can the galaxy s21 plus give the iphone 12 pro a run for its money both are extremely capable and pack some of the best hardware and software available into two beautiful bodies each phone also has features that are unique so this video will help you choose the phone that best fits your needs we’re going to compare these two phones we’re going to talk about what’s good what’s bad and ultimately which one you should spend your hard earned money on we’ll get to the price and configuration later on in the video but in the us both phones start at 999 dollars with 128 gigs of storage and in each section i’m going to cover the specs and the features and then talk about how they relate to real life use now kicking off this comparison let’s talk about the cameras which i consider to be the main reason why people upgrade their phones and you’ll see that this ends up being a split decision now both phones feature triple camera setups and both are capable of capturing beautiful images even in challenging lighting conditions the iphone 12 comes with three 12 megapixel cameras an f 2.8 ultra wide an f 1.6 wide and a 2x optical zoom f 2.0 telephoto now if you’re not a big camera nerd like this guy when you see aperture numbers like f 2.4 or f 1.
6 we’re talking about the size of the opening in the lens and a smaller number means a bigger opening and the important part is that the larger opening lets in more light which gives you cleaner images and better low light performance and speaking of conditions where there isn’t a lot of light the iphone 12 pro also adds a lidar scanner to help improve low light autofocus now moving on to the s21 plus we have a 12 megapixel f 2.2 ultra wide a 12 megapixel f 1.8 wide and a 3x 64 megapixel f 2.0 telephoto this telephoto camera can also give us a total of 30x zoom when combining the zoom in the lens with digital zoom as we normally see in the camera world the specs only tell part of the story and i suggest that you focus on see what i did there actual results and user experience because at the end of the day you probably don’t care about any of these numbers you just want really nice photos and videos and in the past this was a landslide in favor of the iphone but samsung has made some pretty serious improvements like could you tell which photo was which the iphone photos seem a little more natural to me and i like the skin tones better and to me they appear to be a little less artificially processed and don’t get me wrong they’re definitely both heavily processed it’s just that the computational photography on the iphone is more to my liking but it comes down to which photos you like better because if i told you that a
certain photo is better than another one because it’s got better dynamic range and there’s more detail in the shadows and the highlights would that actually matter to you if you like the other photo better and this is why i wanted to give you enough photos to help you choose and by the way camera one was the iphone 12 pro now when it comes to video the choice is a little less clear the s21 plus can shoot at up to 8k at 24 frames per second but the video quality on the iphone 12 pro is just superior again i’ll show you some samples to demonstrate the difference and definitely let me know which one you like better now i’m clearly into video i like gear and lighting and all that stuff and i’ve always been a proponent of resolution isn’t everything resolution is simply the number of pixels that you’re capturing that’s it it doesn’t actually have anything to do with the quality of the footage now when shooting 4k on both phones i absolutely prefer the results i get from the iphone 12 pro but wait there’s more where samsung comes swinging back is with software features and we already talked about the additional magnification of the telephoto lens but we’re also getting one of my favorite video features on any phone director’s view so you can shoot video while on the right side of the screen you’re getting previews from all three cameras you can
switch between camera to camera while recording and then get either a wider view of the scene or the ability to zoom in on a subject now the next level of this feature is that you can also turn on the front-facing camera so now you’re recording with the back and the front at the same time and this way with picture in picture you can capture your reaction to what you’re showing at the same time i think this is a great feature that a lot of people are gonna like having now ultimately i think that the iphone has better image and video quality and the s21 plus has more powerful features so it comes down to what you prioritize now moving on to the design apple and samsung took drastically different approaches here like all four of the latest models the iphone 12 pro features a squared off design and similar to what we see on the ipad pro and the ipad air 4.
We’ve got an aluminum frame with a really nice matte back and i chose graphite for mine i really like this shiny frame in concept but it will absolutely pick up every single fingerprint so i end up liking the matte frame on the iphone 12 and the iphone 12 me the front glass is made of what apple calls ceramic shield which is supposed to make it less resistant to cracks now the s21 plus features a more rounded edge design with glass on the front and the back and i love the frosted glass look on the back and i chose to go with phantom black because come on it looks sweet now overall i think that this is a super sharp looking phone and i’m curious to know which design you guys like better as far as handling the iphone 12 pro is noticeably smaller i almost dropped it but it is noticeably smaller and if you have smaller hands or if you just prefer a smaller device take that into account and i was surprised that the s21 plus didn’t feel too big and it’s actually really comfortable to hold and to use now without a case i actually like the s21 plus better it’s a little slimmer on the edges and the rounded design is just more comfortable than the squared off it’s like it’s kind of sharp on the iphone 12 pro if you go ahead and add a case which i do to every single phone that i own because otherwise i’d break it then it doesn’t really matter because you’re holding on to the case now looking at the design of the camera modules both phones offer three rear-facing cameras apple opted for a squared off camera module and samsung chose to go with an elongated module that blends seamlessly into the side of the phone now moving on to the display the iphone 12 pro uses a 6.
1 inch 2532 by 1170 pixel super retina xdr display we’re getting a 60 hertz refresh rate and the top of the display features a pretty noticeable notch which houses the speaker and the front-facing camera the s21 plus has a 6.7 inch 2400 by 1080 dynamic amoled 2x display with a variable refresh rate of 48 to 120 hertz we’ve got the infinity o design with smaller bezels and samsung took a different approach with the punch hole for the front-facing camera now as far as the design of the screen i prefer the s21 plus because the camera is so much less intrusive and it creates more of an immersive user experience when you’re watching content or playing games i also prefer the adaptive refresh rate on the s21 plus it’s able to reduce the frame rate to 48 hertz and then save on battery life and when you need a more fluid user interface or smoother video playback or more responsive gaming then it can bump that up to 120 hertz you can definitely notice this faster and more responsive display even when you’re just opening apps or scrolling there’s absolutely nothing wrong with the 60 hertz display on the iphone 12 pro it’s bright it’s crisp it’s color accurate and it’s a higher resolution but i do prefer the one on the s21 plus for everyday use because of the
higher refresh rate now if you’ve gotten value from this video give it a thumbs up it lets me know what kind of content you like so that i can make more of it and i still see that over 90 of you are new viewers so hit that subscribe button now as far as performance it’s really hard to complain about either of these phones the iphone 12 pro comes with the a14 bionic chip and the s21 plus comes with the snapdragon 888 the iphone outperforms the s21 plus for single core performance and the s21 plus gets a higher multi-core performance if you care about benchmarks the s21 plus also comes with more ram at eight versus six gigs on the iphone 12 pro now when actually using both phones they’re snappy they open switched between and then closed apps really quickly and this difference in ram didn’t create a meaningful difference i’m not going to get into the operating system itself because that’s more of a personal preference where both systems have their pros and cons i will mention that apple does have longer support of their devices so if you tend to keep your phones for more than three years that may be a consideration app support is again specific to each user so if you have certain apps that you must have just make sure that they’re available for the phone that you choose now one thing i absolutely love about the s21 plus is the ability to multitask so you can have two apps open at the same time
either stacked or side by side and that has been super useful for me like there are times when i’m replying to text or to an email and then i need to reference either a website or a document and this way i can just have them both open at the same time i can copy and paste if i need to without having to like open and close the app and so again this is a feature that i end up using all the time now something that i like about the iphone and how it interacts with the rest of the apple ecosystem is airdrop it’s crazy easy for me to just share content between devices i can just airdrop it to my ipad or to my macbook it doesn’t matter it’s super easy and i know that it can be accomplished on the s21 plus as well but it’s a little more streamlined with the iphone as far as biometric authentication we’re getting face id on the iphone 12 pro which is fast accurate and works great in most situations the s21 plus has face recognition and an in-screen fingerprint sensor which again works great in situations where your face may be covered now i’m going to give the edge to the s21 plus because it does give you both options and i do want to mention that i like the fact that apple added the iphone unlock feature if you own an apple watch now as far as battery the iphone 12 pro has a 2 815 milliamp hour battery versus the 4800 on the s21 plus and in my testing the s21 plus got an additional 45 minutes to an hour of battery life now the other phone comes with a charging adapter the s21 plus
charges using a usb c cable and it supports up to 25 watts fast charging now the iphone 12 pro still uses a lightning cable with a maximum of 20 watts now both phones can be charged wirelessly and of course the iphone 12 pro also supports apple’s maxi next i want to talk about gaming and as far as performance both phones did a great job the a14 chip on the iphone 12 pro and the snapdragon 888 were plenty powerful to provide smooth gameplay without dropping frames or lagging i found the s21 plus to be more comfortable to hold again because of the rounded edge design and as time went on this became more and more noticeable the iphone 12 pro also overheated faster and that led to the display dimming in order to keep the phone cooler now this pretty much made some games unplayable or at the very least extremely challenging it was significantly harder to see the other players and in many games that’s the difference between winning and losing the display on the s21 plus is also larger so it’s easier to see it has smaller bezels and a punch hole camera instead of a large notch so it’s definitely more of an immersive gaming experience and then on top of that of course it has 120 hertz maximum refresh rate so when games can take advantage of that that’s a bonus remember that i have links in the description to all the products i talked about hopefully this video was helpful click on my face to subscribe and then watch one of these videos you know what i always say buy it nice or buy twice good luck and see you soon
Read More: iPAD or LAPTOP – M1 iPad Pro or M1 MacBook?
