Here it is, in all of its shiny, rhyming glory. The Mate 8 is Huawei's biggest unveil of the show, kicking off today's pre-CES press conference with eight tenants of smartphone design. We'll spare you the point by point breakdown of the octet of new features and stick to the important bits.
For once, Huawei didn't devote too much time to design basics during the presser, a bit of a surprise given how much the company prides itself on its product builds. Perhaps it's just over any sort of perceived inferiority when it comes to bigwigs like Samsung and Apple. To anyone following the industry, it won't come as any surprise that the company's got another solidly designed product on its hand.
The M8 is a 6-inch that's big and bright, but feels surprisingly light in the hand, fitting nicely, thanks in part to that curved metal backing, an ergonomic touch few companies offer aside from Huawei and Motorola, instead preferring to focus on just keeping the handset as slim as possible.
The rear of the device is a brushed gold that's extremely sparkly under the bright lights of the Mandalay Bay Convention Center. It's a bit gaudy for my taste, but the company seems to know its audience fairly well when it comes to things like product color — after all, the big reveal at the end of today's event was the addition of a gold version of Huawei's latest Nexus device.
Also on the back is the Mate 8's upgraded camera and a super secure fingerprint reader that also doubles as a call and selfie button. We'll be putting that to the test when we get our review unit in the not-too-distant future — well, everything but the selfie bit, that is. Ditto for the massive 4,000 mAh battery inside.
At the center of it all is a big, bright 1080p screen, which looks great at first glance, and an octa-core processor with extremely zippy performance. All and all, it's looking like another solid premium offering from the company.
