Galaxy S26 Ultra vs. Xiaomi 17 Ultra: Not Even Close! — Transcript

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1. 0:00I’ve been using Xiaomi 17 Ultra for a few months  and the more I use it the more I realize how
2. 0:05useful the continuous telephoto lens and having  a large 1-inch type main camera sensor is. Galaxy
3. 0:12S26 Ultra on the other hand has this new privacy  display that is super useful and upgraded camera
4. 0:19hardware. But the camera sensors are still behind  of what Xiaomi offers. Today I’m going to test
5. 0:25the cameras of these two phones thoroughly but  also will talk about the displays as it became a
6. 0:30controversial topic. The main camera of the Xiaomi  is a 1-inch type sensor with f/1.7 while Galaxy
7. 0:37is offering a 1/1.3-inch sensor with f/1.4. When  taking photos you will notice that Xiaomi offers
8. 0:45simply a better Bokeh and there is more visible  background blur. This is something that makes the
9. 0:50photos looks more professional and distinguish  between a dedicated camera and a phone. For
10. 0:56color science too, the Xiaomi is at least more  interesting. It has two modes, Leica vibrant and
11. 1:02Leica authentic. The vibrant mode is more similar  to what the Galaxy and iPhone offer. The colors
12. 1:08are slightly saturated. The authentic mode on the  other hand has more muted colors and is contrasty.
13. 1:15I’ll write down which mode I’m using next to the  images. On both Leica modes the Xiaomi photos tend
14. 1:21to have more magenta in the white balance, while  the Galaxy photos are slightly towards green as
15. 1:27you can see in these pictures. Galaxy also has  the tendency to raise the shadows a bit more
16. 1:33and making the photo look more uniformly bright.  Especially on skin tone I do notice Xiaomi adds a
17. 1:38bit more color to the face even in Leica authentic  mode compared to the Galaxy. The other thing that
18. 1:44is common in Xiaomi 17 Ultra is that the exposure  is half a stop more than the Galaxy which results
19. 1:50in brighter pictures overall. I also do feel it  does raise the whites a bit like in the mosaics
20. 1:56of this picture. That’s not necessarily something  bad but I do feel sometimes my pictures are more
21. 2:01exposed than what I want them to be. In this shot  in auto mode, the Xiaomi overexposed the shot,
22. 2:08resulting in the moon, which is one of the most  important elements of the shot to be completely
23. 2:12white. Therefore I had to decrease the exposure  by one stop and shoot the picture again and this
24. 2:18time I got what I wanted. The problem is  it doesn’t always overexpose. Sometimes,
25. 2:24like this picture, the exposure is just perfect,  so I can’t simply underexpose by default and call
26. 2:31it a day. Sometimes, like this shot, it does  also slightly underexpose, which results in a
27. 2:38slightly darker picture than the Galaxy. But  I should say close to sunset the exposure of
28. 2:44the picture on the Xiaomi is just perfect. Also  there is almost no banding in the sky compared
29. 2:50to the Galaxy. It does make the photo much more  moody, and it looks like something coming out of
30. 2:55a Fuji film or Leica camera rather than a phone.  For food pictures here I’m using Leica vibrant,
31. 3:02and the Xiaomi pictures have a bit more orange  tint in them, but overall both are doing a fine
32. 3:07job. One thing about Xiaomi processing is that  it also freezes motion better. For example,
33. 3:13in this picture the cyclist is frozen. In low  light too, when I was shaking my head to test
34. 3:18the motion blur, I noticed Xiaomi freezes the  motion better than the Galaxy S26 Ultra, as you
35. 3:25can see in these shots. For video with the main  lens it’s very interesting how the colors differ,
36. 3:31where the Galaxy this time has lots of magenta  in the sky while Xiaomi made the sky very blue.
37. 3:37The reality was something in between. For indoor  videos they are both doing a great job, with not
38. 3:44much noise despite having a phone size sensor, and  stabilization is better on the Galaxy. Galaxy also
39. 3:51has this crazy lock stabilization mode, and as  you can see no matter what I do the image stays
40. 3:57stabilized. For the telephoto lens, the Galaxy S26  Ultra has a 67mm camera and a 111mm camera lens,
41. 4:07while Xiaomi has a continuous 75 to 100mm zoom.  The sensor of the Xiaomi is much larger than the
42. 4:143X zoom of the Galaxy. For things like buildings  in daylight the difference is not going to show as
43. 4:21much, like the picture I took here with 3X zoom.  But when you move to a more complex situation like
44. 4:27this picture, if we zoom into the subject you  can see there is no comparison between the two,
45. 4:33especially since the Galaxy photo is only 10MP.  Indoors, the Xiaomi on 3X is just much better,
46. 4:40with better bokeh, better dynamic range, and more  details. And even during the day when light is not
47. 4:46sufficient, like in a narrow street in Barcelona,  you can see how much better the Xiaomi photo is
48. 4:51at this specific zoom. Moving to 5X zoom closer  to 100mm, the result is more similar. Especially
49. 4:59during daylight the photos can be very close  to each other even though the Xiaomi sensor is
50. 5:04larger. But zooming a bit more to 200mm, where  the phones should crop the photo, you can start
51. 5:11to see Xiaomi here too is creating a nicer picture  overall. And of course the bokeh of the telephoto
52. 5:17portraits on the Xiaomi is going to be stronger  due to the larger sensor compared to the Galaxy.
53. 5:23For zooming like crazy, the Xiaomi picture is  cleaner but also the AI is more aggressive in
54. 5:28generating information that doesn’t necessarily  exist in the first place, whereas Galaxy is more
55. 5:33doing upscaling. For video with the telephoto lens  you can see the background blur is stronger on the
56. 5:39Xiaomi. That said, I really like the processing  of the video on the Galaxy more. You can also
57. 5:45do telephoto macro on both phones. Optically  the Xiaomi is doing better here, but again I
58. 5:51feel the highlights are overblown. The ultrawide  camera on both phones is obviously the weakest,
59. 5:57but Galaxy at least has a bit of a wider focal  length. That means when you take a picture you can
60. 6:03simply fit more into the frame. For night photos  I find Xiaomi doing better processing, likely due
61. 6:09to being able to gather more information with the  larger sensor, especially in the light reflection
62. 6:15part. And the photos look less noisy. As you can  see Xiaomi is increasing the ISO only to 200,
63. 6:21which is amazing considering it’s just a phone.  Xiaomi 17 Ultra is like a camera with a phone
64. 6:27attached to it, but of course there is more to  it. For example the battery is the new silicon
65. 6:33carbide technology, and therefore they were  able to put a larger capacity of 6000 mAh,
66. 6:38whereas the Galaxy is having a 5000 mAh battery.  I used the Chinese version for this comparison,
67. 6:45and I’ll put the link in the description if you  want to get that version. I’m also going to do a
68. 6:49full battery test soon, so subscribe to not miss  that video. The charging speed of the Galaxy is
69. 6:55up to 60W, whereas Xiaomi is up to 90W. The  Xiaomi wireless charging speed is up to 50W,
70. 7:02whereas Galaxy is up to 25W. Both support reverse  wired and wireless charging, but neither supports
71. 7:09MagSafe out of the box. But there is a simple  solution for that, and that’s using a MagSafe
72. 7:15case from the sponsor of today’s video, Dbrand.  You know Dbrand from their cool designs, but
73. 7:20my favorite case from them is this simple clear  one that is going to stay rent free on my phone.
74. 7:26You can also attach any MagSafe accessory to  it and it won’t fall off, as they have a strong
75. 7:32magnet inside the case. If you feel bold and want  to be cool, you can get this Tank case. They even
76. 7:39have this epic design on the back. The case is  super rugged too and is the clickiest one I’ve
77. 7:45ever seen. I simply love how it feels in hand.  You can also get a more boring but military grade
78. 7:52case with grippy sides to protect your expensive  phone while spending just a few bucks on it. I’ll
79. 7:58put the links in the description. Grab yours,  as I already love mine, and thanks to Dbrand
80. 8:03for sponsoring this video. For display there is a  lot of controversy about the Galaxy display that
81. 8:09they are still using an 8 bit panel. I did compare  the Galaxy S26 Ultra display to the S25 Ultra,
82. 8:16iPhone, Xiaomi, and Pixel, and I can tell you the  banding is definitely less noticeable than the
83. 8:21S25 Ultra, likely because they are using FRC  to emulate being 10 bit. That said, it’s not
84. 8:28as accurate and good for hiding banding as the 12  bit panel of the Xiaomi 17 Ultra made by TCL. Also
85. 8:35Xiaomi 17 Ultra PWM is 2160Hz compared to 480Hz on  Samsung, which protects your eyes as there will be
86. 8:44less flickering on the display. That said, Galaxy  S26 Ultra has two main advantages over Xiaomi. For
87. 8:51one, it has strong anti reflective properties  which help when you want to read under direct
88. 8:55sunlight. Second, there is this new privacy  display which I personally activate whenever
89. 9:01I’m sitting in public transport. Especially the  hiding of notifications is very interesting.For
90. 9:07performance, the Galaxy is using the Snapdragon  8 Elite Gen 5 Galaxy Edition, while the Xiaomi is
91. 9:13using the vanilla version of it. Overall there  won’t be any real difference between the two,
92. 9:18but at least in benchmarks like Geekbench the  Galaxy gets a bit higher score in both single
93. 9:24core and multi core compared to the Xiaomi 17  Ultra. Overall the Galaxy S26 Ultra offers a
94. 9:30great experience with OneUI. It has a practical  display for outdoors and protects your privacy,
95. 9:36has decent camera hardware, and an S Pen  that can be very useful for people like me.
96. 9:41On the other hand the Xiaomi has Leica colors,  much better camera hardware, especially the
97. 9:47better telephoto lens and the continuous zoom  which can be very helpful in certain scenarios.
98. 9:52The downside is you won’t find the phone in  all markets and it’s also harder to sell them,
99. 9:57I’m talking from experience. If you enjoyed  this video and want to see how Xiaomi 17 Ultra
100. 10:02compares to S26 Ultra, Pixel 10 Pro, and iPhone  17 Pro with more focus on portrait photography,
101. 10:09you can watch this video next. Thanks for tuning  into Techmo, and I will see you in the next one!