The Nexus 5 was an amazing phone for its time. For $350 you could get an unlocked phone with stock Android and a phenomenal camera. It was only 8 megapixels, but it had features like HDR+ and OIS, which were revolutionary for 2013.

Unfortunately, over the summer my Nexus 5 died and I needed to get a new phone. I wanted to get a phone with a good camera, but it didn’t feel right spending $600+ on a flagship phone. I ended up trying the Moto E4. It’s an amazing phone for $129, but I didn’t like the camera, so I decided to upgrade to a Cyber Monday Moto G5+ for ~$200. It has a Sony IMX362, the same sensor that’s in the Pixel 2. The f/1.7 lens is great too. The camera doesn’t have OIS, and it lacks a lot of the hardware-based image post-processing present in the Pixel line, but it seemed like a decent compromise to me.

Meanwhile, my wife just upgraded her Nexus 5 to an iPhone SE. The iPhone SE has the same camera as the iPhone 6s, which has been favorably reviewed.

With 5 different cameras, I decided to take some comparison shots. read more »