Expect a new front camera sensor and improved software for portrait videos
With just over a week separating us from its official unveiling at Unpacked on February 1, anticipation around the Samsung Galaxy S23 series is becoming palpable. Leaks have painted an increasingly clear picture of the new flagship lineup, with specs spilled, retail packaging revealed, and pricing plans made public. We even know a lot about the impressive new hardware being used to power the rear camera in the S23 Ultra, but we hadn’t heard much about the all-important front-facing camera — that is, until now.
Prolific Samsung leaker Ice Universe shared some details on Twitter about a new sensor Samsung’s using in the Galaxy S23 Ultra’s selfie camera. Last year’s Galaxy S22 Ultra used a 40MP ISOCELL Slim GH1 (model S5KGH1) as its front camera. This year, though, the S23 Ultra looks like it’s moving to a 12MP sensor with the part number S5K3LU. This could be seen as backing up a previous leak which claimed the new phone’s camera would have a wider field of view.
At first glance, the reduction in overall resolution might stand out as a downgrade, but last year’s model used pixel binning to merge data from adjacent pixels, giving the Galaxy S23 Ultra’s selfie cam an effective resolution of 10MP in most photos. This new sensor would hopefully use larger pixels to gather light more accurately, reducing the need for pixel binning while still upping the total resolution in finalized photos.
Ice Universe also took to Chinese social media site Weibo to share some more S23 Ultra selfie cam news (via 9to5Google). The front-facing camera should now be able to capture 4K video at 30fps, and this will be supplemented by improved edge tracking for portrait mode videos. The software feature, popularized by Apple, adds a bit of background blur to videos to simulate a bokeh effect. While this was included in the Galaxy S22 series, Samsung has allegedly improved the software’s ability to differentiate between the background and the subject of the video.
These changes, combined with all of the exciting features and specs we’ve seen in previous leaks, will surely help the Galaxy S23 Ultra rank highly among the best Android phones in 2023. No phone is ever perfect, but the balance of fixes and flaws in Samsung’s 2023 flagship seem to be tipping in the Galaxy S23’s favor.
