The Samsung A72 achieves only average performance level. The wide-angle camera works rock solid, without any high or low points. As a normal camera, it is a disappointment. With the A72, you should then rather reach for the tele, which also only delivers usable pictures in brightness. This basically also applies to the ultra-wide-angle module, which, however, always requires a "greater willingness to compromise".

Wide angle (main camera) – 1.8/5.2 mm lens

(35mm equivalent: 26 mm), 64 MP sensor, JPEG with 64 or 16 MP

Samsung once again uses a wide-angle camera with a 64 MP quad sensor as the main camera, but it delivers pictures with 64 or 16 MP resolution here. The pictures with 16 megapixels achieve a better score than the 64 MP files on all measured brightness levels. In high light, the maximum resolution is an option. The signal processing, which is unfortunately almost always too motivated at work in Samsung, can preserve finer details a bit better in the 64 MP pictures, although the A72 cannot keep up with.  Th Samsung S21/S21+. Apart from a too hard tuning, the JPEGs with 16 megapixels deliver an average quality here.
With decreasing light, one should switch to the 16 MP resolution, because then 64 megapixels no longer offer any advantages, but occupy more storage space. Compared to the pictures taken in high light, the fine details drop visibly. Samsung still keeps the noise low, but structures are lost in the process. When it gets dark (5 lux), the wide-angle camera goes into night mode, which converts the sensor data into 12 MP images. This cannot prevent a further drop in image quality, but the results are quite okay.

Normal focal length – 1.8/5.2 mm lens 

(35mm equivalent: 52 mm), 64 MP sensor, JPEG with 16 MP

When used as the dual zoom the wide-angle-camera uses the center area of sensor. The result is always photos with 16 megapixels - but with surprising differences between the A52 and A72. Although both devices use the same wide-angle camera and both score almost the same in the wide-angle measurement, the signal tuning is now different. The A52 handles details more gently than the A72, which intervenes more strongly and also quite roughly. Thus, the result is clearly in favor of the A52, whose shots simply show more drawing. The normal focal length of the A72 loses too much resolution compared to the wide-angle module, even in bright light.

Tele lens – 2.4/7.1 mm LENS

(35mm equivalent: 78 mm), 8 MP sensor, JPEG with 8 MP

Like the Oneplus 9 Pro, the A72 is equipped with an 8 MP telephoto camera, here designed as an optical triple zoom with image stabilizer. The A52 model also uses the wide-angle camera for longer zoom levels.
In itself, an extra camera is good and also proves itself in certain scenarios. Compared to other telephoto units, the A72's nevertheless performs poorly and ends up in one of the rear places. In high light, the aggressive signal processing ensures crisply tuned images without noise and with hard edges. But this is at the expense of fine detail. The detail level is lower than Oneplus 9 Pro and can be called satisfactory at best. Nevertheless, the optics are suitable for portraits - as long as you image subjects large. 
In lower light (200 lux), artifacts and noise increase and the detail drawing is reduced significantly. In darkness, the device automatically switches to the wide-angle camera and then photographs the scene with a digital zoom whose resolution is interpolated to 12 megapixels. The result is correspondingly disappointing. 

Super wide angle – 2.2/1.7 mm lens

(35mm equivalent: 13 mm), 12 MP sensor, JPEG with 12 MP

Samsung equips the A52 and the A72 with the same 12 MP ultra-wide-angle module. Both devices perform very similarly in the lab. Compared to the A32 and its 8 MP ultra-wide-angle module, the image quality of both smartphones takes a little step forward. The ultra-wide-angle camera is not good in bright light, but it is still usable. The pictures look slightly washed out - Samsung holds back a bit more than usual with contrast enhancement. Distortion is also corrected better than in Samsung's A32, so vertical lines are reproduced almost without curvature. However, the detail level is too low to satisfy photographers. As expected, the quality decreases with decreasing light - then we advise to switch to the wide-angle-camera.

SAMPLE PHOTOS

Wide angle (main camera) – 1.8/5.2 mm lens (16 MP JPEGs)

Normal focal length – 1.8/5.2 mm lens (16 MP JPEGS)

Tele lens – 2.4/7.1 mm LENS (8 MP JPEGS)

Super wide angle – 2.2/1.7 mm lenS (12 MP JPEGS)