Technologies

iPhone 17 Pro vs. Galaxy S25 Ultra Cameras Compared: Which Is the Photography King?

Both phones are amazing, but which one takes better photos? As a professional photographer, I wanted to find out.

Today’s top phones come with high performance specs across the board, and that includes the camera systems. With a great camera phone in your hand, you can take superb images that can help you on your way to Instagram stardom. Or whatever. The iPhone 17 Pro and Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra are no exceptions. Both phones impressed us in their respective reviews, and both pack camera setups that offer stiff competition to the likes of Google and Oppo. But how do they compare with each other?

To find out, I took them out on multiple image-capturing missions around Edinburgh, testing them in a variety of conditions and then scrutinizing the results.

With phones at this level, there often won’t be a “winner” in each test. Many results will come down to personal preference, as you’ll see here.

Read more: Best Camera Phone of 2025

As a professional photographer, I prefer a more true-to-life image, with natural tones and rich contrast, that provides a good baseline for me to apply my own edits should I want to.

I also dislike over-processing, which can make an image look too digital and artificial. Some of you may disagree, preferring instead more vibrant images with strong saturation and clarity that can be shared directly to social without any extra effort on your part. Either stance is fine, but it’s why tests like these need to be taken with a pinch of salt.

With that said, let’s dive in and take a look at the images. All shots were taken in each phone’s standard camera app in JPEG (or HEIF for some of the iPhone’s images) and have been imported and resized in Adobe Lightroom, but with no additional edits or sharpening applied.

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iPhone 17 Pro vs. Galaxy S25 Ultra: Main camera tests

Like any average day of mine, this test begins with plenty of bread and melted cheese. Both shots look great, with great detail and even exposure. The colors on the S25 Ultra are marginally richer, which I don’t mind here as it helps the food really pop.

Outside in the Autumn light, I love the colors captured by both phones. The iPhone’s image has richer contrast, with deeper black levels that I think look better, but otherwise, there’s very little to choose between them.

It’s the same when I got close to this leaf. I think the iPhone’s bokeh (the out-of-focus background) looks a little nicer, but I slightly prefer the deeper tones on the S25 Ultra. (These are true optical bokeh, not portrait-mode style processing.) Toss a coin and choose your favorite.

There’s a much bigger difference here, though. While the exposure is comparable, the S25 Ultra’s colors are significantly more saturated than those of the iPhone — notice the blue boat hull and the reddish building at the right. Is that good? Well, that again comes down to opinion. To my eye, Samsung’s shot looks overly saturated to the point of looking quite fake. I much prefer the more muted, almost filmic tones of the iPhone.

And it’s almost exactly the same story when I switched to the ultrawide cameras of both phones. The S25 Ultra delivered a highly saturated image while the iPhone’s is much more subtle.

The Galaxy S25 Ultra has done a better job here, though, color-wise, with warmer, more autumnal tones that suit the scene well. The iPhone’s shot looks a little cold by comparison.

But just to confuse the result, while the iPhone’s colors might not look as nice, when I looked close up at the details around the edge, I noticed that its shot has noticeably better clarity, while the S25 Ultra’s image has lost a lot of detail. Will you ever notice that difference? Almost certainly not, especially if you’re only posting to Instagram or sending messages over WhatsApp. However, when both phones are over $1,000, you’d better believe I’m going to nitpick harder than you ever thought possible.

That said, I actually don’t have a lot to say between these two shots inside a museum in Edinburgh. Both are well-exposed, and while the iPhone has leaned slightly more toward a magenta white balance, I don’t really see that as either a good or a bad thing. Take your pick.

I definitely prefer the iPhone’s shot when switching to the ultrawide lens, though. The S25 Ultra has evidently tried to pull down the highlights on the reflection on the floor, leaving it looking a little gloomy. The floor pops more in the iPhone’s shot, which adds nicer contrast to the scene overall.

Here’s another example of more vibrant tones from the S25 Ultra, with the iPhone looking more natural. I know which I prefer (the iPhone, if you haven’t been paying attention), but there’s nothing wrong with the S25 Ultra’s shot either.

And in this image, looking up at some golden leaves, I can see almost no discernible difference whatsoever. Lovely stuff.

The iPhone’s shot is definitely much brighter here, and it looks better for it. I’m not sure why the S25 Ultra has underexposed its image, but it’s made the scene look quite drab as a result.

iPhone 17 Pro vs. Galaxy S25 Ultra: Zoom photos

Both phones have dedicated optical zoom lenses, with the iPhone’s going up to 8x (what Apple calls “optical quality,” which is a processed crop of the 48-megapixel sensor) and the S25 Ultra going slightly further to 10X. Both phones offer different preset zoom levels in between.

Starting at 8x on the iPhone and 10x on the Galaxy, this shot of golden leaves looks great on both, with vibrant tones and solid details.

While using the iPhone at 4x zoom and the S25 Ultra at 5x, I again think that both phones have done a great job. The iPhone has leaned slightly harder into warmer autumnal tones, with the greens of the grass and leaves looking more vibrant and emerald in the S25 Ultra’s image.

At 5x zoom, the Galaxy S25 Ultra’s image looks quite dull and underexposed, with a slight magenta shift to its colors. The iPhone’s shot at 4x zoom appears brighter, with more pleasing colors.

And it’s much the same at the full 8x and 10x zoom levels; the iPhone offers better contrast and colors.

I’ve found the Galaxy can struggle with its colors more when zooming than when using the main camera. Take this as an example:

At the standard focal length of the main camera, these images are almost identical, with beautiful warm tones captured by both phones.

But zooming in to 2x has really thrown the Galaxy off. Its white balance instead errs on the colder side, with a more pronounced magenta bias, losing the lovely golden light that’s still present in the iPhone’s image.

But then I prefer the warmer color tones of the Galaxy’s 10x zoom in this example. The tree leaves look noticeably warmer and rich.

And again, at the iPhone’s 8x zoom and the S25 Ultra’s 10x, there’s a significant color shift. The iPhone’s image appears more cyan-toned overall — and I think it has slightly better contrast as well.

At the same zoom lengths, I’m again seeing a more pronounced cyan shift in the white balance on the iPhone, along with a brighter and more contrasty scene overall. For my taste, I prefer the iPhone, but the S25 Ultra is still technically solid.

It’s interesting to see how each phone performs better in different scenarios, almost there’s almost no rhyme or reason I can see as to why. In some zoom images, the iPhone appears warmer and richer, while at other times, the S25 does. It makes it very difficult for me as a tech writer to consider either one a winner, though, as it largely comes down to personal preference.

iPhone 17 Pro vs. Galaxy S25 Ultra: Night mode

Switching to night mode on the main camera, the iPhone’s image is noticeable brighter (particularly in the cobbled street and the sky), although that slight cyan shift is now in the S25 Ultra’s image. The S25’s shot is also marginally sharper, but you’ve really got to zoom in close to see the difference.

And it’s a similar story here. The iPhone’s shot is brighter in the sky and with noticeably less image noise, but the details on the buildings are much clearer on the S25 Ultra’s image.

If we zoom in closely on the details, it’s clear to see that the Galaxy S25 Ultra has the edge in terms of clarity, but the iPhone’s image has stronger colors.

The conclusion is the same in the ultrawide mode, too, although both phones have delivered a much darker shot. Ultrawide night mode still has some way to go, regardless of the phone you choose.

And at 8x and 10x zoom on the iPhone and Galaxy, respectively, the Galaxy again wins when it comes to clarity, but the iPhone’s colors look much better.

iPhone 17 Pro vs. Galaxy S25 Ultra: Selfie test

There was no way I was going to publish this many photos without putting my own big stupid face on the page somewhere. And I have to say the iPhone has done a far superior job in capturing said face. The exposure is brighter with better contrast, the colors are warmer and punchier, and the details are better, too. The S25 Ultra’s image looks really rather drab in comparison.

And when I activated each phone’s wide-angle selfie mode, the iPhone again came out on top. The better exposure, contrast and colors are still the case, but it also offers a much wider view than the S25 Ultra can manage. This could be helpful if you’re trying to squash loads of your friends into the scene or, like me, good if you want to show a lot of extra space around you where friends could be if you’d bothered to make any or talk to anyone outside of the workplace.

iPhone 17 Pro vs. Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra: Which has the better camera?

After many test photos taken, miles walked and millions of pixels peeped at on screen, I can finally conclude that the best camera phone between the iPhone 17 Pro and the Galaxy S25 Ultra is… drumroll please…

You decide.

Is that the best I can do based on my 14 years of experience as a tech journalist and photographer? Honestly, yes. Both phones have performed extremely well in these tests, and neither can be objectively considered significantly better than the other in any major way.

The S25 Ultra, like almost all of Samsung’s phones, tends to lean more toward highly saturated colors, while the iPhone keeps things a bit more natural. At night, the Galaxy is sharper, but the iPhone has better colors. Sometimes the iPhone’s zoom shots looked richer, while other times the S25 Ultra’s zoom images were preferable. Preferable to me, anyway.

As I mentioned at the beginning of this test, I take a more subtle approach with my photos, preferring a natural base image that gives me more scope for applying my own edits in apps like Adobe Lightroom or Google’s Snapseed. The iPhone 17 Pro remains my preferred camera phone for that reason, but many of you will likely love the punchier look offered by the Galaxy phone.

The one area where the iPhone certainly came out on top is with the front camera, so if high-quality gurning selfies are your thing, go with the iPhone.

Really, either phone is an absolute cracker when it comes to photography, and it really shouldn’t come down to camera performance if you’re struggling to decide whether to go Android or iOS.

Technologies

China indicates rare earths will keep flowing to EU, regardless of U.S. trade deal expiration

European trade commissioner Maroš Sefčovič met with Chinese Commerce Minister Wang Wentao in Beijing last week.

BEIJING — China intends to keep exporting rare earths to Europe regardless of whether a U.S. trade deal with Beijing gets extended past January.

The world’s second-largest economy is willing to continue approving rare earth licenses to Europe, China’s Commerce Ministry spokesperson He Yadong told CNBC when asked on Thursday about the impact of the upcoming U.S. deadline.

Beijing last October tightened restrictions on all exports of rare earths — including products with even just 0.1% of China-sourced rare earths. The move followed a new U.S. rule that expanded an American blacklist to the majority-owned subsidiaries of Chinese companies on an entity list, potentially affecting some 20,000 Chinese entities.

However, both the U.S. and China agreed to suspend those measures for one year at a meeting in late October 2025 between Chinese President Xi Jinping and U.S. President Donald Trump. Ahead of the leaders’ latest summit last month, U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the truce was extended by two months to January.

Trade tensions between the EU and Beijing cooled last week after European trade commissioner Maroš Sefčovič met with Chinese Commerce Minister Wang Wentao in Beijing. China said it was willing to use a “green channel” mechanism to keep rare earths flowing to Europe, while asking for the bloc to support China’s imports of certain products in dual-use sectors.

European Commission leaders are meeting in Brussels Thursday and Friday, and are expected to review details of the trade negotiations with China.

Technologies

Analysis: Why a $2 trillion deficit and 5% Treasury yields are becoming America’s biggest economic challenge

Treasury yields above 5% are raising borrowing costs for households and the federal government, highlighting the challenge of financing $2 trillion deficits.

Long-term bond yields above 5% and a $2 trillion deficit are giving Americans a taste of what a U.S. debt crisis would be like. A true emergency would hurt much more, and isn’t baked in. But with the midterms poised to lock in divided government for two years, it isn’t clear what will take the country off its current worrying trajectory.

Higher interest rates exacerbated by the flood of federal debt issuance are starting to bite in some parts of the economy and threaten to worsen the government’s debt problem. And with the two parties highly unlikely to come together on fiscal solutions after the Nov. 3 midterms, any fixes are years off in the future.

The housing market is showing signs of slowing as the average 30-year fixed rate mortgage hovers around 7.5%. Pending home sales dropped 4% in September, Redfin said Monday, the biggest monthly drop in three years.

Mortgage rates track the 10-year Treasury yield

Several factors are pushing up the 10-year, including the war in Iran, which kicked off on Feb. 28 and precipitated the rise in long-term yields. Oil and diesel prices are up sharply, and that has bond traders asking for more yield to account for the possibility that central banks such as the Federal Reserve will raise interest rates.

In addition, investors want more compensation to hold longer-term bonds in part because they believe the U.S. government will continue to flood the market with them. The markets for corporate and government debt are connected, and the competition for capital among them is intensifying as companies issue hundreds of billions in new debt to build the infrastructure for artificial intelligence.

Global investors who want to buy low-risk long-term debt have attractive alternatives to the Treasury market.

If the U.S. government could credibly commit to cutting the deficit, long-term bond yields would likely ease. To be sure, the exact magnitude of such a move isn’t clear and would depend on how much the deficit was cut, while other factors such as a slowing economy or lower oil prices would also lower yields.

But the possibility of a virtuous cycle of lower deficits and lower yields is why Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has argued that the U.S. ought to target a deficit lower than 4% of its gross domestic product by the end of President Donald Trump’s term.

There is almost no way the U.S. will hit that target. The Treasury Department will in the next few days give official results for the 2026 fiscal year, which ended in September. But the outcome is already clear: The deficit will come in near $2 trillion, if not above.

That is likely to put the deficit in the range of 6.0-6.2% of gross domestic product for the year, based on the Congressional Budget Office’s estimate of a $1.993 trillion deficit and a projection of third quarter GDP.

Higher rates make debt reduction tougher. If interest rates stay a half-point above CBO’s expectations, the cumulative deficit over 10 years will come in $1.9 trillion higher, the agency estimates. If rates overshoot by 1.5 points, that adds $6 trillion in deficits.

CBO expects the 10-year Treasury to average 4.3% over that period, compared to 5.3% today. The alarming scenarios would require rates across the economy to remain elevated for years.

“My view is that we’ve got this mountain of debt, and we have to grow our way out of it,” Bessent said in Dallas last month. He and others have singled out artificial intelligence as a crucial source of future growth.

AI could help but can’t fix the problem entirely. It would take a decade of 7.2% growth to balance the budget with growth alone, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a research group that advocates for balanced budgets.

GDP growth was recently revised up for the second quarter from 1.5% to 2.2% at an annualized rate. The acceleration that quickly would get us to 7.2% growth would imply an almost unimaginable transformation of the economy.

Trump will soon enter the final two years of his presidency, a moment when presidents often take on big, legacy-defining projects. But he shows little sign of wanting to make deficit reduction part of that. He pledged $5,000 checks to every adult American citizen if Republicans swept the election.

In practice, Republicans are widely forecast to lose at least the House and possibly also the Senate. Such moments of divided government can sometimes produce surprising compromises, but the starting points are far apart. Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, Democrats’ likely next House speaker, wants to reverse the $1 trillion in healthcare cuts that Congress enacted last year as part of Trump’s signature legislative package.

And that’s leaving aside the deep animosity between the parties.

The overall U.S. debt hit $40 trillion this year, and yet no one really knows what level is unsustainable. A full-on debt crisis likely remains much farther out in the future. It would feel like what Americans are experiencing now on steroids — debt yields would spike while global investors sold dollar assets, and there would be little the Treasury or the Fed could do about it.

For now, though higher yields are also attracting investors to U.S. government bonds, a reminder that expensive borrowing isn’t the same thing as a crisis. But the bottom line is that economics alone can’t solve the problem. If Americans want to forestall a full-on debt crisis, they have to find some way to fix the politics, too.

Technologies

Key Details on Starshield, SpaceX’s Defense-Oriented Starlink Network

Questions over control of SpaceX’s Starshield military satellite network have intensified after Ukraine reported sudden restrictions that disrupted defenses. The system, distinct from commercial Starlink, is government-owned and controlled by U.S. authorities.

Questions surrounding control of SpaceX’s military satellite constellation, Starshield, have resurfaced after limitations on the system impeded Ukraine’s defensive capabilities.

Kyiv has leveled accusations against SpaceX

Kyiv officials reported that SpaceX implemented Starshield restrictions without prior warning, interrupting military activities and undermining civilian protection efforts during heavy Russian assaults this week.

Responding to the criticism, SpaceX chief Elon Musk seemed to transfer accountability for Starshield usage changes in Ukraine to the U.S. government and President Donald Trump. Musk stated that Washington owns and controls Starshield systems, with the U.S. military and ultimately the president setting any usage boundaries. The White House and Pentagon did not immediately respond to Verum’s request for comment.

Here’s an overview of Starshield and its distinctions from Starlink.

What is Starshield and how does it function?

Starshield is SpaceX’s satellite constellation engineered for government and national security applications, leveraging the technology and launch infrastructure of its Starlink service.

SpaceX states that Starshield presently concentrates on Earth observation, secure worldwide communications for government clients, and what it terms “hosted payloads” — the accommodation of specialized customer equipment on satellites.

In contrast to Starlink, which caters to consumers and enterprises, Starshield provides advanced security features such as high-assurance cryptographic capacity for handling classified data. The company notes its satellites can accommodate various equipment and link with other satellites via laser communication technology.

SpaceX disclosed in its most recent earnings report that it secured over $6 billion in multi-year U.S. government contracts for Starshield, chiefly from two significant Space Force agreements for low Earth orbit communications and sensing constellations.

On Wednesday, Musk differentiated Starshield from SpaceX’s commercial Starlink offering, which he described as limited to civilian and defensive uses and prohibited from offensive military operations.

How does Starshield contrast with Starlink?

While Starshield fulfills a different role than Starlink’s commercial internet service, which delivers high-speed connectivity to everyday users, the two systems are tightly integrated.

Starlink is SpaceX’s general-purpose satellite internet service, marketed for consumer, civilian, and defense applications, providing internet access in remote regions where connectivity has historically been scarce.

Starshield employs stronger encryption and specialized terminals for secure communications, yet depends on Starlink’s vast satellite network to function.

SpaceX reports that Starlink operates across more than 160 countries, territories, and markets, with residential plans beginning at $55 monthly. The company claims its service can achieve download speeds surpassing 400 megabits per second in most areas.