GoKawiilThe Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra is one of the best phones you can buy in 2026, and if you already own one, I have some positive news for you: Your phone can take better photos than it does right now.
Samsung added a larger aperture (on two sensors) and upgraded its camera processing to fare better against Apple's iPhone 17 Pro this year. However, if you haven't played around with the settings, you aren't making the most of Samsung's new upgrades.
The Galaxy S26 Ultra has a versatile camera system, but the default settings might not work for everyone. They didn't for me. So I took a deep dive into the buried menus and found ways to improve the shutter speed, reduce compression and trigger the 24-megapixel processing pipeline, among other things. If you aren't satisfied with the image quality on your Samsung phone right now, I recommend taking a look at these options in the Samsung Camera Assistant.
Locate the Camera Assistant settings
Change these Camera Assistant settings to get the most out of your Galaxy S26 Ultra cameras. Prakhar Khanna/CNET
The Camera Assistant on Galaxy smartphones is a Good Lock module (essentially like a plugin). It adds additional settings to the default Camera app. For the longest time, Samsung didn't preload these settings on its flagship phones, but things have changed with One UI 8.5 on the latest Samsung flagships. You can now find the Camera Assistant settings within the Camera app.
To find these additional settings:
Open the Camera app. Tap on the four-dot icon to get the menu. Tap on Settings. Scroll to the Camera Assistant. Tap on it. It'll take you to the Samsung Galaxy Store with a pop-up for Camera Assistant. Tap on Install.
However, if it is not present here, you'll need to install the Good Lock app through the Galaxy Store. Search for Camera Assistant and download the module from there.
Once located, you're now ready to take control over the processing and camera performance. Several of these options aren't objectively better than the other, but here's what I recommend changing and which setting could fit in what scenario.
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