We expect Samsung's Galaxy S22 to feature a camera upgrade, but it may not include the best smartphone camera technology Samsung just unveiled: the highest-resolution cell phone camera sensor it has ever produced.

Samsung's new ISOCELL camera will bring enhanced photography capabilities to the smartphones that will eventually use it; the Galaxy S22 may not be included, but many other companies that buy cameras from Samsung will be able to make good use of these sensors in the future. In 2022, expect future smartphones to have great rear camera sensors.

The ISOCELL HP1 sensor is primarily a 200MP sensor. However, it is also capable of pixel binning (combining information from multiple pixels into a single virtual "superpixel"), which allows it to capture 50MP images at 4 pixels at a time or 12.5MP images at 16 pixels at a time for improved low light photography. This feature has a dramatic "chameleon cell" sound to it.

The HP1 can also record 8K video at 30 frames per second using the 50MP mode. Samsung says this only reduces the field of view to a minimum and should make it easy to capture all the action you want to record.

Joining the HP1 is the ISOCELL GN5, a 50MP sensor that uses larger 1 micrometer (μm) pixels (the HP1 has 0.64 μm pixels). This larger pixel should be useful for capturing low-light images. However, the main new feature of the GN5 is its dual-pixel pro autofocus, which Samsung promises will capture sharper images at ultra-fast speeds.

It may still be months before we see these new sensors in phones that we can actually buy. Aside from Samsung's own phones, Samsung's cameras are also found in phones from Xiaomi, Motorola, Vivo, ZTE, and other smaller brands. Within the next year, phones from these companies will have one or both of these sensors.

Not long ago, there were rumors that the Galaxy S22 Ultra would feature a 200MP camera sensor, which is probably what this sensor is. However, more recent rumors have Samsung again using a 108MP camera, but a more sophisticated model than the one used in the Galaxy S21 Ultra, Galaxy Note 20 Ultra, and Galaxy S20 Ultra.

Even with only 108MP, Samsung offers the highest megapixel count obtainable in any phone, along with several other phones that use the same sensor. However, thanks to Apple's amazing iPhone 12 Pro Max camera while taking one of the top spots for our best camera phone, none of Samsung's Ultra phones are in first place yet.

We expect to hear more about the Galaxy S22 in the coming months leading up to the expected January launch period. So far, however, we have heard rumors of a more powerful Snapdragon 895 chipset, an under-display camera (like the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 3), and possibly a smaller display. Hopefully, all of these features will combine to create a series of models that can compete with the upcoming iPhone 13 and Google Pixel 6, and turn around Samsung's disappointing flagship sales over the past year.