Who else expected the "certain elements in the shot to be out of focus" link to lead to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bokeh ?

If you don't want any frame stacking, you'd need to use a dedicated camera instead of a smartphone, because a smartphone without HDR isn't viable.

I have an old Android with a 13MP camera (Sony IMX214, 1/3.06") that leaves HDR off by default. I haven't had a need to turn HDR on except if I'm trying to photograph something with regions of extreme contrast.