Huawei has today revealed the new Honor 8, a flagship for the company’s affordable Honor brand. Despite that, the Honor 8 is no slouch. Under the hood this device is packing nearly the same specs as Huawei’s current flagship, the Huawei P9, but at half the price.
The Huawei-made Honor 5X has topped our picks for a budget smartphone for quite some time, however there have always been some caveats. The heavy software skin atop Android on this device has never been great, but just last week Huawei rolled out a major update to the Honor 5X with Android 6.0 Marshmallow and EMUI 4.0 in tow. While there isn’t a lot on the surface that has changed, this one update has made the Honor 5X a much better budget smartphone.
Update: Shortly after publishing this article Huawei provided us with this statement:
It has recently been highlighted that an image posted to our social channels was not shot on the Huawei P9. The photo, which was professionally taken while filming a Huawei P9 advert, was shared to inspire our community. We recognise though that we should have been clearer with the captions for this image. It was never our intention to mislead. We apologise for this and we have removed the image.
The cameras on our smartphones just continue to get better and better with improved sensors, powerful software, and impressive low light capability. But there are certain things they just can’t do.
With its P9, Huawei implemented an advanced dual-camera system to improve quality of the shots you take, and while they can be certainly impressive, as noted in our full review, Huawei’s marketing department might think just a bit too highly of this camera…
We know that Samsung has slowly begun investing more into its own Tizen OS platform as of late (and recent rumors suggest that it could begin moving in that direction even more). But now it appears that yet another Android OEM has begun building its own mobile OS: Huawei. The Chinese company “doesn’t want to be on the crutch of Android,” according to a report today from The Information, although people familiar with the project say it’s still early days…
Expanding on their collection of budget friendly Android smartphones, Huawei has today announced the Honor 5A, a new $100 smartphone for the Chinese market. This device will ship in two variants, one for China Netcom, the other for remaining markets.
The rumor mill has all but confirmed that HTC is making the next two Nexus phones (which, as we told you yesterday, will be more influenced by Google), but sketchy rumors suggesting Huawei is planning a reboot of its Nexus 6P have today become a lot less sketchy. Previously, all we saw was a benchmark of a 2016 Nexus 6P with 4GB of RAM and — purportedly — a Snapdragon 820, but now we have a statement from the Chinese company itself…
Huawei‘s ambition are not small. At the Wall Street Journal and f.ounders-held Converge technology conference in Hong Kong, Huawei director Richard Yu — who heads the company’s consumer electronic business — made it clear that the firm’s short term plan is more than aggressive…
Among the common trends that seem to be picking up in mobile photography, we can certainly include the adoption of dual cameras: brands like LG and Huawei — with the G5 and P9 respectively — have in fact already brought dual-camera equipped, high-end terminals to the mainstream market.
Now, following numerous reports of Apple allegedly looking forward to entering the game, Samsung seems willing to join the part as well (via Pocket-Lint)…
For the most part, lawsuits involving Android OEMs have drastically died down since their peak in the early 2010s. A new lawsuit filed by Huawei against Samsung, however, alleges unlicensed use of cellular technology and software patents in smartphones.
At Google I/O‘s keynote yesterday, one of the highlights of the final unveiling of Android N was all about Virtual Reality. While no “Android VR” headset was announced, the search giant introduced Daydream, a VR platform that will be available within Android N.
According to Clay Bavor, which debuted Daydream on stage, as many as eight big-name partners are already onboard: Samsung, HTC, LG, Xiaomi, ZTE, Asus, Alcatel and Huawei, and today, the latter OEM is giving us some more information about its integration with Google’s VR vision…
Huawei has taken the wraps off its latest Honor smartphone in China and, if the spec list is anything to go by, this could be one of the best-equipped affordable smartphones around. With a 5.7-inch screen, high-end processor, fingerprint sensor, dual cameras and a premium metal build, the Honor V8 looks astonishing for its starting price of 2299 yuan ($352).
The latest figures from Strategy Analytics show that Chinese brands Huawei and Oppo were the main winners in a year that saw the first ever fall in global smartphone sales, with established brands Samsung and Apple both seeing falls in their share.
Linda Sui, Director at Strategy Analytics, said, “Global smartphone shipments fell 3 percent annually from 345.0 million units in Q1 2015 to 334.6 million in Q1 2016. It is the first time ever since the modern smartphone market began in 1996 that global shipments have shrunk on an annualized basis. Smartphone growth is slowing due to increasing penetration maturity in major markets like China and consumer caution about the future of the world economy.”
While Samsung held its number one place in the rankings, it saw its sales drop by 3.7M year-on-year, while Apple’s iPhone sales dropped by 10M in the same time-frame. It was Chinese brands which picked up these lost sales …
For the past couple of years, Huawei’s sub-brand Honor has been one synonymous with releasing premium-looking well-specced devices at an affordable price. This year, it appears the company is looking to step up its game. A TENAA listing for the upcoming Honor V8 suggests the company is about to launch something of a flagship killer…
While Xiaomi and Huawei may be battling it out for the top spot in China, both brands are reportedly being hit hard by Apple’s cheapest-ever iPhone, the iPhone SE.
It was previously reported that third-party retailers in the country received 3.4M preorders before the iPhone SE went on sale, and now a supply-chain report says that Apple is taking market share from local brands.
Earlier this month, Huawei took the wraps off its first premium dual-camera equipped flagship, the P9. If a teaser which leaked to Weibo holds any weight, the company is about to introduce similar technology to its sub-brand, Honor’s next phone.
Huawei has today introduced a VR headset for its flagship smartphones (via Weibo). And, as you can tell, it looks a lot like Samsung’s Gear VR headset. This comes hot on the heels of the Chinese company’s introduction of its latest P9 and P9 Plus smartphones, and you might guess, this headset is fully compatible with them. It also works with Huawei’s previously-launched Mate 8…
2015 was an incredible year for Huawei. No Chinese OEM made as big a dent on the western smartphone market as the Nexus 6P makers did. There’s no denying that it released some fantastic hardware last year, including one of the best Android Wear smartwatches. The year culminated in the launch of the first Chinese-made Nexus phone. With all that success, there’s a lot riding on this year and, arguably, its first flagship of 2016: The P9.
We’re pretty big fans of the Huawei-made Nexus 6P, even arguing at one point earlier this year that it was the best Android device available. Now, if a trademark filing is any indication, Huawei appears to be planning some sort of successor to the device as the company this month has filed for a new trademark for a device named the “Huawei 7P” (via Phandroid).
Yesterday, we brought you hands-on coverage of Huawei’s latest flagship smartphone from the launch event in London. Lighting wasn’t fantastic, but our initial thoughts were general positive towards the Chinese manufacturer’s latest high-end, elegant, glass and metal device. Now, we have the retail packaging, and couldn’t resist shooting an unboxing.
Alongside its two new flagship phones, Huawei this morning also announced the TalkBand B3, a wearable device that sports both productivity and fitness features in what looks to be a pretty attractive package. As the name suggests, this is a band rather than a smartwatch — pretty close in form factor to the Fitbit Alta.
Huawei has officially announced its next flagship smartphones today at a press event in London as expected. We were on hand to get a first look at the device, which boasts some pretty impressive specs and new custom Leica-designed camera system. Here’s the rundown…
The prosperous urban regions of China – where almost all the emerging middle class are to be found – is a key market for premium smartphone models, and the latest figures from Kantar Worldpanel suggest that local Android brands are taking market share from Apple.
The latest smartphone OS data from Kantar Worldpanel ComTech for the three months ending February 2016 shows that Android increased its sales share in urban China to 76.4% from 73% in the same period a year ago. In the US and EU5, Android continued to make year-on-year gains.
Apple saw the iPhone’s market share drop 3.2% in the same period.
On the eve of the P9 event in London, the Wall Street Journal is reporting that Huawei plans to launch a flagship phone in the US later this year. Entering the US market is a part of its broader plan to compete in the premium phone market and shed its image of making low-end devices.
It looks like the first results of Huawei and Leica’s long-term partnership will be introduced in the P9 flagship. While the smartphone has been heavily leaked in the past, a new image from the notorious Evleaks reveals Leica markings in the camera visor…
