10 Best iPhone for Photography in 2022

Though its camera improvements may be fairly modest when compared to the iPhone 12 Pro, the iPhone 13 Pro still sports some worthwhile upgrades. There’s a useful new macro mode, along with an improvement to low light shooting with the ultra-wide camera. New picture styles are worth experimenting with, while the Cinematic video mode is a clever feature and nice to have if you’re a budding movie-maker.

As for camera hardware, Apple has gone for a triple-lens set up on the iPhone 13 Pro, giving us a standard, ultra-wide, and telephoto lens. We have the same focal lengths for the 26mm (equivalent) standard lens, and 13mm (0.5x) ultra-wide optic, but the telephoto lens has been extended to a 3x (78mm) offering, compared with the iPhone 12 Pro’s 2x lens.

Overall, the iPhone 13 Pro is without question the best iPhone for photographers to date (exactly what we’d expect) and it produces some fantastic images and video, but it’s not for those who are particularly budget-conscious, especially if you’re already in possession of a 12 Pro which is very nearly as good.

The iPhone 12 Pro Max was the king of iPhone cameras for some time and still represents a sound investment now, even with the advent of the iPhone 13 Pro.  

Apple squeezed all its best camera tech into what was at the time its largest, most expensive phone, and unlike with the two 13 phones, there is a lot of difference in camera terms between the 12 Pro Max and the 12 Pro. 

Compared to the smaller iPhone 12 Pro, you get an aperture of f/2.2 on the telephoto lens versus f/2.0, a wider optical zoom range (5x compared to 4x), and higher digital zoom (12x against 10x).

There’s also Apple’s sensor-shift optical image stabilization, which stabilizes the sensor itself rather than the lens to improve your photo quality.

This is the best iPhone for photography in 2020 or even 2022.

The iPhone 13 Mini does exactly what it says on the tin: gives you the same functions and firepower as the iPhone 13, in a more svelte form factor and with a smaller price tag to match. Unlike the iPhone SE, which achieves a lower price point by sacrificing specs (including, most notably, battery life), the iPhone 13 Mini squeezes the raw power of the standard 6.1-inch iPhone 13 into a 5.4-inch handset.  

if a small phone is important to you, this is the one to go for – it takes superb photos, 4K 60p video, up to 240fps slow-mo (in 1080p), and its portrait functions now power the brilliant Cinematic mode for shallow depth of field in video. If you own the 12 Mini, there’s not much reason to upgrade – but if you’ve skipped a generation, you’ll fall in love with it!

With each new iPhone release, it’s easy to assume the best iPhone for photography is simply the latest one. But that obscures the fact that even slightly older Apple phones, like the iPhone 11, possess some of the best iPhone cameras available.

Case in point: The iPhone 11 Pro has a triple-lens system with excellent zoom, Portrait mode, Smart HDR, plus 4K video recording at 60fps. Despite all these top-notch features, it costs a fraction of the price of the iPhone 12 Pro (and even less if you get it refurbished). It’s a solid all-rounder that won’t break the bank.

The iPhone 12 Mini of a pleasing trend of Apple filling out the smaller end of its mobile offering, as well as putting out big flagship phones with more features, cameras, and pixels than ever. This means it’s much more affordable than its contemporaries like the iPhone 12 Pro, as well as being a good deal easier to hold and carry around.

Despite the reduction in size, Apple hasn’t skimped on tech for the iPhone 12 Mini. it boasts a beefy dual-camera array, with a 12MP 26mm f/1.6 and a 12MP 13mm f/2.4. There’s no telephoto like you get on the Pro, but it’s still very impressive, and with the capacity to shoot 4K video as well, any content creator is going to have a whale of a time with it.

The only real disappointment is the battery life. Granted, things had to give somewhere, but still, having a 2227mAh battery to work with is really going to curtail your ability to get a full day’s use out of the thing, at least without carting around a separate power bank. 

The iPhone 13 Pro Max is the biggest and best of Apple’s new-generation iPhones, with the same cameras and tech as the iPhone 13 Pro, but with a bigger screen (6.7 inches versus 6.1 inches).

The Pro Max also boasts a slightly longer battery life of up to 28hrs video playback versus up to 22 hours on the smaller ’13 Pro. It might be tempting to pick the Pro Max over the regular Pro model just to get ‘the best of everything.

The regular Pro costs enough, so why not take that last step and get the bigger screen? Well, some may simply find it too big to be comfortable to use every day. There’s no doubt the iPhone 13 Pro Max is a truly stunning camera phone, whether you shoot stills or video. However, the regular iPhone 13 Pro boasts the same photographic performance in a more ergonomic (and cheaper!) package, hence why it’s higher up this list.

If you’re looking for the best bang for your buck when it comes to a new iPhone, then we’d argue that the iPhone 11 might just be it. While we love newer iPhone models, the price difference can be hard to justify when the older iPhone 11 still delivers such respectable image quality.

The iPhone 11 does have a few downsides though, namely its lack of a telephoto lens and OLED screen, but you can pick it up for such a great price now, that you have to ask yourself how important these features are to you? If you’re looking for the very best iPhone for photography, then we’d recommend going with a Pro Max model.

However, if you want a great iPhone for taking pictures that won’t break the bank, then the iPhone 11 is a natural choice. 

So iPhone 12 might not have quite the same wow-factor as the iPhone 12 Pro, but it’s certainly no slouch when it comes to its photographic capabilities. The iPhone 12 has a dual-camera system featuring an ultra-wide f/2.4 camera and a wide f/1.6 camera.

While the iPhone 12 doesn’t have a dedicated telephoto camera, users can achieve a digital zoom of up to 5x. All of the iPhone 12 models are now capable of HDR video recording with Dolby Vision, although on the iPhone 12 this is only up to 30fps as compared to the iPhone 12 Pro’s 60fps. The iPhone 12’s front-facing camera is capable of both Night mode and Deep Fusion, which weren’t available on the base iPhone 11’s selfie camera.

The iPhone 12 is also now capable of Night mode Time-lapse. One of the most exciting upgrades for the iPhone 12 family is the new Ceramic Shield display, which features a 4x better drop performance. The iPhone 12 is also compatible with new MagSafe accessories and wireless chargers.

So if your budget is under 30 or 35 thousand then this is the best iphone for photography.

This is a particularly bright OLED display with a max power of around 650 nits. It copes remarkably well outdoors and goes into a ‘turbo’ mode when required, to make sure you can see the image preview even when it’s sunny. 

Both X-series phones also have dual front-facing cameras. The imaging sensor is a 7-megapixel chip just like the recent older iPhones, and the second is a “time of flight” camera. This is used solely for depth mapping. Its primary function is to make the Face ID unlock feature work well, but it also improves “bokeh” images. You can alter the blur effect level, effectively changing the virtual aperture, after shooting the image. 

The iPhone XR is one of the most interesting phones in the 2019 line-up from an Apple fan’s perspective. It’s now an older, cheaper iPhone so bargains are out there, although the lack of a zoom camera is its biggest loss.

The iPhone XR has only one rear camera, the same 12-megapixel stabilized get-up as the iPhone XS. You get great images, sure, but zoom is handy for gigs and other situations when you can’t simply move closer.

Here you have to use a compromised digital zoom. Other differences? While the iPhone XR has the same processor as the pricier iPhone X models, it uses an LCD screen rather than an OLED. This screen is larger than the iPhone Xs’s, though, and battery life is far better than that of the smaller, fancier iPhone Xs too.