How is a phone compared to an insane external lens with the S23 Ultra’s Zoom camera?

The Live X200 Ultra Is a great camera phone in itself (if you are willing to import it), to a small extent because of the impressive 200MP 3.7X Periscope camera. However, the company switches things up by offering an optional External lens For even better zoom.

The X200 Ultra’s 2.35x Teleoto Converter lens makes the phone’s 200MP Periscope camera effectively a ~ 8.6x shooter. I thought it would be a good idea to compare this lens with the Galaxy S23 Ultra, which was the last of Samsung’s flagship with a dedicated 10x camera (10MP). I did not expect S23 Ultra to keep very well, but here it is.

Is it a surprise that I think the Vivo X200 Ultra and its external lens easily beat the two-year-old Galaxy S23 Ultra’s 10x camera in the comparisons above? Certainly not, I compare a flagship 2023 with a brand new Flagship phone with a bulky lens. Samsung’s 10x and 30x images are washed out and lack details compared to the Vivo images.

You can see this difference most clearly in the second set of pictures, as I can find out “1919” on the mini-sprouted tower in the Vivo picture. I also like the sea in the other Vivo picture, which looks like a painting in the Samsung picture. Samsung’s 10x image also contains plenty of noise in the dark parts of the stage. However, Vivo’s pictures are a bit too contrast to my taste, so it’s not a complete victory here.

You can take a closer look at the difference in definition via the comparison below. In fact, I can see the cable car inside the station with Vivo unlike a dollop of galaxy. When you say it, the X200 ultra’s heavy -handed image processing is clearly clear. The phone’s AI-driven processing appears to be struggling with complex nature, resulting in these overlooked, almost striped textures in the mountains. I would like to see the company take a step back with this aggressive imaging processing in several situations.

What about people, though? Well, the good news is that the X200 Ultra’s lens offers a shallow depth of field sharpness without having to switch to portrait mode. This gives the stage a good level of depth due to the blurry background, while the S23 Ultra’s rendering seems flatter for comparison. This is also clear when zooming in to 30x and 800mm.

The X200 Ultra images also show significantly more details, so I can crop a little further and still end up with a decent image. On the other hand, S23 ultra’s images simply lack the same level of clarity and are significantly noisy. It is not a pure swipe for the vivo hand and lens. None of the phones caught really accurate skin tones here, but the Galaxy S23 Ultra came closer to the actual stage of 10 times. I also noticed web-like objects in the 800mm vivo picture around the left ear. It is a very small problem and not something you want to see unless you are really pixel, but it is worth pointing out anyway.

When I compared lens -free X200 Pro to Galaxy S23 Ultra Earlier this year, I thought Vivo was really able to stretch the advantage over Samsung in low light. So what happens when you add an external lens to the mixture?

The first set of images highlights one of Vivo’s traditional forces, namely its ability to tame light sources in low light. Meanwhile, the signage in S23 Ultra’s image is blown out. Vivos Snap also gives us a much clearer look at the building’s artwork. None of the phones manage to stay noise-free in this challenging stage, but you don’t have to zoom in to see it on the Samsung picture.

The second set of images reveals a bigger difference, as noise dominates the Samsung image while Vivo’s aggressive noise reduction pays off in this situation. I can also create different pieces of text in the X200 Ultra’s Image, which is a testimony to the details offered here. You can see photos with full resolution from each phone via our Google Drive -folder.

It really is no surprise that the Vivo X200 Ultra and its bulky telecommunications lens came out on top in this comparison. In fact, I would be more concerned if this was a closer battle. The combination of the 200MP 3.7X camera and external lens result in significantly better image quality, especially in long range and in low light. However, it was not a flawless victory for Vivo, due to the occasional imaging problem.

If anything, this shooting exchange makes me sad that we haven’t seen a Camera Since the Galaxy S23 ultra with a proper 10x zoom shooter. I don’t think a modern 10x camera would actually beat the X200 Ultra and its giant lens, but updated hardware and more sensible image processing will certainly help get much closer. So my fingers are crossed for more 10x cameras in 2026.