Why can’t phone cameras take pictures the way I see things at night, even though they can adjust for brightness?

Question

Why can’t phone cameras take pictures the way I see things at night, even though they can adjust for brightness?

In: Technology

Answer 1

Camera sensors are typically not sensitive enough to pick out details from very low light scenes. Human eyes aren’t well suited for low light either, considering that many more animals have better night vision performance than us, but we still have better eyes than cell phone cameras. There are cameras that are more suited for low light, but they often have very poor *normal* light performance. So making one that can do it all is pretty difficult.