Huawei’s Honor sub-brand h�s yet another smartphone for everyone, and this one might redefine the budget flagship killer segment in the market. Honor today unveiled their Honor Play handset which is priced at Rs.19,999/- packs some serious punch under its hood and will take on the likes of Xiaomi Mi A2, Moto X4, Galaxy A6 and more.
Design: Typical iPhonish design cues
Starting with the design, which is similar to the Honor 9N or even with the Huawei P20, but on the rear, this has a matte black finish rather than a shiny mirror finish. As this is 2018, the year of notch display and the Honor Play comes with one on it’s large 6.3-inch IPS LCD panel, which carries a 1080p Plus resolution with an aspect ratio of 19:9. Thin side bezels bring up to�83% screen-to-body ratio.
The unibody design is similar to what we have seen on the Honor 9N and the 9 Lite, and this what Huawei is following in 2018, however, with the Mate 20 series coming this fall, slight changes are expected. Honor Play comes with Hybrid sim solution, instead of a dedicated slot of an sd-card and two sims.
On the rear, you get your Typical dual-camera setup in a vertical cluster under which sits the fingerprint scanner, but you still have a small chin on the front. But then again this is not using a bendable OLED panel like the iPhone X, to get rid of the chin from the front.
Specs: Everything a Gamer wants
| Display | 6.3"-inch IPS LCD Display |
| Display Properties | 1080+ 19:9 Full-Vision Display |
| Display Protection | Corning Gorilla Glass |
| Processor | Kirin 970 |
| Processor Architecture | 4 Cores2.4 GHz Cortex-A73 & 4 Cores1.8 GHz Cortex-A53 |
| RAM | 4GB/6GB |
| Storage | 64 GB |
| SD card slot | Yes (up to 256 GB) |
| Features | AI-CAM, HiTouch, GPU TURBO |
| Dimensions | 157.9 x 74.3 x 7.5 mm |
| Weight | 176g |
| Connectivity | 4G VoLTE, 3G GSM, 2G GSM, Bluetooth 5.0, Wi-Fi, GPS+GLONASS |
| Primary Camera | Dual-Camera 16 MP+ 2 MP rear camera, AT f/2.2 Aperture & f/2.4 |
| Secondary Camera | 16 MP front camera at f/2.2 aperture |
| Battery Capacity | 3,750 mAh |
| Charging Time | 0-100% in 1 hours 12 mins |
| Battery Life | Not available |
| Screen-on Time | Not available |
| Colors | Platinum Gray, Aurora Black, Moroccan Blue and Raspberry Rose |
| Price | $290 19K INR, $349 24k INR |
| Availability | Online on Amazon India |
As the name suggests, this device is target towards gamers, as it packs Huawei’s Hi-Silicon Kirin 970 chipset which is on par with the Snapdragon 845 and Snapdragon 835, so that’s flagship level spec at a budget price is the main highlight here.
Apart from that we also have here Huawei’s GPU Turbo technology which promises to squeeze more juice out of that GPU which on here is the powerful Mali-G72 MP12 clocked at 850MHz. It’s not the highest end GPU on a smartphone, but it’s pretty powerful and will play most games without any lag and with GPU Turbo assist you can expect an insane gain up to 50% more performance without throttling.
In the memory department we only one variant for now which is the 6GB RAM model coupled with 64GB of internal storage. Apart from that, you get a standard speaker setup, nothing special on the audio side here to enhance the gaming experience.
Camera
A Dual-Camera setup is here, with a 16-megapixel main sensor at f/2.2�aperture, while the second sensor is a 2 megapixel unit at f/2.4 aperture with LED flash and standard phase detection auto-focus, nothing fancy here on the hardware side. But Huawei’s built-in Ai does the magic, and from the early shots seen in indoor conditions, the Honor Play does an above average job.
And when compared to the Mi A2 the Honor Play performed much better, due to the Ai assist, which was very impressive for a phone focusing on just gaming.
There’s good news for selfie lovers, the Honor Play sports a monstrous 16 megapixel at f/2.2 aperture front snapper, which will also do front portrait shots and filters as well. However, it misses on the front facing selfie flash, which gets offered on entry level budget smartphones.
Software
Honor Play ships with�EMUI 8.2 user interface out of the box, and it’s based on Android Oreo 8.1 which is currently the latest flavor of Android until Android Pie 9.0 shows up within this month.
Honor is also pushing out its�Hi-Touch feature which lets you scan object around you in real time and then detects it, and provides you information about the same as well as links to buy that scanned item from Amazon if it’s available online; which is pretty neat stuff.
GPU turbo is also another USP here, however, not every game will be supported but can expect popular titles such as PUBG and Asphalt to be on-board. If Honor manages to get a ton of games, then this will justify the existence of GPU turbo utility to a large extent.
Huawei is not the best when it comes to Security Updates and major Android OS updates either, but considering this flaunts their flagship chipset with AI capabilities baked in, it should get Android Pie Update�as EMUI 9.
Battery,�Price, and�Availability
With all the gaming and the high-end CPU on board, the Battery on the Honor Play is also decently large at 3750mAh, which should extract almost 5 hours of screen on time with heavy usage.
Pricing for the Honor Play
- 4GB/64GB -�?19,999 INR
- 6GB/64GB – ?23,999 INR
Honor as always has arrived with aggressive pricing this time with high-end specs, and a gaming phone for the masses. As the trend of smartphones gaming�grows, such products will also benefit others who are not into mobile gaming and are looking for a good value for money proposition.
Honor Play will be an online exclusive and will go on sale in India starting today. Until stocks last, there’s no flash sale model here.
