The smartphones that have launched this year have done exceptionally when in the design department. The amazing glass body of the Samsung S7, the stunning metal frame of the HTC 10 and the modular design of the LG G5 have been some of the most innovative and beautiful design elements of this year.
The Huawei P9 joins the league of stellar looking smartphones this year. The unibody design that is rugged with a metal chasis is extremely pleasing to the eye. The phone offers the latest form of connectivity with a USB-C type connector at the bottom. One side of the phone houses the nano SIM tray as well as the Micro-SD slot.
The phone is quite durable and can easily survive a few hard fall’s. Another interesting feature is the fingerprint sensor. The brand claims that the level 4 sensor incorporated in the Huawei P9 is considerably faster and more accurate than the level 3 fingerprint sensors provided by other phones in the market.
The fingerprint scanner not only proves useful at the time of unlocking the phone, it can also be used for minor commands like swiping photos and pulling down the notification panel. The phone is just 7mm in thickness. Users who are careful with the phone might end up dropping it frequently as the edges are quite slippery. Overall, this design looks splendid and feels very premium.
The screen size of the Huawei P9 is 5.2 inches. With a resolution of 1920×1080, the display quality is quite nice. The pixel density of 423 pixels per inch is quite pleasing to the eye. However, the display is not the best one out there, not by a long shot! The QHD displays and AMOLED screens offered in other devices fare better in terms of screen quality. Although a normal user won’t find much difference.
Frankly, a full HD display is quite good for a mobile phone. This device runs on custom version of Android Marshmallow. It is called the Emotion UI 4.1 and just like the previous custom android versions created by Huawei, this one also sucks! This device is stuffed with bloatware and its a major letdown these days.
Also, there isn’t much hope that this device will receive the Android N update anytime soon as Huawei is not a brand known for timely software updates. Under the hood, the Huawei P9 features the HiSilicon Kirin 955 chipset. With an octa-core processor and 4GB of RAM, this device performs exceptionally fast.
The brand’s custom hardware is more than able to compete with the Snapdragon powered chips features by its rivals. The Mali T880 MP4 GPU makes sure that graphic intense applications and games don’t lag. On the performance front, the Huawei P9 delivers!
Needless to say, the camera featured in this device is awesome. From the very beginning, this phone was advertised as one with exceptional camera quality. The claims of the brand are absolutely true! The camera setup created by Leica is beyond the shred of a doubt, the very best thing about this device.
The dual camera setup is one of the most impressive ones in the market. Both cameras feature a 12-megapixel Sony IMX286 sensor. The 8-megapixel front camera is also good enough for decent video calling and clicking selfies. Being considerably cheaper than its rivals, the Huawei P9 is an amazing deal for people on a tighter budget. The phone thus wins the Review Central Editors’ Choice award.
Price: AED 1800
