Formally launched throughout my protection of IFA 2022 in Berlin, Germany, the Honor 70 collection, particularly the Honor 70 (official web page) is designed to deliver a high-end design appear and feel to the aggressive $600+ market phase. Now we have had time to look deeper, and right here is our expertise and evaluation of this lovely smartphone.
This cellphone doesn’t have an official retail channel within the USA, so the $650 road value is predicated on costlier import channels. Outdoors the USA, the official UK value is 499.99 UKP for the bottom mannequin (8GB RAM, 128GB storage). In Spain and France, the official value is 549 Euros. If you would like 256GB of storage, it’s 599 Euros.
Design
The Honor 70 is constructed round a skinny and light-weight chassis with glass on each side and a “tremendous twin curved display screen,” which signifies that the curve is current on the entrance and the again, making the sting appear and feel additional skinny.
This kind of design was super-expensive to provide, and it’s good to see it coming into mainstream segments like this $650 cellphone (road value). Not everybody likes curved screens, however I believe they appear actually cool, and the chassis feels agreeable in hand.
Some folks may keep in mind the problems with the grip inducing undesirable contact occasions, however I haven’t skilled this in current telephones with a curved display screen, in order that shouldn’t be an issue anymore. I’m interested by what different folks assume.
Our unit is the “Emerald Inexperienced,” and it appears nice with its anti-fingerprint matte textured floor within the again, Nonetheless, Honor has different cool again covers, notably the Crystal Silver, Icelandic Frost, and Midnight Black.
The chassis is gentle (178g) for a 6.67-inch cellphone and really skinny, too: 7.91mm. Many individuals like that very a lot, particularly once you carry your smartphone in (tight) pants or shirt/vest pockets.
Sadly, there’s no water-resistance certification (IP Score), so please watch out round water. At this value vary, it’s not shocking because the IP certification does value additional. Nonetheless, it could have been very good to have some unofficial water safety. Plainly’s not the case.
Sound
A single speaker delivers clear and distortion-free audio on the underside proper. It is rather respectable however just isn’t loud and good as telephones with twin audio system, it’s simply physics. On the similar time, it’s comprehensible that assets should be moved round when constructing inexpensive premium telephones.
Show
The 120Hz FHD+ (2400 x 1080) 6.67″ OLED show appears nice and has all types of tuning choices within the settings. I prefer to set the Coloration and Temperature mode to “pure” relatively than “vivid” (default), however the different default choices work nicely for me.
The dynamic refresh fee ought to present a great ratio between scrolling smoothness and battery life. The refresh variability just isn’t as granular as costlier telephones and doesn’t go all the best way all the way down to 1Hz or 10Hz. Nonetheless, the general system energy effectivity makes up for that.
As standard with OLED, colours do look nice, and Honor has included a default background picture that matches the unit’s colour (inexperienced in our case), a pleasant contact.
We measured the utmost brightness at 784 NITs with handbook settings, which is a good quantity. There isn’t an additional enhance in brightness if you happen to’re in direct daylight, in order that’s just about the ceiling. The costliest shows can spike briefly to greater than 1500 NITs, but it surely’s short-term as a result of your eyes will adapt and negate that additional brightness if left ON for too lengthy.
Lastly, there’s an under-screen fingerprint reader, which shines a powerful gentle to learn the fingerprint. In our expertise, it labored nicely and was environment friendly. Probably the most seen draw back in comparison with an ultrasound reader is the acute brightness of the fingerprint reader’s gentle when your eyes are accustomed to the darkness.
Honor 70 digicam
The brand new Honor 70 digicam sparked fairly a bit of pleasure on the net as a result of it’s the first to make use of Sony’s new IMX800 digicam sensor in its f/1.9 27mm major digicam.
The IMX800 is a 50 MP sensor with 1.0-micron sensing pixels, which subsequently makes it a sensor that’s roughly 50mm² (54 mm² truly) giant. That’s comparable in dimension to the Samsung GN5 discovered within the Galaxy S22’s major digicam, for instance.
The Honor 70 ultrawide digicam is intriguing and contains a 50MP sensor as nicely, though we expect the pixel dimension might be very small, maybe within the 0.6 to 0.7-micron vary (that’s our guess, trying on the photographs we shot). Finally, the f/2.2 13mm lens may not let sufficient gentle undergo to totally benefit from this sensor.
The third digicam is a depth sensor to help with portrait mode background blurring.
Our Ubergizmo CAMERA HW rating for the Honor 70 is 147, which locations it close to the brand new Samsung Galaxy Z Flip4, additionally geared up with a comparable major and ultrawide set of cameras.
The first digicam captures good photographs which can be detailed with correct HDR, even in troublesome high-contrast conditions, like nature pictures which have a mixture of extraordinarily shiny (solar, sky, cloud) and shadowed (low vegetation) areas.
There’s no telephoto, however the 2X zoom most likely makes use of a 50MP sensor cropping method that’s, in our opinion, much like an optical 1.7X zoom. It’s extra helpful for portrait footage (~50mm) than for precise long-zoom (5X-10X).
The ultrawide digicam can seize pictures which can be sharper and clearer than the iPhone 13 Professional’s ultrawide digicam. Nonetheless, the expertise just isn’t at all times constant. Honor’s ultrawide digicam captures are typically a bit on the tender (blurry) facet for each day and evening footage except you’re actually cautious holding the digicam nonetheless (greater than regular). The Ultrawide digicam doubles as a macro digicam since it could actually deal with a topic situated solely 2.5cm away!
Honor has added a cool software program characteristic referred to as “Solo Reduce Mode” to construct a further vertical video prepared for TikTok, Instagram, and the like. The concept is sensible: whilst you movie a film in panorama mode, you may choose one particular person to be tracked. The cellphone will generate a separate vertical video for that topic, which you’ll be able to submit instantly as a narrative, no enhancing required!
Efficiency
The Honor 70 is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 778G (5G), a computing platform initially designed for costlier smartphones. In its value class, it does provide good CPU efficiency, and most customers needs to be fully glad with day-to-day utilization and primary gaming.
Not surprisingly, this cellphone has precisely the identical efficiency as others that run on the identical Snapdragon 778G platform, together with the Honor 60 and Honor 50 smartphones.
Since this chip has been round since Might 2021, it’s not shocking that some telephones just like the Oppo Reno8 characteristic a quicker processor just like the MediaTek Dimensity 1300. That mentioned, the Oppo Reno8 has fully completely different tradeoffs regarding design and opulent supplies.
Heavy customers and avid gamers may discover different telephones devoted to efficiency. Nonetheless, they’ll most likely should forgo among the design or digicam benefits (together with the selfie digicam) of the Honor 70. Once more, it’s a balancing act in these value ranges.
For customers who actually need excessive excessive efficiency, a cellphone just like the OnePlus 10T is a formidable competitor for about the identical finances, though its major digicam just isn’t as highly effective because the Honor 70’s.
Software program
It goes with out saying that Honor has full entry to Google Companies like different android smartphones. Some folks ask due to the previous Honor standing as a Huawei subsidiary, however Honor is now an impartial entity.
This cellphone runs on Android 12, with Honor’s Magic UI 6.1 as a prime layer and customized interface. For these conversant in Honor, issues haven’t modified a lot, so that you’ll really feel proper at dwelling. The identical is true for Huawei HarmonyOS since each software program have loads of the identical logic in widespread.
For these coming from one other Android pores and skin, don’t fear, as Magic UI is analogous and intuitive sufficient for any Android person.
Battery
The 4800 mAh is a bit bigger than the earlier Honor 60, however the general battery life stays very comparable due to the upper show refresh. Goal battery benchmarks like PCMark Work 3.0 (200 NITs) present a 10h20mn battery life below steady load and on-screen time.
In the true world, this interprets to a stress-free smartphone expertise, and it’s best to go by your day and are available dwelling with battery capability to spare. By the best way, the quantity of capability crammed into such a skinny chassis is exceptional (mAh per cubic inch).
When you should cost, the included 66W AC adapter (a ~$45 worth at huge manufacturers) will get the battery from 0 to 80% in about 30mn, which is far quicker than the iPhone 13 Professional, though not absolutely the quickest in the marketplace.
Conclusion
The Honor 70 is a smartphone that caters to customers who demand lovely craftsmanship, premium appears, and an awesome major digicam expertise. And for them, Honor does ship. Have in mind there are two different telephones on this product line: the Honor 70 Professional and Honor 70 Professional +, so that is the baseline.
Honor-oriented useful resource utilization to particular supplies and elements to make this occur. As such, this isn’t a gaming cellphone, nor it pretends to be one of the best digicam cellphone. Honor has different choices for that, just like the Honor Magic4 collection.
With a road value of about $650, we discover this cellphone to ship fascinating worth for customers who care about its strengths. There’s no query that’s one of the vital aggressive market segments, however Honor is extra more likely to sway consumers based mostly on design, model belief and person expertise than sheer technical specs and benchmark numbers.
Filed in . Learn extra about Honor, Honor Opinions and Smartphone Opinions.
