[Xperia Z3 General] One Twelve:
aka my eyes do not deceive me. I know what i'm seeing and i don't need some stinking org to tell me otherwise :D

If you are trained then there is less chance otherwise you can be made to believe anything. Awareness or knowledge matters.

Be very sceptical of these shootouts by gsmarena, phonearena or any other arena because they are all auto-shootouts. If the camera gets tricked and it can happen with the best of dslrs in tricky lighting they do not make adjustments. They do not correct it. If they did the differences would be much smaller than they make and they will not have some dramatic headline to attract you.

So the result from auto which depends on a number of variables is chosen as the final result and a judgement is made. See the streetlight closeup in Scene 1 with the 6 different images. There is a varation in exposure. In some the sky is overexposed and with iphone it is underexposed. Which is the correct one. Only the guy who took the shot knows and he did not adjust exposure or metering to achieve the desired result. So the biggest problem with these comparisons is we never get to see the best the camera can do. It is a random lucky pick, where one may get it right and is deemed the winner another might get it wrong but has the ability to correct but is still considered a loser. This camera owns that and so on as far as this round is concerned.

See, the 'evidence' with your own eyes :)

What happens when the best camera they chose gets it wrong in your hands and it will at some point then what do you do. Oh you must get this latest device it is so much better than previous model !!!

Now this is a tricky lighting situation. The foreground which is the gate and adjoining wall is in shadow. But the background tree with leaves is well lit. There is a major difference in lighting between foreground & background. The question is which do you expose for. Depends on the subject. What is the subject.

The Z's and htc one do good in low light because they are more sensitive. This means in strong lighting they will overexpose easily which is the case here. If you overexpose you lose data and cannot get it back so the result looks bad. What i find misleading with this photo is presumably one is exposing for the gate and wall in the foreground. But why did they choose to highlight the leaves at the back which are well lit ? what was the point.

If you expose for one then the other will be either underexposed or overexposed. The only difference is a matter of degree. So to get a better shot they should have used exp compensation or even different metering. But no, they stuck with auto because that is what everybody will do. Now, if manual controls are missing then this is the best you will get like with G3. You cannot do better. But if controls are available then you must use them to get a better shot. Had they done this all photos from the devices would look better than auto.

This is a good exampe where HDR can be used. All you need to do is take the shot so dynamic range is preserved, then make copies of the shot in post, add +1 and -1 exp comp then blend manually yourself. The one in the camera will do an average job. If you do it manually you will have more control and get better results with any camera. Bracketing would be a useful feature to have in this situation.

The idea that the camera knows everything and you know nothing is the problem. Marketing makes you believe that . But who takes the shot matters much more. They won't tell you this because then people will say oh i have to know so much why computer cant do it.