Nikon Z9 vs iPhone 17 Pro

I took these images yesterday, the first with a Z9 and 24-70 f2.8 S II and the second with an iPhone 17 Pro in RAW format a little while later.

The DNG file from the iPhone was 83MB before moving into Lightroom and converting to JPEG. The image needs a little work as it should be white rather than cream

Surprising how good the latest phone cameras are.





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Alan

Nice results! I'm waiting for mine to arrive. I skipped a couple of iterations, but now am ready for the better picture and video features.

You said you used RAW on the iPhone but the image says the original is a jpeg?

Also it seems that the iPhone uses sharpening under the hood, for instance on the letters on the propeller on the left.

Using IOS26 you have the option in the 'camera' app to use HEIC or RAW. I used RAW and then Air Dropped the image to my Mac which produced a 73.3MB DNG image.

I then produced the JPEG from this file in Lightroom.

I've no idea what image processing might be performed by the phone.

I won't be selling my Z9's any time soon, but it's good to know that you can get a decent image at 0.5x to 8X optical magnification from the phone.

Thanks for posting the 2 images. Just wondering why the color different between the 2 images on the Porsche is so significant. Would like to see the Iphone image with the real Porsche color, as I'm considering getting that phone soon, primarily for the camera.

Best,

Den

The main camera on smartphones has been very good for a long time in static scenes under ideal lighting conditions. But when you view this iPhone shot at 100%, it completely falls apart. There are no details. 40 MP is too much for smartphones. And smartphones are not made for RAWs, even if they offer the option. At least with my Galaxy S25 Ultra, I find that I get the best quality with the .heic files in the 12 MP mode.

I'm sure that I could spend a little longer in Lightroom and correct the color of the iPhone image to match the Z9 image color, which is very close to the actual color of the car.

The sunlight was changing between taking the two images, so the color temperature was probably different.

This looks a bit closer, but could still be improved more in Lightroom.



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Alan

dspoel said:

You said you used RAW on the iPhone but the image says the original is a jpeg?

Also it seems that the iPhone uses sharpening under the hood, for instance on the letters on the propeller on the left.

Click to expand...

He used ProRAW judging by the files size of 83MB he mentions and converted to JPEG in Lightroom to upload here which the OP says in the post.

Raw is a bit of a misomer with ProRAW as there is a lot of processing going on in the phone, including some sharpening and noise reduction but that is a lot less than for other file formats such as HEIC or JPEG which always look oversharpened and overprocessed. ProRAW gives quite amazing results out of the box and there is plenty of headroom for further processing.

There are apps that enable shooting of true raw unprocessed stills on iPhone but these are not in the same league as ProRAW. They require a lot of post-processing and never match the quality of ProRAW. Better to take advantage of Apple's ingenuity and use a real camera if you want true unprocessed raw.

Kamil Z said:

The main camera on smartphones has been very good for a long time in static scenes under ideal lighting conditions. But when you view this iPhone shot at 100%, it completely falls apart. There are no details. 40 MP is too much for smartphones. And smartphones are not made for RAWs, even if they offer the option. At least with my Galaxy S25 Ultra, I find that I get the best quality with the .heic files in the 12 MP mode.

Click to expand...

Are you talking about viewing the jpeg at 100% or the original file?

If I view the image full screen on my 32 inch XDR display it's still very acceptable, but I'd be disappointed if a $1100 phone could match a $9000 Z9 and lens.

Can you not save photos straight from the phone in jpeg? I don't do RAW under any circumstances and have tried HEIC (or whatever it is) with my iphone and don't like it at all and some of my computers refuse to like it either. I am considering moving up from my 13 pro, but if I can't save12mp jpegs straight from the phone, it's a no deal. Certainly could not stand many of the RAW files at the size you mention. We always keep thousands of photos on our phones all the time to share with family and friends. My phone is my travelling photo album.

FYI, I just tried taking a 'normal' photo with the phone and it place a 3.5MB HEIC file on my Desktop.

I always run my Z9's in RAW and process the files in Lightroom. I never use JPEG in camera.

I only started this thread as a comparison that some might find interesting. I suspect this is moving off topic for the 'Nikon Z' thread and the Moderators might want to close it.

it looks very good! worth all of the 1100 quid!
.
how big do you reckon the phone photos can be printed?

Thanks for doing that, color looks much closer to Z9 image now.

Best,

Den

No problem.

My monitor screen is 27 inches wide. It looks ok zoom out to that width for a print.

Kamil Z said:

The main camera on smartphones has been very good for a long time in static scenes under ideal lighting conditions. But when you view this iPhone shot at 100%, it completely falls apart. There are no details. 40 MP is too much for smartphones. And smartphones are not made for RAWs, even if they offer the option. At least with my Galaxy S25 Ultra, I find that I get the best quality with the .heic files in the 12 MP mode.

Click to expand...

You are making statements that you can't back up. You are comparing Apples and Oranges (well Galaxies) and you don't have any Apples.

The fact is that the main sensors on the new iPhones are 48MP and Apple does some real magic here. How do I know? Well I've actually got an iPhone 16Pro (last year's model) and I did a lot of testing of the various stills file formats. From this actual experience, I can categorically state that the ProRAW 48MP format from the main 24mm equivalent camera is mindblowing considering this is a tiny sensor and a tiny lens. It's not by any means going to match what I can do with my Nikon kit but I can tell you for sure that the quality of ProRAW 48MP images is astounding. It is not true raw as I said above as Apple is doing processing but it's good intelligent processing that leaves plenty of room for further modifications in post. And believe me, there is plenty of detail.

I tested out all the other stills formats as well and I can say without the slightest doubt that ProRAW is far better than any of the HEIC or JPEG formats. Even the best 48MP HEIC is too overprocessed. To a non-photographer, it may look fine but compare it to ProRAW and it's a different (lower) league. As for the 12MP HEIC - let's say it just doesn't cut it.

And that is not even mentioning the video capabilites. Apple Log HEVC is excellent, ProRes even better and I expect that ProRes Raw in the new phones must be amazing as well. I'm not intending to upgrade this year as I did last year and I don't need ProRes Raw in a phone. But it's there. Maybe you should try one and then you can compare with your Galaxy.

ClintGryke said:

Kamil Z said:

The main camera on smartphones has been very good for a long time in static scenes under ideal lighting conditions. But when you view this iPhone shot at 100%, it completely falls apart. There are no details. 40 MP is too much for smartphones. And smartphones are not made for RAWs, even if they offer the option. At least with my Galaxy S25 Ultra, I find that I get the best quality with the .heic files in the 12 MP mode.

Click to expand...

You are making statements that you can't back up. You are comparing Apples and Oranges (well Galaxies) and you don't have any Apples.

Click to expand...

I'm not familiar with iPhones. But when viewed at 100%, this 40 MP shot has the exact same "oil painting" look as my Galaxy shots when I shoot at 50 MP. I can get shots from my Galaxy that, at least to me, are of a better quality than this 40 MP shot. I'd rather have a clean 12 MP shot than a 40 MP shot that looks completely artificial and simply not good.

You can take very good shots with smartphones. But in my opinion, you should focus on their strengths. High detail resolution isn't one of them.

ajr images said:

I took these images yesterday, the first with a Z9 and 24-70 f2.8 S II and the second with an iPhone 17 Pro in RAW format a little while later.

The DNG file from the iPhone was 83MB before moving into Lightroom and converting to JPEG. The image needs a little work as it should be white rather than cream

Surprising how good the latest phone cameras are.

Click to expand...

Smartphone cameras have gotten quite good, if they're shot in good light. It's the low-light where the differences (I feel) start to really show, and smartphones just can't match dedicated cameras (too much detail loss IMO especially in really low light situations). But for shooting in good light, they done fine and might be enough of a case to not need to carry a dedicated camera all the time.

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