In the good old days, you had to be careful enough to carry a point and shoot camera to a holiday or a party where you wanted to capture timeless memories in the form of photographs. As a result, you often missed out on some of the most beautiful moments because let’s face it, even if you have the best of memory, you are bound to forget such things once in a while.

Then came camera phones which changed things quite a bit. However, in the initial stages, the cameras weren’t all that great and people usually preferred to use a traditional camera instead. Over the years, the quality and specifications of in built phone cameras have improved radically, so much so that some of them are as good as point and shoot cameras.

Here is a list of the best camera phones available in the market as of now:

1. Apple iPhone 5- Soon after the Apple iPhone 5 was launched, people were already calling it the best smartphone around. The Apple iPhone 5 is certainly a complete phone as it offers excellence in every department including its camera. It comes with an 8 megapixel camera and a new sapphire crystal lens. The new iPhone also features dynamic lighting and image stabilization, making way for better quality photos. Significantly, the quality of photos doesn’t depreciate too much in low lighting and you can also click photos while shooting in video mode.

2. Nokia Pure View 808- If we were to consider just the camera and nothing else, the Nokia Pure View 808 with the much talked about 41 megapixel camera would be the best investment. The great part about the camera is that it lives up to its hype. The photos are sharp and the precision of detail is impeccable. The phone’s camera has an extra large sensor which lets more light in and captures more detail in a photo. This is backed by an equally efficient software to process the photos. On the flip side, the phone has some major problems like the Symbian OS is largely outdated, the outer body is bulky and the price is extremely high.

3. HTC One S- In the recent past, HTC has produced some excellent camera phones including HTC One X, One  S and HTC Amaze 4G. HTC One S has an 8 megapixel autofocus camera with a 28mm wide lens. The camera produces high quality, razor sharp photos both indoors and outdoors and just like iPhone 5, it allows you to take photos in the video shooting mode as well.

4. Samsung Galaxy SIII- Samsung Galaxy SIII is another big player in the smartphone world. The 8 megapixel camera is endowed with backlit sensor and LED flash.  The colors of the photos taken with this camera are bright and well defined. Additionally, the shutter lag is next to zero which means that the photos are processed almost instantly. Even the front facing camera manages to produce some very decent photos.