Huawei's Honor brand launched its first smartphone for this year, introducing the midrange Honor 9 Lite with a FullView Display, four cameras, and more exciting highlights.
The Honor 9 Lite made its debut at an event in London on Tuesday, Feb. 6, and is making its way to European markets including the UK, France, Germany, Spain, and Italy. It's the first Lite version to hit Western Europe and it's shaping up as a strong contender considering its design, specs, and price point.
Honor 9 Lite Specs, Features And Design
The first thing that strikes is the Honor 9 Lite's design, in a signature blue color with a shiny glass back. The smartphone bears a resemblance to the Honor 7X, but the mirrored back panel is borrowed from the Honor 9. That glossy back panel might be a fingerprint magnet and make the handset more vulnerable to drops, but it does lend a more premium look.
In terms of specifications, the Honor 9 Lite sports a 5.65-inch IPS FullView display with minimal bezels, an 18:9 aspect ratio, and an FHD+ resolution of 2,160 x 1,080 pixels, which translates to a pixel density of 428 pixels per inch.
Honor had to ditch the front-facing fingerprint scanner to accommodate the slim bezels, so it opted for a rear-mounted fingerprint sensor instead. The Honor 7X and the Honor 8 comes with rear-mounted fingerprint scanners as well.
The Honor 9 Lite packs Huawei's Kirin 659 octa-core processor under the hood along with 3 GB of RAM, 32 GB of native storage space expandable via microSD, a 3,000 mAh battery with six power-saving features, and a 3.5 mm headphone jack. The smartphone comes with a micro USB port rather than a USB Type-C one, but this may be a trade-off for a lower price.
On the software front, the Honor 9 Lite comes with EMUI 8.0 based on Android 8.0 Oreo, promising an advanced experience and no slow-downs as the smartphone ages.
"EMUI 8.0 is equipped with the latest AI technology including enhanced F2FS file system, resulted in more optimized system caching and more effective defragmentation," touts Honor. "No more worries about your device getting slower over time."
Honor 9 Lite Cameras
The highlight of the Honor 9 Lite is in the camera department as the smartphone comes with dual front cameras and dual rear cameras. Both camera modules comprise of 13-megapixel + 2-megapixel cameras, with the latter designed to capture depth-of-field data for photos with bokeh effects.
The 2-megapixel sensors on the front and back help the latest Honor smartphone achieve a DSLR-like depth of field, enabling users to capture bokeh-style selfies and pictures. With selfies, for instance, it can focus on the person's face and blur out the background.
That said, the Honor 9 Lite will not be able to take high-quality photos like most flagship smartphones do, but it will deliver a more than decent photography experience for its price and category.
Honor 9 Lite Pricing And Availability
The Honor 9 Lite is now on sale via Honor's online store and costs £199 in the UK and €299 in France, Germany, Spain, and Italy. The smartphone will also hit several other markets, including Greece, Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic, and more.
To get a better idea of what the smartphone brings to the table, check out the video below.
