The Galaxy S22 features the same basic camera setup that Samsung used for the Galaxy S21, but with some notable improvements to the hardware. The main camera now has a 50MP rating instead of the 12MP wide-angle shooter used in last year's phone. The sensor is 23% larger, too, to let in more light, as Samsung makes a push to improve camera performance in low light.

Consider this photo of the Oakland skyline taken at the maximum 3x optical zoom for the Galaxy S22 and using a digital zoom for the Pixel 6, since Google's phone isn't equipped with a telephoto lens. Indeed, the zoom capability on the Galaxy S22 is its best feature, as you won't find many phones with a telephoto lens at this price. Like every phone we test, we set the Galaxy S22's screen to 150 nits and had it surf the web over cellular — 5G, in this case — until it ran out of power. The results did not impress, as the Galaxy S22 managed 7 hours and 51 minutes of battery life — a little more than two hours worse than the average smartphone. Turning off adaptive refresh rate improved matters a little, with an average time of 8 hours and 2 minutes, though that's still short of what we'd expect from a premium phone like the Galaxy S22. The Galaxy S22+ and S22 share an impressive 50MP wide-angle rear camera, teamed with a 12MP ultra-wide rear camera and 10MP telephoto camera. Advanced camera technology paired with the cutting-edge Nightography feature, capture high quality content even in low light settings. The 12MP ultrawide camera on the Galaxy S22 appears to be unchanged, but you won't hear me complaining if photos like this one taken at my local decommissioned naval air station are the result. The jet stands out nicely against the blue sky — I think this is the rare example where the Galaxy S22 does a better job with color than the iPhone 13, which darkens the blue a little too much. It's just a well-balanced shot that makes perfect use of the ultrawide angle lens' 120-degree field of view. The gap has only grown with the release of the iPhone 14, which runs on a modified version of the A15 Bionic that powered the iPhone 13, and the iPhone 14 Pro, which features an even faster A16 Bionic. While the Galaxy S22 can still hold its own against most Android phones, any recent iPhone outmuscles Samsung's one-time flagship.

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No one would consider the Galaxy S22 a big leap forward for Samsung's phones, though I'm not sure it really needs to be. The fact that Samsung is extending software support for an extra year suggests the phone maker knows people are holding on to phones longer and that anyone with last year's Galaxy S21 is unlikely to be eyeing an upgrade. Inside, Samsung has beefed up the chip to the new Snapdragon Gen 8 1, which should give marginal gains over the last generation while still keeping this device at the forefront of power versus its rivals. It's now got an adaptive refresh rate display (10 to 120Hz) to aid with battery life, and Samsung has also shuffled the rear camera array round to have a higher resolution main camera, at the expense of the telephoto. Speaking of colors, they're pretty vivid on the Galaxy S22's AMOLED panel. When set to Natural mode, the S22's display shows off 110% of the sRGB color spectrum, matching the iPhone 13's output. You can get even more colors on the S22 screen by opting for Vivid mode, though that will come at the expense of color accuracy. As it stands, the S22's 0.25 Delta-E rating in Natural mode edges ahead of the iPhone 13's 0.26 score. (Numbers closer to zero are more accurate.) Because I'm testing the Galaxy S22 in the U.S., my version of Samsung's phone is powered by the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1, the same chipset found in other S22 models. In other parts of the world, Samsung uses its own Exynos 2200 chipset, though our Galaxy S22 Plus benchmarks indicate similar performance regardless of the silicon. That's good news in one sense, as the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 powers some of the best performance we've seen from an Android phone — at least for a phone released in early 2022. Since then Qualcomm released the more advanced Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1 — it powers the Galaxy Z Fold 4 and Galaxy Z Flip 4— and then there's the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 in the Galaxy S23 family that brings another big peformance boost.

The main lens isn't the only one to see changes with the Galaxy S22. Samsung also changed things up with the telephoto lens, downgrading the sensor from 64MP to 10MP but opting for a 3x optical zoom instead of the hybrid zoom it used on the Galaxy S21. The result is sharper, more detailed shots when you zoom in for a closer look. One interesting thing to note about the Galaxy S22's photography is that it differs slightly between countries due to the different chipsets Samsung uses. You can read more about that in our report on some recent Galaxy S22 Ultra camera testing.

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The results are much better in graphics testing where the Galaxy S22 produced a 60 FPS result in 3DMark's Wild Life Unlimited test. That's better than the iPhone 13's 56 FPS result and well ahead of the 34 FPS the Pixel 6 produced. Samsung phones have traditionally struggled with one of our real world tests in which we use Adobe Premiere Rush to transcode a 4K video into 1080p. It took last year's Galaxy S21 more than 1 minute to finish the task, but the Galaxy S22 improves that time to 47 seconds. That's still longer than the iPhone 13's 26-second time, but faster than the 49-second result the Pixel 6 turned in. The Galaxy S23 shaves another 8 seconds off the S22's time, with the help of its more advanced processor. To see just how well the Galaxy S22's cameras performed, I put Samsung's new phone up against the Google Pixel 6 and iPhone 13. (For more photo comparisons, plus an overall look at how these phones compare, you can read our Galaxy S22 vs. Pixel 6 and Galaxy S22 vs. iPhone 13 face-offs; we've also got iPhone 14 vs Samsung Galaxy S22 and Google Pixel 7 vs. Galaxy S22 face-offs with comparisons to newer models.) The Galaxy S22 photo is understandably sharper, while the Pixel 6 can only manage to keep the boats in the foreground in focus. Everything else is a little fuzzy.

We've mentioned some of the ways the Galaxy S23 beats out Samsung's older phone in this Galaxy S22 review, and our Galaxy S23 vs. Galaxy S22 comparison goes into additional detail on the differences. But to sum up, the biggest changes you'll miss out on if you opt for the cheaper S22 are the better performance and battery life that the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 delivers. When it comes to the videos, 4K-60 FPS recording is here in addition to the fantastically sharp and cinematic 8K-24 FPS mode. The auto-framing feature isn't all that well refined, but the ability to pause the recording to continue recording a bit later is a great feature. Performance and Battery Life The Galaxy S22 misses out on the big improvements enjoyed by the S22 Plus. That larger phone supports 45W wired charging, while the Galaxy S22 makes do with 25W. Consequently, a drained Galaxy S22 can get to a 60% charge after half-an-hour, while the S22 Plus is already at 70%, even with a bigger battery to fill. That's still faster than the iPhone, which can get to a 51% charge after 30 minutes. Samsung Galaxy S22 review: Software and special featuresThe Galaxy S22 holds one other edge over phones in its price range such as the iPhone and the Pixel. Samsung has opted for a 120Hz refresh rate, which means smoother scrolling when compared to phones like the iPhone 14, which is fixed at 60Hz. Even the Pixel 7's 90Hz refresh rate doesn't measure up to what the Galaxy S22 offers. (The same was true when the S22 competed with the iPhone 13 and Pixel 6.) The problem for Samsung — and indeed for all Android phone makers — is that Apple's mobile silicon remains the better performer. On Geekbench, the iPhone 13 posted a 1,684 single-core score and a 4,129 multicore result, blowing the Galaxy S22 away.