When you spend more than $1,000 on a smartphone, you expect great cameras as part of the package. It's not enough to offer a decent point-and-shoot experience at this level.

To truly stand out, today's smartphones have to pack pro-level camera performance into impossibly small bodies, leveraging dedicated image-processing hardware and software to make even rookie photographers look competent.

No two rivals represent this arms race better than Apple's iPhone 17 Pro and Google's Pixel 10 Pro XL . These flagship models represent not just the high end of each line but also the role models for other companies to follow, particularly the Pixel 10 Pro XL, since Google makes Android. (For a look at how the iPhone compares against another leading camera phone, the Samsung

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