The smartphone cameras on the Samsung Galaxy line, Sony Z range and Apple iPhones are getting so good it's now almost not worth carrying a separate snapper for most things unless you have serious uses for it.
For fun out with friends, capturing your kids or just sharing your life with the world on social media, there's certainly nothing better than a smartphone.
But which handsets are packing the best cameras? Well, that depends on your definition. To help work out the best for you, you can stare at specs, do high-level investigation, use science – DxOMark is the camera world's top tester – and look at a selection of images and decide which you like most. Or just browse this list below.
Each smartphone has its own strengths with regard to image quality, usability and, of course, price, but all the phones below are worthy of your consideration.
Best for performance: Samsung Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge
Samsung's killer feature might not be the most obvious, but it actually makes a massive difference when you need to take a photo quickly. To activate camera mode, just double-press the home button and you're in, super-fast.
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Of course, getting into the camera quick is no good if the results are rubbish, and, happily, photos on the S6 are consistently strong.
Optical image stabilisation means that shots stay sharp and blur-free. The lens is designed to let in loads of light, which makes for good low-light shots, with the results having great colour and few compression problems.
DxOMark agrees on this, too – it's their best rated phone – and is without doubt the best all-round package for photography and phone combined.
Price:: from £559 (S6) and £749 (S6 Edge)
Best for selfies: LG G4
The camera in LG's G3 was fairly good, but not great. However, its successor's 16-megapixel image capture and excellent colour reproduction can produce some truly stunning results. But the area where a lot of thought has gone is on the front-facing camera, to set you up for selfies.
The G4 not only has an 8-megapixel front-facing cam but enables you to take snaps via motion control by making a making a fist and then opening it. That starts a countdown, after which the phone snaps you. You can even do the same gesture twice to make it shoot a series of selfies for you to select the best.
Elsewhere, it's solid but just not quite as good as Samsung's efforts, often trying to find a unique take for the sake of it. LG's take on the "double tap to launch", for instance, has you holding the down the phone's rear button on the rear of the phone, seeing it load and shoot a picture in one motion.
It's a nice idea in theory, but it's fairly slow in truth and your shots can end up being a bit variable as it's hard to judge when the camera will actually take the snap.
Price:: from £480
Best for creativity: iPhone 6 and 6 Plus
Apple's most recent phones both perform beautifully despite the relatively low 8-megapixel rear camera (that's just size, remember). A variety of sensors and a dual LED flash help it outperform its paper specs, with a camera app as simple yet as powerful as any native one on the market.
Of course, away from Apple's own camera, the App Store is full of third-party apps for almost limitless options of photography, filming, editing and general image tomfoolery. It's a real treasure trove of an ecosystem, whether you're after hipster filters or pro-level performance. But then you are paying top whack for the phones.
The real difference between the two devices, in fact, is that the 6 Plus has a major advantage with optical image stabilisation, which shuns to auto variety to really boost clarity in low lights. Of course, you have to saddle yourself with a beast of a handset for the pleasure, but at least you have the option.
Price:: from £539 (iPhone 6) and £619 (iPhone 6 Plus)
A camera phone for everyone: Sony Xperia Z range
When it comes to photos, anything from the Xperia Z range of Sony mobile phones is a really safe bet. The Exmor sensors are all the same, at least in megapixel terms, with a whopping 20.7 squeezed in. Both capture 4K video too, although the phones use different software and processing to get their images just so.
DxOMark says that the Z3 is better, as you would expect from a more recent model, but the Z2 and even the Z1 are still very good camera options. This is no real surprise as Sony is one of the greatest imaging specialists in the world, producing more broadcast TV cameras and cinema cameras - not to mention sensors - for other companies than any of its rivals.
So think of the Z1 as a solid second phone for festivals, the Z2 a good choice for those on a budget and the Z3 the leader. The Z3 it will soon be semi-retired to allow the Xperia Z3+ to make its mark, so keep an eye out for price drops.
Price:: from £220 (Z1), £329 (Z2) and £499 (Z3)
Which smartphone cameras should you avoid?
Well, DxOMark believes that the cameras in the HTC One M8 and M9 are a little underwhelming for all their fanfare over "ultra pixels", and we find it hard to disagree. They're not terrible, you'll get by - but if you're really buying with photography in mind, they're just not up to the standard of these other high-end handsets.
Also, let's spare a thought for the former all-conquering Lumia 1020, with that amazing Pureview sensor that manages 40 megapixels of final image resolution. However, it's really knocking on now and the software side is becoming a problem. Indeed, Microsoft's absence at the top of DxOMark's camera-phone league, despite having bought the top of the phone camera chops in Nokia, is hard to ignore.
