Huawei P20 Pro survives scratch, burn, and bend testing but gets wounded in the process

The Huawei P20 Pro is the latest smartphone to be put through the now-routine scratch, burn, and bend testing by Zack from YouTube channel JerryRigEverything. Huawei's newest flagship starts off decently, but finishes the test in not the best shape.

The screen scratches only with a level 6 Mohs pick, and at level 7 there's a deeper groove. Huawei fits the P20 Pro with a plastic screen protector from the factory, but doesn't advertise that there's Gorilla Glass of any kind on top of the display panel. It's just 'tempered glass' of the generic variety.

That seems to be a problem because while bend tested, the P20 Pro's front glass cracked. It was just the glass, the AMOLED panel underneath was unscathed. That said, the crack looks like it originated where the level 7 Mohs pick scratched the phone.

So the glass may not have cracked had that scratch not been there in the first place. On the other hand, until this point over 100 phones have been put through this testing and most survive intact, with no shattering.

In the burn test, the AMOLED screen in the P20 Pro survives for about 20 seconds, but then never recovers. That's par for the course for this particular display technology.

Huawei sells P20 and P20 Pro phones worth $15 million in 10 seconds

Huawei's latest flagship smartphones, the P20 and P20 Pro, have made quite a splash in the mobile world since they were announced last month. And that's now emphasized even more by their sales performance in the company's home market, China.

P20 and P20 Pro devices worth CNY 100 million (that's more than $15 million) were sold in the country in the first 10 seconds after they became available to purchase from its online store last Thursday.

That's definitely impressive, and it might predict that the duo will be successful elsewhere too. The P20 and P20 Pro are now available globally at Huawei authorized retailers and select mobile carriers.

Huawei P20 Pro review: style and substance

If you’ve been waiting for a phone that can upset the Apple-Samsung duopoly, this is it

By Vlad Savov 

on April 6, 2018 8:18 am

  

I’ve spent every waking moment of the past 10 days in the company of the Huawei P20 Pro. This phone has surprised and delighted me like few others, and what you are about to read is a collection of happy words about it. I don’t think the P20 Pro is perfect, nor the best phone ever released, but I do believe it’s one of the most important devices we’ve seen in the mobile world for years.

In spite of its massive networking and telecommunications business, and the millions of phones it sells in its native China, Huawei has remained an underdog in other smartphone markets. The P20 Pro changes that. This phone is as powerful, refined, fast, stylish, and desirable as anything we’ve seen from Samsung, LG, and HTC at their best. At a time when US spy agencies are warning Americans off Huawei phones due to (so far unsubstantiated) espionage fears, Huawei is responding in the best possible way: by making amazing phones.

Huawei is releasing the P20 Pro today for a price of €899 in Europe with 6GB of RAM and 128GB of storage. That places it in direct confrontation with Samsung’s Galaxy S9 and Apple’s iPhone X. And the remarkable thing is how well Huawei’s phone competes in that rarified class of super flagships.

The P20 Pro is a typical Chinese phone in that it has an overwhelmingly rich spec sheet and an eye-catching design. But it’s different in how effectively it capitalizes on its high specs and in how subtly beautiful it is. Instead of one color, Huawei has given this phone an iridescent gradient paint job that exudes sophistication. The combination of beauty and brawn here is topped off with IP67 certification for water and dust resistance. Every phone company wants to imbue its devices with a premium feel, but few succeed as well as Huawei has done with the P20 Pro.

It starts as soon as you take the phone out of the box, with its perfectly contoured sides resting softly in the palm of your hand. For a phone with glass on both the front and back, the P20 Pro feels surprisingly rigid and durable. With a huge 4,000mAh battery inside, it also conveys a satisfying sense of density that only Apple’s iPhone X can match. There’s a litany of subtle design details and pleasing symmetries in this Huawei design that add up to create a positive first impression. I love the inconsequential but cool accent color on the power button, for instance. It’s fair to say that I liked the P20 Pro before I even turned it on.

Huawei makes its own app store global

Huawei might be one of the biggest smartphone companies in the world right after Samsung and Apple, but unlike its competitors, it was lacking an in-house globally available app store. This changes now as the Chinese company announced the launch of AppGallery, available for download by all Huawei smartphones. Owners P20 and P20 Pro are lucky enough and already have it pre-installed.

    
Huawei AppGallery screenshots

AppGallery comes with 5 tabs - Featured, Category, Top, Manager, and the last one being Me where is all the user settings and app preferences.

Since Huawei is the biggest smartphone manufacturer in China, a lot of apps in the various categories are aimed at Asian markets like Amap for navigation, WeChat for communication and QQMusic for entertainment. You can also find regular applications like Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube, but you probably have downloaded them from Google Play Store.

Huawei owners should enable third-party app downloads and go to wap2.hispace.hicloud.com where the app will automatically start downloading. The service can be disabled through its Settings menu in the Me tab or could be completely uninstalled, but all the downloaded apps will stay on the phone.

Via

Huawei Honor 7A unveiled: Oreo on an 18:9 screen and a modest budget

Huawei unveiled the Honor 7A, a phone built in the spirit of the View 10. It is an affordable entry-level device, however, launching in China at CNY 800 ($130/€105) for the 2GB/32GB version and CNY 1,000 ($160/€130) for the 3GB/32GB version. It will be available tomorrow at Huawei Mall, Tmall and JD.com.

The phone boasts an 18:9 screen, 5.7” in size and with 720 x 1,440px resolution. Good thing too, as the Snapdragon 430 chipset doesn't have the best GPU. Anyway, a fingerprint is still available, though on the back instead of below the screen.

The dual camera on the back is has a 13MP main sensor and a 2MP assistant (used for AI-enhanced bokeh effects, of course). The main camera can capture 1080p video. Around the front, there’s an 8MP selfie shooter with a dedicated LED flash. It can be used for face unlock too.

The good news on the topic of connectivity is that this is a dual-SIM phone – with a separate spot for a microSD card. It has a 3.5mm jack too (backed by Huawei's Histen tech) and FM radio out of the box (something flagships don’t promise these days).

The Huawei Honor 7A is built on a metal frame sandwich between curved glass. The glass has a high gloss finish and is available in Magic Night Black, Platinum Gold, Aurora Blue. There's a 3,000mAh battery inside, no word on fast charging.

Source (in Chinese)

Huawei Mate 10 Pro drops to $650 in US

Nearly a couple of weeks ago, we told you about Huawei Mate 10 Pro getting a $100 price cut. Well, in case you missed that deal, there's no reason to get disappointed as the price has dropped further.

The smartphone is currently going for $650, down $150 from its launch price tag of $800.

All major retailers including Amazon, Best Buy, B&H, as well as Newegg are offering the deal. You can choose from blue and gray color options (black is still going for $1,200). For more information, head to the Source links below.

Source 1 2 3 4

Huawei P20 isn't officially coming to the US

Earlier today, Huawei took the wraps off the P20 and P20 Pro, its latest flagship duo. Neither of those devices will be officially sold by the company in the US, though.

This is anything but surprising, given Huawei's much publicized issues with offering the Mate 10 Pro through carriers in the country. In the end that didn't happen, because of pressure from US lawmakers (allegedly). You can still buy the Mate 10 Pro unlocked in the States, but that won't be the case for the P20 family.

While Huawei has made even the Mate 9 available in the US in unlocked form, it's never gone the same route for any handset in the P line, so this latest development is basically part of the company's overall sales strategy. There's a lot of paranoia in the US regarding its ties with the Chinese government, so don't expect things to change for the better anytime soon.

Source

Huawei also announces the affordable Y7 Prime 2018 with 18:9 screen, dual rear cameras

It's a big day for Huawei, as the Chinese company has unveiled a trio of high-end flagship smartphones, namely the P20, P20 Pro, and Mate RS. While those (especially the last two) focus on packing as many top of the line features as possible, Huawei's also thinking about the youths who can't afford any P20 whatsoever, not even the P20 Lite.

And so it has created the Y7 Prime 2018, an affordable model that has young people everywhere in its marketing materials. Like any handset worthy of having "2018" in its name, it too comes with a tall 18:9 touchscreen (5.99" in size), though with 1,440x720 resolution to keep costs down. On the flip side, there's no notch here.

    
Huawei Y7 Prime 2018 official images

The Y7 Prime 2018 also has a dual rear camera setup, with a 13 MP main sensor and a secondary 2 MP one used solely to capture depth information and create bokeh effects. For selfies you get an 8 MP shooter.

The phone is powered by Qualcomm's Snapdragon 430 SoC, that comes with a 1.4 GHz octa-core Cortex-A53 CPU. The Y7 Prime 2018 has 3GB of RAM and 32GB of expandable storage. It boasts a triple card slot so you can use two SIMs and one microSD at the same time.

It runs Android 8.0 Oreo with EMUI 8.0 on top, and the lights are kept on by a 3,000 mAh battery. Dimensions are 158.3 x 76.7 x 7.8 mm, and it weighs 155g. It will be available in black, blue, and gold. A fingerprint scanner is on the back as you can see.

Huawei P20 Porsche Design likely coming too

Huawei is all about partnerships with premium brands - they have the Leica collaboration for the cameras, and they have Porsche Design for.... design. The company's two latest Mate iterations have come in special PD trim, and now apparently it's making its way to the P-series too.

A tweet from Huawei Mobile is hyping us up for a meet-up of luxury and technology, to take place on March 27. March 27 also happens to be the P20 family's announcement date. In our book that means a Huawei P20 Porshe design is on the way, or rather - a Huawei P20 ProPorsche Design, because only the top of the line phone should be good enough for the luxury badge. Makes us wonder if this is the one with 512GB of storage.

Huawei Mate 10 Pro Porsche Design

Source

Huawei trolls Apple and Samsung with P20 promotion

Yes, those are Huawei trucks parked in front of an Apple store. They parked in front of a Samsung store too. The company is getting cheeky with its promotion of the upcoming P20 phones.

However, the trucks were spotted driving around and leaving pavement graffiti in London. And yet the P20 event will be held in Paris, France next week – on Tuesday to be exact.

     
Huawei's power-washed pavement graffiti for the Huawei P20

The Huawei P20 Pro will have a triple camera and one of the image sensors will have a whopping 40MP resolution, according to rumors. The Huawei P20 will stick to a dual camera instead and we’re not entirely sure if it will get the 40MP sensor too. Both are getting notched screens, though.

Source | Via

Best Buy to reportedly stop selling Huawei devices in the coming weeks

Following the fairly recent warnings from official US organizations against using Huawei devices in the United States, CNET reports that Best Buy will no longer sell Huawei devices in its retail stores or on its website.

…according to a person familiar with the situation. Best Buy made the decision to end the relationship, the person (familiar with the situation) said.

Apparently, the same person, according to CNET, claims that Best Buy has already stopped ordering new smartphones from Huawei and will stop selling them over the next few weeks – presumably once stocks run out.

Best Buy told CNET “We don’t comment on specific contracts with vendors, and we make decisions to change what we sell for a variety of reasons.” On the same page, a Huawei spokesperson had similar things to say: “as a policy, we do not discuss the details of our partner relationships”.

Of course, there are many factors to consider. The main factor would be whether a line of devices is actually performing well in sales. Presumably, in a big, high-profile retailer like Best Buy, most people would not buy a phone that they’ve never heard of.

Remember, Huawei does not advertise in the United States as much as the big guys and brand recognition is quite low. Best Buy employees would rather make a sale with a more well-known product than waste time trying to convince a customer to buy a phone made by an unknown Chinese brand.

Still, Huawei can’t catch a break in the United States – especially when a number of heads of US intelligence agencies explicitly warned consumers against purchasing both Huawei and ZTE smartphones for concern of unwanted surveillance.

At the time of this posting, Best Buy isn’t selling the new Honor 7X nor the Honor View 10. Meanwhile, the Honor 6X from early-2017 is on clearance. The Huawei Mate SE and Mate 10 Pro are still available while the Mate 9 is on clearance.

US consumers can still purchase Huawei and Honor phones from B&H Photo, Newegg, or Amazon - where Honor is one of Amazon’s top-selling smartphone brands in the unlocked smartphones category.

Source

Huawei P20 Pro to have a 40MP sensor, plus 5x "hybrid zoom"

The triple camera has been the cornerstone of the Huawei P20 Pro marketing campaign, but concrete details have been scarce. The new camera, co-developed with Leica, may pack a 40MP sensor, the likes of which haven’t been seen since the PureView days. Here’s the breakdown.

The 40MP sensor will serve as the primary camera. Next to it is an 8MP telephoto camera with “hybrid zoom”. According to unconfirmed info this cam will provide 3x optical zoom, which along with info from the 40MP sensor will help achieve high-quality 5x magnification.

The third sensor will have 20MP resolution and will likely shoot in black and white as well as assist with bokeh effects. The triple camera will be assisted by Laser AF and an IR-RGB sensor. As for the slow-mo videos, the P20 will reportedly shoot 960fps at 720p (same as the Galaxy S9 phones).

The Huawei P20 Pro will have a 19:9 screen with a notch, where a 24MP selfie camera will live. The screen should be a 6.1” OLED panel with 1,080 x 2,240px resolution.

The body of the phone will reportedly measure a slender 7.65mm and weigh 175g, which is pretty good for a 4,000mAh battery. It will support Huawei’s SuperCharge at 22.5W.

The battery will be charged over USB-C and there’s a bit of bad news here – the port will also need to handle headphones as the 3.5mm jack will be retired.

Europe will likely get the P20 Pro version with 6GB of RAM and 128GB storage. The expected price of this model is €900, in line with competing flagships. 64GB and 256GB storage versions may be available in other regions.

   
Huawei P20 Pro: black, blue, and "Twilight"

It shouldn’t come as a surprise that the phone will be powered by a Kirin 970 chipset and will run Android 8.1 Oreo with EMUI on top.

Source (in German)

Huawei P20 Lite goes official in China as nova 3e

Huawei P20 and P20 Pro are to be unveiled in a week, but their Lite sibling just can't wait that long. After going on pre-order last week, the phone's Chinese version dubbed Huawei nova 3e now saw its announcement.

So, the nova 3e a.k.a. P20 Lite packs a trendy 5.84" IPS LCD screen with a notch and 1080p resolution. The phone opts for a dual-glass design with a metal-frame, just as it was rumored.

The nova 3e runs on the familiar in-house Kirin 659 chipset with an octa-core A53 processor, Mali-T830 MP3 GPU, and 4GB of RAM.

One of the nova 3e highlights is the camera experience. There is a dual-cam setup on the back with a 16MP sensor behind f/2.2 lens and a secondary 2MP helper for background blur. At the front sits a 24MP selfie shooter (Sony IMX576) behind f/2.0 lens.

The nova 3e/P20 Lite has a fingerprint scanner on its back, an audio jack and offers FM radio. It is powered by a 3,000 mAh battery with fast-charging support.

Pre-orders start today in China, while shipping begins on March 27. The available color options are Black, Blue, Gold, and Rose Gold. The 64GB model is priced at CNY 1,999 ($316), while the 128GB goes for CNY 2,199 ($348).

Source

Huawei Mate 10 Pro is already $100 cheaper in the US

After failing to offer it through US carriers, Huawei launched the Mate 10 Pro stateside around one month ago, in unlocked form. The phone's recommended retail price is $799, but at the moment you can pick one up for $100 less than that.

The deal is available at both Amazon and Best Buy. The retailers are currently charging you just $699.99 for the device. It's unclear if this is a permanent price drop or just a limited time offer, so if you've been eyeing the Mate 10 Pro but haven't purchased one so far, perhaps now's the time to finally do the deed.

You can choose between Titanium Gray and Midnight Blue color versions. The Mate 10 Pro works with GSM-based carriers such as AT&T, T-Mobile, and the various MVNOs operating on their networks. It won't however work on CDMA-based carriers like Verizon and Sprint.

Via

Leaked Huawei P20 video teases slow-mo recording

It seems that the Huawei P20 Pro camera will join the slow-mo competition as this leaked teaser reveals. It shows a guy doing a backflip and time slows down to a crawl as the three circles appear – you know, Huawei’s constant reminder of the triple camera on its upcoming flagship.

Unfortunately, the teaser doesn’t say anything about frame rate or resolution. Now, if we were Isaac Newton, we could probably make a guess. But since we’re not, we’ll just say that the Mate 10 (which uses the same chipset as the P20) can shoot 1080p @ 120fps video.

Note that only the Pro model will have a triple camera – you can see it here. Technically, this is unrelated to slow-mo shooting, but that doesn’t mean that Huawei won’t keep it exclusive to the its pricier model.

Source | Via (in French)

Huawei P20 goes to Geekbench running Android 8.1

The Huawei P20 – code name Emily or EML-L29 – took its Kirin 970 chipset for a run in the Geekbench fields. The chip performed as expected and seeing Android 8.1 as the software version was a pleasant surprise.

The Oreo will be topped with EMUI, of course, but Huawei has really made an effort to keep the software fresh recently. 4GB of RAM isn’t ideal for a flagship (it matches the P20 Lite) but it’s not a dealbreaker either.

GeekBench 4.1 (multi-core)

Higher is better

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Samsung Galaxy S98830

Sony Xperia XZ28466

Huawei P20 (unofficial)6699

Huawei Mate 106625

GeekBench 4.1 (single-core)

Higher is better

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Samsung Galaxy S93759

Sony Xperia XZ22454

Huawei Mate 101882

Huawei P20 (unofficial)1878

Anyway, the Kirin chipset and its NPU will power P20’s AI-enhanced dual camera. The triple camera (featured oh so often in the teaser campaign) is reserved for the P20 Pro – you can see the family portraits here.

The P20 phones will be unveiled in Paris on March 27. The price for the P20 Lite was just confirmed as the phone went on pre-order out of the blue. The rumored price for the Huawei P20 is €670.

Source | Via (in Dutch)

Huawei nova 3e goes official on March 20

Exactly one week before its world premiere of the P20 family in Paris, Huawei is holding a different event in China. This will take place on March 20 and on that occasion the Huawei nova 3e will be announced for the domestic market. That's been made obvious by the event invite Huawei has sent Chinese media. You can see the invite to the left, and it spells out the phone's name very clearly.
The nova 3e has managed not to leak at all so far, which is intriguing. The lack of previous news about it might be due to the fact that it's just going to serve as the P20 Lite for the Chinese market. This is apparently what's now rumored regarding the nova 3e, and if this pans out then the fact that we haven't heard anything about it yet makes perfect sense.
That's because if feels like the P20 Lite has been leaking every day for a couple of weeks now. Also, Huawei has a propensity for launching the same device in different countries under different names. If the nova 3e is the P20 Lite in disguise, then expect it to possibly be powered by the new Kirin 970 mid-range chipset, with a neural processing unit of its own and a hexa-core CPU with two Cortex-A72 cores and four Cortex-A53 cores. It's made on the 12nm process, an improvement compared to the 16nm Kirin 659 it aims to replace.
On the other hand, the nova 3e is said to use a 5.6-inch 1080p+ tall display, a rear-mounted fingerprint sensor, a vertically-aligned dual rear camera setup, and a 3,350 mAh battery. That capacity and the screen's size don't line up with what we've heard about the P20 Lite, so perhaps these will be two different devices after all.

Source (in Chinese) | Via

Exclusive: Here's another look at the Blue Huawei P20 Lite

A few days ago we gave you a first look of the Blue Huawei P20 Lite in the wild and today we have an even clearer photo to share.

We can see the back in full view - the dual sensors on the back - a main 16MP cam and a second 2MP depth-sensing unit - the fingerprint scanner and the lovely liquid-like mirror finish of the panel.

 
Exclusive look at the Huawei P20 Lite

We also managed to scavenge a few other leaked photos and a hands-on video of the upcoming Huawei P20 Lite. The images below show the same back and the front with the notch-topped display.

  
A few other leaked photos of the P20 Lite

The video below is technically a "hands-on" although we only get some modest 360 action - yes, we see the working screen but we don't see the phone being used. Oh well.

The Huawei P20 Lite will pack a 5.84-inch 1080x2280px display with little to no bezel, classy glass body but will cut back on things like Leica-branded cameras and more than 4GB of RAM to push the price to below €400 (it's expected to go for €370).

Thanks for the tip, STech!

Via 1 | Via 2

Blue Huawei P20 Lite poses for a photo

Huawei's P20 roster is due to be officially unveiled on March 27 in Paris, but it's not like it's been shrouded in secrecy. The latest in a series of leaks we have today is of the P20 Lite version, in a color scheme we like to call 'life-altering blue' (we kinda like blue phones).

 
Huawei P20 Lite

The lone live photo only shows the back of the phone, and it matches the look we're familiar with from previous leaks - first @evleaks showed a Shirley-named prototype, then came TENAA and press renders.

The Huawei P20 Lite is said to sport a notched (gasp) 5.84-inch 1080p+ display, and will be powered by the in-house Kirin 659 chip. Two cameras will be on the back, of course, but the second is just a 2MP one for depth sensing, so no Leica branding. That will run you €370 in Europe, though all of the above remains to be officially confirmed.

Source

Huawei Y9 (2018) goes official: 2 cameras front and back, 4,000mAh battery and Oreo

Huawei has announced the Y9 (2018) midranger in Thailand - a phone that shares a lot of bits with the Mate 10 Lite and puts them in a redesigned package.

There's a 5.93-inch IPS LCD on the front, naturally in an 18:9 aspect, because who still makes 16:9 phones. Resolution is 1,080x2,160pixels - the new FullHD.

Inside it, the Kirin 659 is in charge of things, Huawei's own chip now dominating the company's mid-tier lineup (for example, Honor 9 Lite, P smart, and the Mate 10 Lite, of course, have it). In this case it's paired with 3GB of RAM, while storage is 32GB (expandable via microSD).

The camera department appears to be coming straight from the Mate 10 Lite - a 16MP primary shooter on the back, and a 13MP selfie cam, each of them with an extra 2MP camera for depth sensing.

At least a couple of things the Y9 (2018) does better than the Mate - it launches on Android Oreo, while the 10 Lite is still on Nougat, and battery capacity is a more generous 4,000mAh (3,340mAh on the older phone).

Availability and pricing remain to be detailed.

Source (in German)