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Huawei P9 review: aiming for the big boys but just missing on software
4 / 5 stars
Latest flagship smartphone from Chinese manufacturer has premium build, excellent Leica camera, fast fingerprint scanner – but its EMUI software is not quite up to scratch
huawei p9
The Huawei P9 feels great in the hand with its 5.2in screen and aluminium body. Photograph: Samuel Gibbs for the Guardian
Samuel Gibbs
Monday 18 April 2016 07.00 BST Last modified on Monday 18 April 2016 09.44 BST
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Huawei’s latest flagship smartphone, the P9, goes toe-to-toe with the best of Samsung and Apple, while undercutting the lot.
At least that’s Huawei’s aim. Being the third-largest smartphone manufacturer in the world, it wants a larger slice of the high-end market. Previous efforts, including last year’s P8, were decent if not standout. The P9 is a different story.
Smooth and good looking
huawei p9 review
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The Huawei P9 has a slim metal body, USB-C port and a so-called 2.5D glass front that is slightly rounded at the sides and corners. Photograph: Samuel Gibbs for the Guardian
The P9 is one of the best looking smartphones available at the moment, with clean lines, smooth edges and an unfussy look. It’s not as eye-catching as Samsung’s curvaceous Galaxy S7 Edge, but it’s certainly on a par with Apple’s iPhone 6S.
The phone feels like a premium piece of electronics. It’s all-metal body, smooth glass front and slightly-rounded sides are solid and well made – a big step up over last year’s P8. It’s tactile and nice to hold, but the back isn’t too slippery, meaning it’s easier to hold than some other all-metal phones.
The P9 is definitely thin and light enough. It weighs 144g and is only 6.95mm thick, which is almost a full millimetre thinner than the 7.9mm-thick Galaxy S7 and 0.15mm thinner than an iPhone 6S.
The 5.2in full HD LCD screen is one of the better displays currently available on a smartphone, with good colour saturation and viewing angles. It isn’t nearly as high-density as the quad HD screen of the Galaxy S7, and is noticeably less sharp when up close and personal with the phone, but most will likely not care.
Specifications
Screen: 5.2in full HD LCD (424ppi)
Processor: Octa-core Huawei Kirin 955
RAM: 3GB of RAM Storage: 32GB + microSD card
Operating system: Android 6.0 with Emotion UI 4.1
Camera: 12MP dual rear camera, 8MP front-facing camera
Connectivity: LTE, Wi-Fiac, NFC, Bluetooth 4.2, USB-C and GPS
Dimensions: 145 x 70.9 x 6.95mm
Weight: 144g
Huawei-made chips
huawei p9 review
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Huawei’s extensive battery statistics and granular control of apps and power usage is excellent. Photograph: Samuel Gibbs for the Guardian
Like Apple and Samsung, Huawei produces its own processor and graphics chips. The P9 has an octa-core Kirin 955 chip, which compares relatively favourably to the current crop of top-of-the-line processors. It has a less powerful graphics processor, but it wasn’t noticeable in general use.
The P9 behaved generally well, with a snappy response and without any problems multitasking or playing the odd game of Asphalt 8 or Super Crossfighter.
The phone could get hot when intensively downloading apps, such as when setting it up for the first time, and after an extended gaming period, but generally ran cool.
Battery life using Huawei’s Smart power plan was reasonably good, lasting just about 28 hours between charges. That was using the phone as my primary device, listening to four hours of music a day via Bluetooth headphones, browsing and using apps for three hours and with hundreds of push notifications and emails coming in through the day.
Even with heavy use, taking photos and navigating my way home late at night, it would still last until bed time. Huawei’s Performance power plan shortened battery life by a few hours, but the Ultra Power saving mode offers to essentially double battery life limiting usage to basic calling and messaging.
Charging the battery took a couple of hours because the P9 lacks any quick charging, which is disappointing. It won’t make any difference for the typical overnight charge, but it will make topping it up during the day take a lot longer.
Android, but not as you might recognise it
Huawei P9 review
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EMUI 4.1 has iOS-style notifications, which are collected by time and app. Photograph: Samuel Gibbs for the Guardian
Huawei insists on heavily customising the standard Android experience with what it calls Emotion UI (EMUI). The P9 runs EMUI 4.1, which is a little more polished than previous versions, with smoother animations and snappier response, and is based on Android 6.0 Marshmallow.
It works essentially the same way as EMUI 3.1 as featured on the Huawei Honor 5X. It doesn’t have an app drawer, meaning every app installed on the phone must be on the homescreen, resembles Apple’s iOS with copycat features for Apple’s Spotlight, time-based notifications lists and other bits and pieces.
It isn’t terrible, but it takes longer to do certain things than the standard Android experience and, by default, looks ugly with boxy boarders around app icons. EMUI has full theming support, and a store. There are a few nice touches too, such as the clock animation, the ability to move multiple icons at once on a homescreen, a sound-playing icon on the app switcher and some advanced gestures, which are all disabled by default but are there if you want them.
Huawei P9
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The multitasking app switcher resembles iOS 8’s but has nice features such as an audio-playing indicator in the top corner of the app card. Photograph: Samuel Gibbs for the Guardian
EMUI also has greater app control built in for monitoring power usage, allowing users to identify problem apps and shut them down – something that can be a difficult process on unrooted Android devices. But the extensive customisation that Android has to go through to become EMUI also slows down updates to Android, which is a pain point for users, who generally have to wait anywhere up to nine months for major updates after they are released by Google.
Some won’t mind EMUI, it’s not as slow or bloat-filled as some customised Android experiences can be from other manufacturers. Some may like it, particularly with theme support. I don’t, and would recommend using a custom launcher such as Nova or Google’s Now Launcher.
Fingerprint scanner
Huawei P9
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The fingerprint scanner on the back of the Huawei P9 is very fast and accurate. Photograph: Samuel Gibbs for the Guardian
The fingerprint scanner is on the back of the phone below the camera strip, in line with where my index finger rests. It’s so quick I thought it was broken when I first used it. Just tapping the sensor is enough to unlock it if the phone is already awake.
Waking and unlocking the phone is immediate and in all the times I unlocked the phone it only required a second press once.
Dual camera
Huawei P9 review
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The dual cameras on the back of the Huawei P9 with Leica lenses. Photograph: Samuel Gibbs for the Guardian
The P9 is the first phone to come with two full resolution cameras on the back. One is a 12-megapixel colour sensor, the other is a 12-megapixel monochrome sensor.
The two work in tandem to boost low-light performance – one recording colour information, the other recording additional light information. The result is very impressive low-light photography, producing images that are balanced without noise that are easily as good as any other smartphone, and perhaps better.
The cameras deliver good detail, good colour balance and offer a variety of interesting modes. One is dynamic software-based aperture adjustment both when taking the photo and after the fact. It’s a cool trick and can produce some stunning photos with bokeh effect – characteristic of shallow depth of field photography using a DSLR.
The monochrome camera can be used on its own for very crisp black and white photos, which is a lot of fun to use and can product stunning images.
Huawei P9 review
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A monochrome shot taken with the Huawei P9’s camera app in automatic mode. Swipe up for camera modes, down for settings or left to enable manual controls. Photograph: Samuel Gibbs for the Guardian
The Huawei camera app is relatively easy to use, with a load of automatic or manual controls, depending on how involved you want to be. My only complaint is that there is no automatic HDR mode – it is either on or off. Most of the time I left it off with good results.
The 8-megapixel selfie camera is decent, if not spectacular. It produces bright shots that lack fine detail, likely due to it being fixed focus, which is a shame.
Observations
The metal back is smooth but not slippery, which feels a bit weird at first, but means it doesn’t slip out of your hand
I found myself carrying it in my hand a lot more; the slightly rounded edges, glass and metal back feel really nice in the hand.
Double-pressing the volume key launches the camera and quickly takes a shot, but I found almost all the times I tried to use it resulted in motion-blurred images
The power consumption breakdown by app is excellent – all Android smartphones should have such detail
The camera flash is very bright indeed, but still has a short throw. It can be quite blinding if too close
Having the volume buttons above the power button is a bit strange and took some getting used to
There are a collection of third-party apps and games that come pre-installed, which can all be completely removed
Price
The Huawei P9 costs £449 with 32GB of storage and comes in three colours.
For comparison, Samsung’s Galaxy S7 costs £569, the HTC 10 costs £570, the Google Nexus 5X costs £339 and the Honor 7 costs £250.
Verdict
The build, the feel, the camera and fingerprint sensor are all top-notch on the Huawei P9. It is the best smartphone the Chinese manufacturer has made, and is so close to competitors Samsung and Apple.
The one thing that lets it down is the software. Version 4.1 is the most polished and nicest version of EMUI yet, but it’s just not as good as the standard Android experience. There are lots of nice tweaks and utilities, but being a clone of Apple’s iOS is not one of them.
The P9 with standard Android as Huawei has used on the Nexus 6P, plus EMUI’s battery statistics and camera application, would be a five-star phone. But the lack of quick charging, EMUI and the fixed-focus selfie camera just hold it back slightly.
Pros: excellent camera, brilliant fingerprint scanner, good screen, great build and feel, microSD card support, USB-C, good battery stats, decent battery life
Cons: EMUI not quite up to scratch, fixed-focus selfie camera, no quick charging, no removable battery, screen not good for VR (low res)