The IS adds to its versatility and convenience—you can take close ups of small insects, use it indoors at a nightclub and capture shots that would otherwise be completely blurry without a tripod.

In short, the PowerShot SD870 IS Digital Elph is one of the best compact cameras we’ve used in some time. Users looking to purchase a pocketable camera requiring a minimum of fuss will be pleased with this model.

The camera’s image quality is generally very good, especially considering its use of a genuinely wideangle lens. A reasonable amount of manual control for what is ostensibly a point and shoot camera means that occasional metering difficulty in tricky scenes can be compensated for, but does require the user to concentrate on what they’re doing.