More Samsung phones are getting an awesome free upgrade for their cameras

Good news for Samsung Galaxy S22 buyers and owners of several of the other best Samsung phones: an app that was previously only available on the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra is coming to your phone too. If you're serious about snapping, it's a really welcome upgrade – and it won't cost you a penny.

The app is called Expert RAW, and it's similar to the ProRAW on Apple phones such as the iPhone 13 Pro. It enables you to capture images in the high-quality raw photo format across all your camera lenses, and the results are particularly impressive with zoomed photos. It also adds high-quality lossless JPEG support and manual control over settings including shutter speed, white balance, exposure compensation and HDR.

A free upgrade for millions of Samsung phones

Expert RAW is coming to the Samsung Galaxy S22 range from 25 February, before rolling out to other devices later this year. The Galaxy Z Fold 3 will get Expert RAW in April, and the Galaxy S20 Ultra, Galaxy Note 20 Ultra and Z Fold 2 will get the app by the summertime.

That means the app is going to be available to millions of Samsung phone users, but unfortunately it won't be available on every smartphone: taking raw photos needs a lot of horsepower as well as specific camera hardware, and not every phone has it.  

According to the Samsung Community notice, If your phone doesn't have an Exynos 990 or SM8250 processor later along with 8GB of RAM and at least 2x zoom on your telephoto lens, Expert RAW won't be coming to your device – so unfortunately if you've got a regular Galaxy S20 or S21, Expert RAW probably won't be coming to your phone. 

At least, not right now – Samsung has had to assess carefully which phones can handle it, and it's always possible they'll be able to bring it to more handsets. Just don't hold you breath.