We asked, you answered: High megapixel count does not matter on a phone | 91mobiles.com

Remember the good old days when phones used to come with a single 2MP camera, and some even had VGA or QVGA cameras. Nowadays, it’s all about megapixels and numbers of cameras, but that’s a conversation for some other day. Today, we’re talking about how megapixel count doesn’t matter. We’re not saying this, you are. Recently, 91mobiles had a poll where we asked you whether we need a 200MP camera on a phone. While the results were close, a majority of you feel that a high megapixel count doesn’t matter on a smartphone. Around 26.6 percent of you want a 200MP camera on a phone, while the rest are not so eager. But why?

Let’s first try to understand what’s a megapixel. So, in digital imaging, a pixel is the smallest element of an image, and a million pixels form 1 megapixel. So, if your phone has a 12MP camera, that means it’s capturing 1,20,00,000 pixels, which is enough for any phone and even for a high-end DSLR camera.

You must be thinking, if a DSLR comes with a 12-megapixel or a 16-megapixel sensor, then why are brands pushing megapixel count with every new phone? There’s a 50-megapixel camera, and then there’s Xiaomi’s favourite 108-megapixel camera, and now we might be getting a 194-megapixel camera phone this year. Yes, you heard it right. Motorola is rumoured to be working on a smartphone with a 200-megapixel camera.

But do you get 108-megapixel photos out of a 108-megapixel camera? No, it’s nothing but a marketing strategy because a 108-megapixel camera isn’t going to click a 108-megapixel photo by default, and you’d be getting a 12-megapixel or a 16-megapixel image only. 

At the end of the day, a 108-megapixel camera clicks a 12-megapixel image, and that’s because of pixel binning. In simple words, pixel binning can be explained as the technology that merges data from a number of pixels on the sensor to produce a much smaller number of high-quality pixels. That doesn’t mean you are getting a low-resolution picture. A 12-megapixel image is good to be printed on a magazine’s cover, and pixel binning helps in low light conditions and noise reduction as well. But, if you want, you also click images in the camera’s true resolution, but there won’t be much difference between that and a 12-megapixel image. Also, you won’t get the best image in the low light scenarios, and either way, it will be compressed when you share it on social media.

But yes, sometimes these higher megapixel cameras click really good pictures; even DXOMark suggests that. But it’s not the higher megapixel count helping the quality; it’s the sensor size. The larger the sensor is, the better is the image. You would have heard about Sony’s 1-inch sensor or Xiaomi Mi 11 Ultra’s 1/1.12-inch sensor. What’s common between them? Both of them are really large sensors, and they’re well below the 100 megapixels count, and they click some amazing pictures.

Samsung has another sensor – the 108MP HM2 sensor with a 1/1.52-inch optical frame – and it sits way below these two sensors in the DXOMark rankings despite having a much higher megapixel count. For instance, Xiaomi Mi 11 Ultra is ranked second, whereas Xiaomi’s own Mi 11 with 108MP HM2 sensor isn’t even in the top 10. Even iPhone 13 with a 12-megapixel sensor is much better than any phone with a 50-megapixel or 108-megapixel camera because of its image processing prowess.

So, that makes clear that it’s not about megapixels every time. What you need for a good picture from a phone is a good sensor with extraordinary image processing and not a 200MP sensor. Apple and Google have proved time and again that they can deliver stellar photography results on their devices by offering good hardware-software implementation. So, next time someone tells you how great pictures you can get out of just because the phone has a 108-megapixel or a 200-megapixel camera, just share this article with them.