if there's some sharpening added

there or if it's an exposure choice that's happening automatically in the camera, but certainly the left one

is resolving a lot more detail. But I'm still getting a little weird flickery thing

as the pan takes place. And the right image still has a greater smoothness

to it. Now this is where I'm starting to figure out which is which because I'm seeing what it's doing with Kirk's complexion

Like, these are quite a bit different, these approaches. He has a lot more color in the image on the left

and he's a lot more pale in the image on the right. Wow

That's a much different approach here. Now I'm a bit screwed up

Now I am a bit screwed up. I'm the only one in here, by the way, that doesn't know which is which, but interesting

Here we get a sense for the depth of field as the focus shifts to the bar

And this is good for an autofocus test as well. Ooh, close focusing test

Interesting. The camera on the right for sure can focus closer. They both can focus pretty close, but the camera on the right can focus closer

Huh. Wow. Ooh, we're gonna check out some portrait mode now

The skin tone, the skin colors. There's a little more yellow on the left

and a little more pink on the right. And the focus fall off around the head

And this is not particularly easy because of all the branches and stuff

And I actually noticed a little segment around the ear on the photo on the right

where maybe it didn't grab it and a little section near the jacket as well

where it kind of screwed up the portrait mode ever so slightly

Yeah, I think the left one probably nailed it a little bit better. It's both are nice images in different ways

Here we have Moe's version. Whoa, those are, wow. The question is, which is the better image

It depends what you're looking for. If you really like crushed blacks, if you like that really dark black color, the camera on the left almost never gives it to you

The camera on the right brings you there immediately. It's tough. A lot of this is personal taste

The left does have more detail. It does have more detail in the skin

Low light. Wow I mean the image on the left for sure Look at the noise and stuff on the image on the right I mean this is so noisy the image on the right the image on the left wins slow motion

so it's 240 fps 1080

there's interesting things that are happening to the exposure here in the indoor environment

especially around color temperature oh this is an interesting clip the clip on the left

is really struggling with exposure it has blown out his thumb and the wall is nowhere near black

it's very gray so it's a there's some guesswork going on there the right hand side is a lot more

true to life here. Wow, this is a tough challenge right here

Close focus. Oh, so the one on the right has like basically macro

That's on the main camera. The dollar bill is touching the phone

Wow. Super close focus. Tremendous detail. I guess the photo on the left is the same range

but it's picking up the grass in the background because it can't focus quite so close

autofocus. Now this was kind of, there was an autofocus issue sort of plaguing

the previous generation Ultra. Looks like it's not there anymore. I think the autofocus is acceptable

on both of these at this point. Obviously the left one, the approach is a slower transition

between focus points, which some may prefer. It's a more action-like type of footage on the right-hand side

It snaps into focus faster. It's hard

I mean, in certain circumstances, I preferred what was happening on the left. In certain circumstances, I preferred what was happening on the right

Oh, this is harder than I expected it to be, to be honest. It went back and forth

I'm gonna go ahead and guess that the left is the Samsung and the right is the iPhone

The left is the iPhone and the right is the Samsung? Are you sure

Wait a second. The iPhone is on the left. The Samsung is on the right. wow interesting wow this is really interesting i feel one thing that kind of surprised me is how

close these have become and the fact that it wasn't as easy as i thought it would be to tell

the difference between the two at least immediately the portrait mode maybe should have been the

giveaway for me that i went once i saw the complexions and i saw that sort of yellowish

more yellowish hue in the skin tones i probably should have said okay that's got to be the iphone

but the thing that threw me off was the struggling the exposure struggling on the snow i was like

that's got to be the new phone with the new software and because i had autofocus issues

with the last generation of the ultra i was like maybe that maybe there's some sort of

software problem or update necessary because that looked really bad to me but yeah it's a little bit

of this and a little bit of that i guess maybe that's to be expected when you're talking about

two liters in the segment at this you know at this type of price point but

i guess i kind of expected the iphone to do a little better maybe if i had to post this picture

immediately, I would pick the one on the left. The wide here I think I still take the iPhone photo That one is tough Only reason I gonna give it to the iPhone again is because of the snow being what I perceive to be the color of the snow and the Samsung going blue

Our first video, that was weird, man, because here he falls and Samsung device

is super stable. Now, maybe it's just the way you fell. And then you look at this frame here

with him laughing and the face is just so much more detailed on the right hand side i'm gonna

take in this video clip i'm gonna take the samsung this one really surprises me in this case the

iphone looks a little less natural in the coat color which i've seen in real life so i'm gonna

take the samsung one here as well this 4k 30 now the running one is really what screwed me up

the iphone is just going nuts trying to figure out exposure and so much so that it would be

distracting to have that in your clip and also in the default stabilization mode the there there are

more stabilization modes on the samsung the right is just a more pleasing smoother movement 4k 60 fps

we have blue snow from the samsung device again but i can't accept the flickering i'm taking the

samsung again yeah i'm taking the samsung again it feels like photo mode is going to the iphone

in video mode is going to the Samsung because now I'm into portrait mode and I remember that the

iPhone was the superior one there as well. So I give portrait to the iPhone. Night mode iPhone wins

Slow motion. The hand is blown out. It's just not good looking. Yeah, I mean the Samsung slow-mo here

looks way better. Close focus. We already covered this. It's not even close. It goes to the ultra

model and then autofocus where i expected the iphone to kill the samsung is tight now i think

most people can appreciate just fast find the focus fast so i give that to samsung as well in

that exact circumstance and then samsung gets the bonus because it has the extra cameras

a 10x i mean that's ridiculous that is a really usable 10x that's optical 10x

100x is obviously the software coming into play here. You have it if you wanna, I don't know

be a weirdo but, and then it can shoot in 8K. Whoa

It can shoot in 8K 24 frames and that is cinematic. The snow is still blue but yeah, Samsung wins

I think the iPhone won the photo compartment. just as an overall package for what I do

and how I use my camera, I'm gonna go with the S21 Ultra

They are both fantastic though. Like they'd just be shooting this caliber of content

off of a smartphone. But yeah, I mean, tough choice. You saw, I even had the two devices wrong

It is a tough match. It's a tough battle. It's a split decision

So there you have it. Camera showdown complete S21 Ultra versus iPhone 12 Pro Max

I thought this was kind of a fun way to do it. Really test yourself what you see and what you're looking for

And even to just figure out what you like in an image or inside of video

So hopefully you had fun taking part and guessing yourself. Remember, I do have an S21 Ultra giveaway coming up very soon

So make sure to subscribe for that. We're going to do it live like I did for that iPhone giveaway previously

I have one silver S21 Ultra and two phantom black S21 Ultras

And I also need to remind you of the LaterCase launch for the new devices

as well as some of your favorites, like the new blue for the variety of iPhone 12s

So go check out LaterCase. Link will be down in the description and pick up what is, I mean

I think one of the best accessories you can throw on your smartphone

so go click the link in the description and check that out too. Stay tuned for the giveaway