Samsung's Galaxy S22 Ultra will be available early next year, but Samsung will have to show its A-game if its camera is to compete with the likes of the Google Pixel 6 Pro and iPhone 13 Pro Max According to the latest Galaxy S22 rumors, Samsung's plan this time around is to push its Ultra talent for highly detailed images

A new Twitter post from leaker IceUniverse claims that Samsung is making improvements to the Galaxy S22 Ultra's 108MP camera mode They mention this again in a reply to fellow leaker FrontTron, saying that there is apparently an "enhanced detail mode"

Samsung uses a 108MP camera in the Galaxy S21 Ultra, Galaxy Note 20 Ultra, and Galaxy S20 Ultra, but most photos on these phones are not taken with 108MP These cameras shoot 12MP images by default due to a process called "pixel binning," which creates larger virtual pixels by grouping actual pixels This process tends to produce brighter images, although some detail is sacrificed

If Samsung were to rework this part of the camera, it could mean a renewed focus on extracting the ultimate detail from photos taken with the S22 Ultra This may be a smart direction to take, as rival phones tend to use lower-resolution sensors For example, the iPhone 13 Pro Max, currently ranked #1 in the best camera phone rankings, uses a 12MP sensor for all its cameras, while the new Google Pixel 6 Pro's most detailed sensor is a 50MP main sensor, itself 125MP image using pixel binning

We have heard some rumors of other cameras in the S22 series as well Apparently the Ultra will feature a new water-drop camera block design, but the sensor resolution is rumored to be the same as the current Galaxy S21 Ultra 108MP main camera, 12MP ultrawide, and two 10 MP telephoto cameras These cameras are said to use larger pixels and better sensors

As for the vanilla Galaxy S22 and Galaxy S22 Plus (possibly called the Galaxy S22 Pro), the cameras are said to be a 50 MP main camera, a 12 MP ultrawide camera, and a 12 MP 3x zoom telephoto camera galaxy Z There is ongoing debate as to whether an under-display camera like the Fold 3 will be used, but it seems unlikely

In terms of seeing these phones actually launch, we expected this to happen at some point in January However, the less expensive Samsung Galaxy S21 FE has not yet launched, and new rumors suggest that the FE will be brought to Samsung's January launch event and the Galaxy S22 will be delayed to February

Update: Leaked information on Samsung's new Galaxy S22 and S22 Plus reveal all about the camera