Samsung Galaxy A22 Full Review (Part-II) – Camera Quality, Performance, Competition & Verdict

A quad-camera arrangement that you’re probably familiar with.

The Samsung Galaxy A22 has a quad-camera setup that is closer to that of the Galaxy A32 than the Galaxy A22 5G, which has a lower-resolution 48MP primary camera and no dedicated macro camera, among other things. In contrast, the A32 has a higher-resolution 64MP camera and higher-resolution 5MP macro and depth sensors. Samsung Galaxy A22 Full Review (Part-I)

The Samsung Galaxy A22 has a 48MP Quad-Bayer, f/1.8 primary camera that, according to its firmware, might be either the Samsung S5KGM2, also known as the GM2 or the Sony IMX 582, both of which have 0.8 m pixels and a 1/2.0″ sensor “PDAF and total area The addition of OIS, which isn’t even available on the Galaxy A32, is maybe the most intriguing feature here.

The 8MP ultrawide camera has a Sony IMX355 sensor – 1/4.0″, 1.12m – and an f/2.2 lens. It’s nothing special. There’s no autofocus or anything. Last. Still, not least, the 13MP, f/2.2 selfie camera has a Sony IMX258, 1/3.1”, 1.12m sensor and is also fixed focus.

The camera app for the A22 is the most recent version available with One UI 3.1, with the most notable change being the move of the video resolution to the viewfinder. Aside from that, it’s the same as every other Samsung phone before One UI 3.1, which is a good thing because it’s simple and easy to use.

The principles are the same as before: swiping left and right switches between available modes, and you can rearrange, add, or remove options from the viewfinder. Vertical swipes in either direction will swap between front and rear cameras.

With no telephoto on board, you get three trees for ultra-wide and two trees for the primary cam and the typical tree indication for zoom control. With a pinch gesture, you may zoom in to 2x, 4x, or 10x, with additional preset zoom levels appearing at 2x, 4x, and 10x.

The settings cogwheel is positioned in the upper left corner of the screen, and the viewfinder contains the standard set of icons. The menu includes the usual items such as grid lines, location data, etc.

There is a Pro mode, but it is the most basic version, with only ISO (100-800) and white balance (by light temperature with icons for familiar light sources) options, as well as exposure correction (-2EV to +2EV in 0.1EV increments,) dialled in. A metering mode selector was also eliminated (centre-weighted, matrix and spot). Unfortunately, there is no manual focusing option. Although the Galaxy A72 and A52 feature more Pro controls, the ones on the A22 are comparable to the A22 5G and A32 5G.

Pro video, speaking of items left out, was also left out. FUN MODE, Samsung’s current Snapchat collaboration that delivers a rotating array of Snapchat filters directly into the default camera app, didn’t work either. We don’t miss it terribly, but we felt compelled to include it because it was an essential element of the A72, A52, and A32’s marketing. Surprisingly, our Galaxy A22 lacks the Deco Pic stamps and masks mode that the A22 5G possessed.

Image quality in daylight:

The primary 48MP camera takes binned 12MP shots by default. These are a bit of a mishmash. On the plus side, the colours are vibrant and vivid, and there is a good amount of resolved detail. The dynamic range is good, especially given the difficult lighting conditions we had to shoot in. These images, on the other hand, tend to be too soft. This is frequently due to the Galaxy A22’s lack of focus. We found ourselves tapping on the viewfinder constantly, with different degrees of effectiveness, to get it to refocus.

We encountered problems with automatic exposure consistency as well. We initially assumed that Samsung’s Scene Optimizer, which is turned on by default, was the culprit for the messed-up autofocus and metering, but we managed to muck up images even with it turned off.

As a result, it is genuinely pulling its weight in addition to Auto HDR, which is also turned on by default. Looking at photos captured in 48MP mode also gives you a decent indication of how much of a difference the extra computational processing makes. This option doesn’t include Auto HDR or Scene Optimizer, and it shows, especially in settings with more sophisticated lighting. Generally, you can observe that highlights and shadows appear better in the primary 12MP auto mode.

Shots taken at 48MP, on the other hand, have a lot more resolved detail. If that’s important to you and individual files larger than 20MB aren’t a problem, go for it. You’ll also have to put up with a little more noise. On the other hand, the added detail does nothing to fight the overall softness of the photos, proving yet again that faulty autofocus is to blame.

There is no dedicated telephoto or another hardware zoom on the Galaxy A22. The primary 48MP sensor does, however, produce crops. You may pinch to start zooming, then select one of the easy buttons for 2x, 4x, and 10x or choose a zoom level up to 10x.

Because they’re taken with the same camera, the 2x shots have the same focus and softness difficulties. You can obtain excellent enough results for social media if you can get the autofocus to cooperate.

The A22’s dedicated portrait mode performs admirably and provides excellent images for a low-cost gadget. The bokeh effect in the backdrop is quite appealing. The camera’s UI has a slider that you may use to alter the intensity. Regardless of the ongoing focusing troubles.

Subject separation and detection are adequate but could be improved. Stray hairs and busy backdrops can trip it up. In portrait mode, Auto HDR is supported. You can even get quite good portraits of non-human subjects if you have enough patience. The detecting system requires a little more time to kick in at times. The Galaxy A22’s 8MP ultrawide camera is serviceable but not outstanding. It contains a lot of information about what it is. It has an excellent colour rendition, but the photos have a lot of contrast.

Because of its fixed focus, unlike the primary camera, the ultrawide does not suffer from autofocus difficulties. It still produces a sharp image. Perhaps a tad too short, with a few noticeable oversharpening artefacts thrown in for good measure.

There doesn’t appear to be any software distortion correction or, at the very least, the ability to toggle any modest modification that may be present.

The dedicated 2MP macro camera isn’t worth mentioning. It can get the job done with enough patience, but it only has a fixed focus set a little further away than we’d like and a focus plane that isn’t very forgiving. Furthermore, the 2MP resolution is a bit of a crutch.

The Galaxy A22 sports a 13MP fixed-focus selfie camera with an aperture of f/2.2. Better than the 8MP camera on the Galaxy A22 5G but not quite as good as the 20MP camera on the Galaxy A32.

In light of the available hardware, we say that selfies still look pretty good. Under moderate and favourable lighting conditions, the focus plane is wide and forgiving, resolved detail is adequate, and colours look decent.

The selfie cam offers a small and wide mode, as expected from Samsung. The comprehensive method produces stills with a resolution of 4128 x 3096 pixels, or just under 13MP, while the narrow way produces stills with just under 9MP (3408 x 2556 pixels). This is how the Galaxy A32 handles its two selfie modes, but it’s not how the Galaxy A22 5G takes its selfies, which are all shot in 8MP. It’s just a fun detail.

The Galaxy A22 can detect when there are multiple people in the frame and switch to wide selfie mode, which is pretty cool. You may also instruct the camera app to remember your previous mode selection, which is helpful. We’re still perplexed why Samsung insists on making the narrow mode the default out of the box.

Making a video:

Unfortunately, the Galaxy A22’s video capture is limited to 1080p@30fps. That goes for all its cameras, including the primary, ultrawide, and selfie. There isn’t even a 60fps mode available. We’re not sure if this is a restriction of the Helio G80, given that it claims to be capable of shooting 2K@30fps and 1080p@60fps. We did test Open Camera to be sure and were still capped at FullHD.

Thanks to its Dimensity 700 5G chipset, the Galaxy A22 5G is capable of an unusual max video capture of 1152p@30fps. However, we wouldn’t call that a significant increase. The Galaxy A32, sadly, is also limited to FullHD. If you want 4K, you’ll have to look at the Galaxy A32 5G or move up to the A52 and its variants.

On the Galaxy A22, you can choose between h.264 and h.265 (HEVC) encoding. The former produces MP4 files with a stable FullHD AVC video stream of roughly 17 Mbps and stereo AAC audio at 48kHz. On the other hand, the latter save room at sacrificing quality. It’s not at all shabby.

The primary camera’s Full HD video quality is good, with respectable detail, mature colour processing, and low noise. However, the dynamic range is somewhat disappointing, with many blown-out highlights.

The ultrawide videos hold up surprisingly well. There is a lot of detail, and the colours are pleasing, even if they differ slightly from the main cam. The exposure appears to be more balanced here, though it’s worth noting that the two snappers frequently choose vastly different orientations in the same conditions.

While the OIS on the Galaxy A22’s primary camera isn’t the best we’ve seen, it smooths out minor shakes in the viewfinder and creates that familiar “floaty” effect when framing. Additional electronic image stabilization is offered for both the primary and ultrawide cameras, with no reduction in FullHD resolution. However, it doesn’t work particularly well on either camera. On the major one, it does an alright job smoothing out shaking but introduces an obnoxious and persistent minor bit of focus suggesting. That’s, sadly, a common artefact of EIS on lower-end systems.

EIS seems to drastically minimize most vibrations but not remove them totally on the ultrawide, resulting in minor but aggressive shaking.

There is no EIS for the selfie camera. It’s probably a good thing because the field of view is already a little cramped for getting a face in the frame at arm’s length, and cropping away from the edge for stabilization would exacerbate the problem.

Selfie videos are passable, but the selfie camera’s narrow dynamic range is an almost continuous stumbling block.

Here’s how the Galaxy A22 compares to the competition in our extensive video comparison database. You’re free to pixel-peep all you want.

Camera quality in low-light situations:

In low-light situations, the Galaxy A22 is expected to struggle. Its primary camera is disappointing, albeit still excellent for a cheap handset. There is a decent amount of information. Noise is adequately tamed, and even dynamic range is not a huge issue, with auto HDR and auto night mode polling their weight.

The most significant difficulty here, just like with daylight shots, is wayward autofocus. Even when the A22 was able to focus correctly, the images were too soft for our liking. The A22 would regularly miss its focus completely, requiring a great deal of tweaking on our part even to get close.

In low-light situations, like in good lighting, opting for 48MP photos can significantly increase resolved data. However, all of the same faults persist in these images, such as malfunctioning autofocus and general softness. Furthermore, you don’t receive Auto HDR or Scene Optimizer when shooting in this mode. In low-light situations, 48MP mode makes little sense, in our opinion.

When using the primary camera to zoom, the overall sharpness and level of detail gradually deteriorate. We’d argue that after 2x, shots resemble more of a painting than anything else, thanks to the sharpening and noise suppression techniques.

In low-light situations, the ultrawide camera is also quite clumsy. There’s a lot of noise, and there’s a lot of oversharpening artefacts. The dynamic range is limited, but it’s not as awful as we’ve seen with other low-cost gadgets.

The Galaxy A22 has a dedicated night mode, but it’s a bit hit-or-miss. Overall, it improves images by better limiting highlights, suppressing noise, and applying a little more sharpening. Although the difference between standard low-light images and night mode isn’t particularly noticeable, the Galaxy A22’s night mode is also relatively quick, making it more viable. We noticed that night mode images are a little darker in general, but not by much.

On a more positive side, night mode is also accessible on the Galaxy A22’s ultrawide camera. Night mode has a modest effect on low-light images, but in our tests, it never managed to muck up a still, earning it a recommendation. In low-light situations, the 13MP selfie camera performs admirably. There is a lot of detail and very little noise in this video. Even dynamic range isn’t a significant concern. Surprisingly, there is no night mode for the selfie camera, even though the Galaxy A22 5G does.

Finally, we shot some low-light videos with the Galaxy A22. The primary camera performs admirably. There is lots of detail at 1080p, and the noise is nicely kept at bay. The dynamic range is far from ideal, and both shadows and highlights suffer. All low-light samples are in the following playlist.

Naturally, quality gradually deteriorates as you zoom. Overall, 2x low-light videos appear to be usable. Anything beyond that, though, we would steer clear of.

Benchmarks for the system:

 

 

The Mediatek Helio G80 chip inside the Galaxy A22 is an adequate performer but will struggle to compete with rival offerings in this price range. It features an octa-core CPU in a 2+6 configuration (2×2.0 GHz Cortex-A75 & 6×1.8 GHz Cortex-A55) and a Mali-G52 MC2 GPU. A variety of RAM and storage options are available, ranging from 4GB/64GB to 6GB/128GB; our

Except for the top-tier 8GB RAM version, these are essentially the same internals as the Galaxy A32, so performance should be relatively similar between the paid and other phones equipped with the Helio G80.

Starting with pure CPU figures and GeekBench, we can see that the Galaxy A22 holds its own but doesn’t outperform its competitors in terms of raw performance.

At the very least, it’s encouraging to see that the Galaxy A22 is making the most of the G80 chipset, gaining a few points in CPU tests on average for its worth.

The Galaxy A22 doesn’t fare well on the more complex AnTuTu benchmark. Still, in previous AnTuTu 8 runs, the inexpensive Samsung outperforms the Poco M3 with its Snapdragon 662 chipset and comes close to the Xiaomi Redmi Note 10 and its Snapdragon 678.

To be fair, the Mali-G52 MC2 GPU is not a powerhouse. It has more than enough “oomph” for casual gaming, with lighter titles even topping 60fps and taking advantage of its 90Hz refresh rate. In fact, with some quality tradeoffs, we even managed to achieve 60fps in PUBG Mobile. Overall, the MediaTek Helio G80 can provide a flawless experience with everyday tasks on the Galaxy A22, with OneUI running without a hitch and with very few stutters and slowdowns. However, this is true for most recent mobile chips and is hardly a significant achievement.

Competition:

Like many other goods, Phones aren’t becoming any cheaper these days. The Galaxy A22 is currently available for roughly EUR 250 when writing this article. That’s a terrible reality in and of itself, given that the MSRP at the time of its official debut was about EUR 20 more minor, but it’s not an isolated incident.

In any case, EUR 250 also buys you a Galaxy A22 5G and an A32 5G, but as we’ve established, those tend to sacrifice some features to permit 5G connectivity. However, there’s the plain Galaxy A32, which we’ve been mentioning throughout the study for a purpose. It outperforms the Galaxy A22 in several areas, including a brighter and higher-resolution Super AMOLED display with Gorilla Glass 5 on top, higher-resolution main and selfie cameras, and a guarantee of longer-term software support. It’s challenging to make a case for the Galaxy A22 in this scenario if everything else is essentially equal, including the price tags.

The Poco X3 Pro comes to mind right away when it comes to low-cost gadgets. It’s still a great offer and a one-of-a-kind anomaly, with a current retail price of under EUR 250. You get a 6.67-inch, 120Hz, HDR10, FullHD+ IPS display and the Qualcomm Snapdragon 860 CPU for that money – a fantastic gaming deal. The X3 Pro, on the other hand, shines in other areas, with Gorilla Glass 6 protection and an IP53 rating, stereo speakers, a massive 5,160 mAh battery with 33W charging, and a 48MP, plus 8MP ultrawide, plus two 2MP primary camera configuration.

The Xiaomi Redmi Note 10 is also reasonably priced and meets most of the same criteria. With a Snapdragon 678 processor, it saves money on the chipset but makes up for it with an excellent 6.43-inch Super AMOLED FullHD+ display.

Last but not least, Realme, not wanting to be outdone by Xiaomi, has a viable alternative in the form of the vanilla Realme 8. A 6.4-inch FullHD+ Super AMOLED display with official HDR10 support and a higher-resolution 64MP primary camera on the back are among its highlights.

Verdict:

Samsung has been putting in the work regarding the latest Galaxy A series. Almost every model in the family has recently proven to be reliable and competitive in some way. The Galaxy A22 suffers from the same issues.

The LTE Galaxy A22 is a well-made device with a high-performing AMOLED display with a 90Hz refresh rate and simple refresh rate handling (even if lower-res). The Galaxy A22 also sports a 5,000 mAh battery that lasts a long time, a surprisingly feature-rich One UI 3.1 Core-shell that runs on top of Android 11, and it makes full use of the good, though unremarkable MediaTek Helio G80 CPU.

It does, however, have its fair share of flaws and faults. The back of the plastic body feels hollow, and the protected display glass lacks any formal ingress protection or a “brand name” indication. The A22 also lacks light and proximity sensors; charging is slow, and the single bottom-firing loudspeaker is underwhelming. The misbehaving autofocus on the primary camera detracts from the otherwise positive experience. That’s on top of a couple of other minor camera flaws.

Even with all of the negatives noted out, the Galaxy A22 remains an excellent smartphone, particularly for its pricing. However, Samsung is its own worst enemy in this scenario because, as we previously stated, the Galaxy A32 outperforms it in a few critical areas while costing the same in most places. So, unless you can find an excellent deal on the Galaxy A22 LTE, the A32 LTE is probably a better choice. Both you and Samsung should be satisfied.