Ranking: Best camera smartphones tested by Notebookcheck

Vivo's X300 Pro is a flagship camera phone with many premium features. With its extra-bright LTPO AMOLED display and an ultra-fast ultrasonic fingerprint sensor, as well as modern communication features including a walkie-talkie, the Vivo phone has a lot to offer.

In Notebookcheck's testing, the X300 Pro proved to be an uncompromising camera flagship and a great buy for photo enthusiasts.

The flagship phone from Vivo has a Zeiss triple main camera setup with a Sony main sensor. The photos it takes are very good and low-light results are also strong thanks to a dedicated image processing chip.

The ultra-wide-angle and telephoto lenses also deliver high picture quality. With the optional teleconverter, the X300 Pro can be even better with more new possibilities than most rival phones.

The X300 Pro can be purchased directly from Vivo Germany. Alternatively, the smartphone is also available on Amazon.de.

The Xiaomi 17 Ultra is a high-end smartphone in a class of its own in every respect. In addition to super-thin display bezels, strong performance and an extra-bright OLED display, the flagship phone also delivers one of the best speaker systems.

The Xiaomi 17 Ultra offers an excellent overall package with one of the best camera setups on the market.

The heart of the rear Summilux camera array is still a 1-inch sensor, but now with LOFIC technology for better dynamic range. The sensor, marketed under the name Light Hunter 1050L - or Light Fusion internationally - thus offers plenty of detail in high-contrast scenes with highlights and shadows. Even in low light, the Xiaomi 17 Ultra offers a high level of detail and appealing sharpness.

The two other Leica cameras are also among the best in a smartphone. These include a 200 MPix telephoto lens with an optical Leica APO lens design and a high-resolution ultra-wide angle including macro function.

The Xiaomi 17 Ultra has an RRP of around 1,500 euros in Europe and is available directly from the manufacturer or from Amazon.

On paper, the Hasselblad camera setup of the Find X8 Ultra is very similar to what the Pro model has. However, the four 50 MP sensors on the back are significantly larger, with the exception of the ultra-wide-angle one. The primary camera with its huge 1-inch sensor produced very good photos with natural bokeh in our testing. The Oppo phone also performs really well in low light scenarios, with a lot of ambient light and textures that are preserved well.

Its two telephoto cameras with OIS and 3x and 6x lossless zoom also have very large sensors (1/1.56" and 1/1.95"), as far as periscope lens go, producing great photos thanks to native magnification - up to 10x is possible.

With its Find X8 Ultra, Oppo has climbed the camera Olympus for the year 2025. Things don't get much better than this.

This phone's close relative, the X8 Ultra is no slouch, either. It's one of the best smartphones overall (no focus on cameras). Highlights of the flagship phone include its strong battery life and high performance with comparatively little SoC throttling, as well as a very bright OLED display.

At Trading Shenzhen, prices for the Oppo Find X8 Ultra start at around 950 euros depending on the configuration.

The X200 Ultra has a very balanced camera setup with similarly sized image sensors. Optical stabilization and a 4K120 video recording option are available. The Vivo flagship aims to please photographers with its 35 mm lens, a 14 mm ultra-wide-angle lens (1/1.28-inch Sony LYT-818), as well as a 200-MP telephoto camera. Naturally, the X200 Ultra delivers very good photo quality in every discipline, and extremely good HDR.

Vivo's X200 Ultra is one of, if not the best all-rounder for mobile photography lovers.

Apart from the Zeiss-branded camera system, the Vivo X200 Ultra is equipped with high-end hardware - a very bright LTPO display with a high pixel density of 510 PPI, a 3D ultrasonic sensor and the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite.

Provided one is fine with ordering their phone from overseas, prices for the Vivo X200 Ultra start at around 870 euros.

Oppo's Find X9 Pro sets the bar high. The successor to the mighty Find X8 Pro does many things even better. The new LUMO image processing in particular has great potential.

The Find X9 Pro delivers strong photo quality and smart camera software.

Thanks in part to the new 50-MP primary sensor, the camera hardware found on the Find's back (pun intended) is interesting to talk about. The camera setup comes with Hasselblad branding in tow. A large stacked sensor from Sony is designed to cover a particularly wide dynamic range thanks to Hybrid Frame HDR, and the results delivered seem very good in daylight with dynamic range really being nothing short of first-class. For zoom photos, a new 200-MP lens was installed, which allows triple optical magnification and captures many details in daylight.

The cooperation with Hasselblad provides the Find X9 Pro with some familiar features, such as the XPan mode or the Hasselblad Master mode (16-bit RAW capture).

The X9 Pro is available in Europe at an RRP of 1,299 euros. If you want it cheaper, you can also buy the Chinese version starting from around 750 euros here (a language pack is pre-installed).

Motorola equips the Signature with four 50-MP cameras, further bigging it up with the Sony LYTIA monicker. The quartet of rear cameras takes very good pictures in daylight with plenty of detail and excellent dynamic range. Colors are also reproduced in a very realistic fashion.

The Motorola Signature scores with long updates and many plus points, which naturally include the excellent camera setup.

The Signature is a powerful flagship smartphone that impresses with its slim yet very robust body, a very bright AMOLED screen and a 7-year update guarantee.

It has an RRP of just under 1,000 euros in Germany and is available directly from Lenovo Germany or Amazon.de.

The iPhone 17 Pro relies on three 48-MP sensors, which means that zoom shots in particular benefit quite a bit compared to what the previous-gen model offered. The telephoto lens now sports 4x optical zoom and optical image stabilization with 3D sensor shift.

The primary sensor produced good and balanced photos in our testing, too, with plenty of detail. Little has changed for the ultra-wide-angle lens as compared to the iPhone 16 Pro, though.

Photo fans will get their money's worth with the iPhone 17 Pro.

Cameras aside, the 17 Pro is a strong high-end phone albeit one without any real innovation baked in. It does have an improved OLED display, and its A19 Pro chip ensures outstanding performance for years to come.

The iPhone 17 Pro can be purchased in all color and memory variants directly from Apple USA. Naturally, one can also purchase the model from all major retailers and e-commerce platforms; for Germany, that's Notebooksbilliger, MediaMarkt and Amazon.de, to give you some options.

Xiaomi's 17 Pro Max has all the features that most customers interested in a flagship phone could possibly desire. Its huge battery ensures extremely good runtimes and thanks to a second display on the back, the Xiaomi phone is the perfect companion for selfie fans and vloggers.

Ingeniously enough, thanks to the second OLED display, the rear cameras of the Xiaomi 17 Pro Max can also be used for selfies.

Its rear camera system was developed in cooperation with Leica, with the Light Hunter 950L sensor serving as the primary camera. The photos look very detailed, with excellent dynamic range and a lot of detail even in complex conditions. All cameras on the Xiaomi 17 Pro Max have a resolution of 50 megapixels, including the ultra-wide-angle and telephoto lens, and deliver solid results.

The Xiaomi 17 Pro Max is not officially sold in the EU as of this writing but can be had from Asia-based e-commerce platforms such as TradingShenzhen, the company that provided the review unit, starting from approximately 890 euros.

The S25 Ultra comes with four lenses, with the main sensor sporting a resolution of 200 MP. The photos produced are downscaled to 12 MP by default, with 24 MP and 50 MP as well as full original resolution also available as options. Photo quality left us impressed, both in daylight and in low-light environments. In particular, the Galaxy's ultra-wide-angle lens is impressive; this is now built around Samsung's 50-MP GN3 sensor.

The dedicated telephoto lenses deliver good-quality 3x and 5x optical magnification with extremely good stabilization.

Thanks to its high-resolution 200-MP main sensor accompanied by powerful secondary lenses, the Galaxy S25 Ultra is one of the best camera phones on the market.

The extremely powerful Snapdragon 8 Elite for Galaxy used here, along with comprehensive AI features, an update promise of seven years and anti-reflective display coating, let the Samsung flagship offer an almost unrivaled experience.

The Galaxy is available for an RRP of 1,449 euros in Germany. MediaMarkt and Amazon Germany are but two options for those interested in acquiring one.

The Magic8 Pro is an almost true flagship phone that impresses with its elegant finish, IP69K certification and bright LTPO OLED display. Thanks to an Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5, the Magic8 Pro also delivers excellent performance and extensive security features with an ultrasonic fingerprint sensor and 3D face recognition.

The Honor Magic8 Pro bills itself as a do-it-all model, with multiple years of updates included.

Cameras of the Honor Magic8 Pro impress with detailed photos and good stabilization. The powerful periscope zoom in particular has nothing to be ashamed of, as far as elite camera smartphones go.

In Germany, the Magic can be ordered directly from Honor.