Sony Xperia 5: Impressive hardware combined with underwhelming cameras

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Sony remains an active player in the camera sensor market, which makes the cameras that it has included in the Xperia 5 even more disappointing. Sony's latest flagship handset is not all bad by any means, but it is hard to see past its underwhelming camera hardware.

Alex Alderson, 11/17/2019

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The Xperia 5 should be a flagship handset that distinguishes itself from the competition with its 21:9 display. Its affordable price tag should also make it more appealing to a broader set of buyers than the Xperia 1. Hardware like a Qualcomm Snapdragon 855, 6 GB of RAM and 128 GB of UFS storage all underline this, as does its 6-inch and 21:9 OLED display.

However, all modern flagships have decent and versatile cameras, something to which the Xperia 5 can only aspire. Sony has equipped the handset with a trio of 12 MP rear-facing sensors that work well enough, but without impressing us in any sense. Frustratingly, our test photos all have a slight fish-eye effect to them. Worse still, we could find no way to compensate against this in the default camera app, which is not something we would have expected from a premium smartphone.

This shortcoming is all the more frustrating because the Xperia 5 is an otherwise good smartphone. Check our full Sony Xperia 5 review if you are interested to see what else the device has to offer.

Buy Xperia 5 now on Amazon