The OnePlus 15 is the latest flagship smartphone from the Shenzhen-based smartphone brand. The newer model features several improvements over its predecessor, the OnePlus 13, that you expect from a generational upgrade, such as a faster processor, a bigger battery, faster charging, and a higher refresh rate display. However, there is one aspect of the spec sheet that has caught everyone’s eye, and that is the rear camera specifications.
You see, much like with every other aspect of the phone, we expect the cameras to be upgraded over the previous generation as well. However, OnePlus has made the curious choice of picking lower-quality parts from its camera bin this generation, which, on paper, makes the new OnePlus 15 look worse than the OnePlus 13. But while things may not look rosy on the hardware front, OnePlus may have a trick up its sleeve when it comes to software.
The company recently ended its four-year-long partnership with Hasselblad, with the latter now working exclusively with OnePlus’s sister company Oppo. OnePlus, meanwhile, is turning a new leaf in its camera journey with something it calls DetailMax Engine. This new processing pipeline is designed to produce more natural-looking images that have less of the artificially processed look and more realistic detail. The phone can also churn out higher resolution 26MP files from its main and telephoto cameras, by combining multiple 12MP frames for dynamic range information with a 50MP frame for raw detail. All of this is combined with the improved processing grunt of the new Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chip.
But how do these new software tricks help the OnePlus 15 against the OnePlus 13 with its better hardware? In this report, we will focus primarily on the point of contention between these two phones, which is the photo quality from the three cameras on the back, to see which one comes out on top.
Main camera
Let’s start with the primary camera on both phones. The OnePlus 13 used the 50MP Sony LYT-808, a 1/1.4” equivalent sensor with 1.12 µm pixel size and f1.6 aperture. This is technically the same sensor found on the even older OnePlus 12, so the OnePlus 13 didn’t exactly move the needle forward on the main camera last year, either. The OnePlus 15, on the other hand, winds the needle back a bit with its 50MP Sony IMX906 (also known as the LYT-700), a 1/1.56” equivalent sensor with 1.0 µm pixel size and f1.8 aperture. This is the same sensor that the company used on the OnePlus 13R and the 13s. Well, those are the numbers, but let’s see how the comparison plays out in the real world.
Let’s start with the 12.5MP resolution, which the OnePlus 15 is set to out of the box. Immediately, there are some noticeable differences between the two phones. You can see them handling the same scene in different ways due to the diverging philosophies on how to handle the image processing. The OnePlus 13 goes for a punchier look with heightened contrast that makes the image pop more. The tonal transitions are much more dramatic, so things like leaves look more dynamic with a wider dynamic range between the shimmering bright and the subdued dark areas. None of this comes at the cost of true dynamic range, as the older phone still manages to expose the shot correctly.
12.5MP main camera: OnePlus 15 • OnePlus 13
Meanwhile, the OnePlus 15 adopts the new processing philosophy that comes with its DetailMax Engine. The tonal transitions are more gradual, so the same leaves that looked three-dimensional and dynamic on the OnePlus 13 look almost monochrome on the OnePlus 15. There is less edge enhancement, so individual objects don’t stand out from each other as distinctly. The sharpening has also been dialed down to a point where it looks like there is barely any left.
The OnePlus 15 also deviates in the way it handles color. The OnePlus 13 has its Hasselblad-tuned colors that prioritize accuracy, or at least that’s what the spiel was. The OnePlus 15 forgoes that ideology and instead goes for punchier and warmer colors that stand out more than the OnePlus 13 colors. It’s not clear if this was done to offset the otherwise more natural look of the image. We are glad it gets rid of one annoyance with the OnePlus 13 images, which was a subtle magenta hue that afflicted all of its images. The OnePlus 15 sky may be bluer than it should be, but at least it’s not purple like on the 13.
The OnePlus 15 also fixes other longstanding issues with the OnePlus 13 camera, such as some amount of chromatic aberration around the corner of the frame. The OnePlus 13 camera would also get weirdly tripped by things like power lines and transmission towers, and simply skip processing the areas in and around these objects, something that does not happen with the OnePlus 15.
However, at the end of the day, all the software sophistication and maturity that the OnePlus 15 brings to the table cannot overcome good ol’ physics. The physically larger, more advanced sensor on the OnePlus 13 with its wider aperture simply soaks in more light. The OnePlus 15 images consistently have noise in the shadows, which the OnePlus 13 images don’t. This is even though the OnePlus 15 images have more detail-reducing noise reduction.
In fact, the details are a bit fuzzy to begin with; smartphone cameras and especially their optics aren’t good enough to naturally capture a ton of detail, which is why some sharpening is necessary. The OnePlus 13 camera inherently captures more detail and then applies less noise reduction to it, so the details pop more, especially with the reasonable amount of sharpening it uses. The OnePlus 15 doesn’t capture as much detail, has more noise reduction, and less sharpening, so the images always have a hazy look to them, especially around the periphery of the frame. This is especially borne out in the RAW files, where the OnePlus 13 surges way ahead with more detail and less noise, and the OnePlus 15, now stripped of its software tricks, cannot keep up.
26MP main camera: OnePlus 15 • OnePlus 13
The 26MP comparison is where things get more interesting. The OnePlus 15 has technically more detail now, simply by virtue of allocating more pixels to cover the same frame. However, the image processing on the OnePlus 15 is even more laid-back in this mode. Contrast is lower, and the image can look even fuzzier at times. It’s not clear if this is the intended look or, more likely, that processing these 26MP files takes quite a bit longer, so some processing was shaved off to keep the turnaround times quick. The phone definitely takes more time to capture and process these, even with the mighty Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 at the helm.
The result of this processing deficiency is that the 26MP files don’t always look meaningfully better than the 12.5MP files, let alone than the OnePlus 13 files. It’s a bigger, softer image, and while there is more latitude while cropping, the difference isn’t that big compared to the 12.5MP images. Moreover, the 26MP resolution is only available in select conditions; if the light levels are low, if you use Motion Photo, Retouch, filters, or if the planets are out of alignment, then the camera will automatically switch back down to 12.5MP, and there is no indication on the screen that this is happening. This sort of renders the 26MP mode a bit of a gimmick, and not something you should be taking super seriously. It’s probably why you need to enable it optionally, and it is not just on by default like on the iPhones.
Just to clarify, this 26MP mode is not the same as the 50MP mode that both phones have. That mode simply upscales the 12.5MP images to 50MP on both phones, and is absolutely useless. It probably only exists for legal reasons on phones, so people don’t go “why is my 50MP phone not taking 50MP photos?”.
Telephoto camera
The OnePlus 15 uses a 50MP Samsung ISOCELL JN5 sensor for its telephoto camera. It’s a 1/2.76” equivalent sensor with a 0.64 μm pixel size and f2.8 aperture. On the other hand, the OnePlus 13 used the 50MP Sony LYT-600 sensor with a 1/1.953” equivalent area and 0.8 µm pixel size. It also gets a faster f2.6 aperture. One other key difference here is that while the OnePlus 13 had a 73mm equivalent focal length, the OnePlus 15 gets 80mm equivalent, turning the 3x telephoto factor on the 13 to 3.5x on the 15.
12.5MP telephoto camera: OnePlus 15 • OnePlus 13
Let’s start by looking at the 12.5MP images first again. Here, we tended to prefer the look of the OnePlus 15 images in daylight for subjective reasons. The OnePlus 13’s processing gets ahead of itself here, and the images often look a bit overcooked. There isn’t a vast difference in sensor quality here as there was on the main cameras, and the only difference we noticed while looking at the RAW files is slightly lower noise on the 13 images. Because of this, the OnePlus 15 is able to easily keep up with the OnePlus 13 in telephoto comparison, and can often beat it in the overall look.
In the dark, the OnePlus 13 camera can flex its better low-light performance and produce generally better results. They still look a bit over-processed, but the OnePlus 15 images start to get muddy with garbled detail.
26MP telephoto camera: OnePlus 15 • OnePlus 13
With the 26MP mode, the OnePlus 15 telephoto can capture a good deal of detail, and distances itself further from the OnePlus 13. However, the 26MP mode on the telephoto camera is even more temperamental than on the main camera, so you need to be in absolutely perfect lighting (along with the other caveats) to be able to shoot in this resolution. Most of the images we shot in mixed lighting ended up in just 12.5MP mode.
You’d also notice parts of some images, such as the leaf on the ground, are blurry in the 26MP shots. That’s because the camera processing on the OnePlus 15 would glitch out randomly and just skip upscaling parts of the image, so some 26MP shots just have chunks that look blurry.
OnePlus 13 minimum focus • OnePlus 15 minimum focus • OnePlus 15 fake minimum focus
Neither camera has a particularly close focusing distance, but the OnePlus 15 can get a bit closer, which, coupled with its tighter crop, makes for slightly better close-ups. We noticed OnePlus plays a bit of a trick in the Master mode, where you can manually set focus. On the OnePlus 15, you can manually focus much closer than you can with autofocus. At first glance, we thought this was similar to how things worked on the Pixel 10 Pro XL. Later, we realized that the OnePlus 15 just slyly shifts to zooming digitally on the main camera when you adjust the focus, which felt needlessly conniving, especially when the differences in quality between a native telephoto shot and the zoomed-in main camera shot would become obvious once you looked at the images. This only happens on the 15 and not on the 13, even with the new OxygenOS 16 update.
Wide-angle camera
Finally, there’s the wide-angle camera. The OnePlus 15 uses a 50MP Omnivision OV50D sensor with an f2.0 aperture. It’s a 1/2.88” equivalent sensor with 0.612 µm pixel size. Meanwhile, the OnePlus 13 uses the same ISOCELL JN5 sensor for its ultra-wide lens that the OnePlus 15 used for its telephoto.
12.5MP ultra-wide camera: OnePlus 15 • OnePlus 13
Both phones capture average-looking images through their respective ultra-wide cameras. The differences are consistent with what we saw with the main camera, where the OnePlus 15 has more appealing colors but the OnePlus 13 has lower noise and slightly better detail. This is especially true in low light, where the OnePlus 13 can often look dramatically better than its successor.
The ultra-wide camera on the OnePlus 15 cannot capture 26MP images, so what you see with the 12.5MP files is the best it’s going to get.
Conclusion
There are more aspects to a camera phone than what we covered above. The rest was skipped primarily in the interests of time, as the above analysis itself required capturing and staring at about a thousand images from each phone, but also because the two phones were comparable in other areas. Both phones produced very similar-looking selfie images and videos. The OnePlus 15 does have a better video feature set, so if that’s what matters to you, then you can safely ignore everything else discussed here.
This exercise proved to be a fruitful one because it showcased what one can achieve with capable hardware versus software augmentations. The OnePlus 15 showed that you can take somewhat mediocre bits of hardware and get reasonable results if you have a sophisticated software stack. The new phone often produces pleasing results and may stand the test of time better, as people are slowly demanding less processed, more natural-looking images from their cameras.
On the other hand, the OnePlus 13 showed that there is still no substitute for good hardware. It had the more technically impressive results of the two, and you will especially love it if you shoot in RAW. You also might still prefer the way images look from this phone, as they have their own charm and instantly pop without needing to be edited. You can also just make the OnePlus 13 images look like the 15’s, but you can’t replicate the quality of the OnePlus 13 sensors.
In an ideal world, we would have liked to see the OnePlus 15 processing with the OnePlus 13’s (or ideally better) hardware. Instead, OnePlus decided to cut corners on the hardware and rely solely on software improvements, which feels like one step forward and two steps back. It’s becoming increasingly apparent that going forward, the OnePlus brand is set to play second fiddle to Oppo in key areas like the camera. This makes us wonder if the OnePlus 13 had the last true flagship-grade camera hardware from this company. If that’s the case, then it would truly be a sad thing for longtime fans of the brand.
