The Mi 11 Ultra comes out ahead of the Galaxy S21 Ultra in early camera tests, but the Huawei Mate 40 Pro Plus is a worthy opponent

The Mi 11 Ultra jumped to the top of DxOMark's leaderboard on launch day, as we reported. DxOMark awarded Xiaomi's latest flagship an impressive 143 points, 4 more than the Huawei Mate 40 Pro Plus and 22 more than the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra. Oddly, DxOMark considers the Galaxy S20 Ultra to have better cameras than its successor, despite the autofocus issues that we encountered when reviewing the device.

Xiaomi has equipped the Mi 11 Ultra with Samsung's ISOCELL GN2, a 50 MP camera that has a 1/1.12-inch sensor, making it the largest of any currently found in a smartphone. The Mate 40 Pro Plus has a 50 MP primary camera, albeit one with a smaller 1/1.28-inch sensor. By contrast, the Galaxy S21 Ultra has a 1/1.33-inch main camera that outputs natively at 108 MP.

The Galaxy S21 Ultra is no slouch in the camera department, but the Mi 11 Ultra and Mate 40 Pro Plus outshine it in practically every scenario. Unsurprisingly, the Mi 11 Ultra excels in all lighting conditions, even if it could have a better dynamic range in low light situations. We have included some examples below, but DxOMark has higher resolution images in its article.

Interestingly, the Mate 40 Pro Plus often reproduces colours more naturally than the Mi 11 Ultra can. Additionally, the Mate 40 Pro Plus regularly outperforms the Mi 11 Ultra in low light conditions. Hence, the Mi 11 Ultra is not always the best camera smartphone, despite its absolute lead over the Mate 40 Pro Plus. Huawei is expected to release the P50 series within the next few months, so it will probably not be too long before Huawei regains its advantage over Xiaomi.

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