Huawei P10 preview: The lean, green photo machine

It’s not often a phone is revealed in a green colour finish. Or “greenery” to give it full credit. Which, as it so happens, is Pantone’s colour of the year 2017. Huawei is oh so on trend.

Not that offering a green finish is the Huawei P10’s biggest sell (other colours are available too). This 5.1-inch iPhone-a-like has all of the company’s latest smarts on board, including dual camera technology, updated EMUI 5.1 software, the top-spec Kirin 960 processor and a newly front-positioned fingerprint scanner.

Does all that add up to make the Huawei P10 the handset people are going to want to buy in 2017?

Huawei P10 review: Design

• Hyper diamond cut finish
• 8 colour options (not all regions)

Throughout its various iterations the Huawei P-series has slowly refined itself into a shapely, good-looking phone. The P10’s 5.1-inch screen size puts it into the smaller scale bracket of phones these days (it’s marginally smaller than the earlier P9 on that count), especially with so many equal-or-greater-than 5.5-inch handsets arriving to market.

The P10 isn’t a wild reimagining of the series; more a nip and tuck revision of the P9. There’s more fluidity to the back camera plate which stretches across the width of the device, while interference from intersecting antenna lines isn’t as prominent as it once was.

The “dazzling” finish options – which takes eight and a half minutes to diamond cut per device, Huawei says – gives a glossy finish without being a fingerprint nightmare, while presenting various colour options (although only blue, green and gold are available in this exact format – graphite black, rose gold, white ceramic (not actual ceramic, it’s polished metal), mystic silver and prestige gold make up the other colours). Shame the blue and green colour choices we saw look dull rather than dazzling, then.

Huawei P10 review: Fingerprint scanner

• Front-positioned fingerprint scanner

Perhaps most notable of all is the Huawei hallmark rear-positioned fingerprint sensor is no more. Instead it’s found around the front, positioned where the would-be home key would otherwise be positioned. Only this not a button at all; it’s a haptic feedback-based sensor that will gently vibrate to communicate – much like the iPhone 7’s Home key or even the OnePlus 3T’s layout.

It’s a bold move shifting where that fingerprint scanner sits, especially given how used we are to finding it on the back of Huawei devices – a location, we’ve felt, where it’s always sat naturally. Placing the scanner on the front means swipe gestures are now a thing of the past, too, which is a shame.

Huawei describes the fingerprint sensor as being the first time a manufacturer has placed it under glass in a “seamless” fashion. Thing is, it’s not really seamless: it’s recessed into the body, just not as deeply as the once rear-positioned sensors are.

It makes using the P10 feel different, almost more futuristic, as you’ll not be poking for soft keys on the screen by default. You can, however, switch on the usual home/back/apps trio from within the software settings – we did so at our device pre-brief just to be sure.

Oh, there’s also predictive fingerprint tracking, so the phone will be able to sense where on the scanner you’re about to press, based on initial movements, for an ultra accurate response. Huawei calls it, yup, Ultra Response.

Huawei P10 review: Screen

• 5.1-inch 1920 x 1080 resolution IPS LCD display
• P10 Plus model is 5.5-inch 2560 × 1440 resolution

While many top-tier Android devices are pushing higher resolutions, Huawei is sticking with a Full HD (1080p) panel in the P10. It’s an IPS LCD which means viewing angles are good, while auto brightness and colour temperature seemed pretty good from our brief glimpse. If you want to tweak things then EMUI 5.1 will offer manual colour balance and low-light comfort reading options too.

The twist actually comes from the P10’s bigger brother, the P10 Plus. We know, we know, we’ve taken until now to mention the elephant in the room: the 5.5-inch larger, more powerful model comes with heaps more pixels on its panel. But we’ve not handled this device yet, so can’t comment on exactly what it looks like. It sounds like the preferable device, though; like the Mate 9 Pro in a different guise – which is perhaps our vision of the perfect Huawei phone.

Huawei P10 review: Power

• Kirin 960 chipset, octa-core (4x 2.4GHz, 4×1.8GHz)
• Mali G71 MP8 GPU, Vulkan API
• 4GB RAM, 64GB on-board storage (plus microSD)
• P10 Plus: 6GB RAM, 128GB storage

Under the hood of the slender P10 body is the company’s current top-spec config: the very same as you’ll find in the Huawei Mate 9. That means Kirin 960 octa-core, 4GB RAM and 64GB on-board storage. That all ought to add up to a very fluid experience – we’ve been using the Mate 9 for some three months now and it rarely falters.

The P10 Plus adds extra RAM (6GB) and extra storage (128GB), in-fitting with its name. That’s the same spec as you’ll find in the China-only Mate 9 Pro, so it’s fitting to see that here.

There’s a microSD card slot in the dual SIM tray too (well, so long as you’re not using two SIM cards, otherwise there’ll be no space for one).

Huawei P10 review: Software

• EMUI 5.1 (built over Android 7.1)
• New Highlights photo tagging and video-generating mode
• UX design follows phone’s exterior colour by default
• Enhanced machine learning for optimum long-term experience

There’s always a lot of chit chat about Huawei’s software. Built on the latest Android operating system, the company’s EMUI re-working adds some interesting features. Our favourite is App Twin, which allows two Facebook/WhatsApp/WeChat/QQ apps to run in the one OS (one per SIM). There are also knuckle-based commands (for when fingertips just aren’t enough!), and machine learning for an optimum long-term user experience. We’ve written about EMUI 5.0 extensively, take a look below.

• EMUI 5.0 tips and tricks: Take charge of your Mate 9, P9, Honor 8

In the P10, Huawei is introducing the latest iteration of its software: EMUI 5.1. This modifies the machine learning based on user behaviour, introduces some compression for lesser used apps, and heightens responsiveness. Other quirks include the UX matching your device’s colour choice straight out of the box (blue meets blue, green meets green, etc – which can be updated within Themes as you please) and, via a left swipe from the home screen, adds HiBoard – the “all about me” pages to keep your experience personal and quickly accessible.

The software also ventures into the camera department, which brings us neatly to that vitally important area of the P10…

Huawei P10 review: Dual cameras

• ‘Leica Dual Camera 2.0’: 20MP B&W sensor; 16MP colour sensor
• 28mm equivalent lenses, f/2.2 aperture (f/1.8 on P10 Plus)
• Front camera is Leica optic/sensor for first time
• Introduces portrait mode, with facial tracking
• Highlights feature for auto-tagging and video editing

Huawei’s most advanced camera setup comes from the – drum roll please – P10 Plus. Why? Because that larger device plumps for Leica Summilux optics at f/1.8. That’s ought to mean brighter, sharper results from the bigger phone.

The standard P10 is similar, mimicking the Honor 8’s 20-megapixel black & white and 16MP colour sensors, coupled with ‘Leica Dual Camera 2.0’ software and lenses for a supposedly more premium experience.

The biggest push in the P10 comes from the software though: EMUI 5.1 means a now Portrait mode is now available, as is Highlights to auto-tag images and arrange everything by categories, dates, events and, well, just about everything Apple does so well with Photos on iPhone.

The Huawei Portrait mode doesn’t depend on a longer focal length lens like the iPhone 7 Plus, however, it’s more about what the software is doing: with the ability to track 190 points of a face, it will ensure exposure is best for the subject, then pseudo-bokeh the background for a more pro-like effect.

This bokeh effect being, of course, a new Huawei staple. Its dual camera technology can depth map a scene and use the Leica software to produce a would-be f/0.95 image with a melty backdrop. It’s imperfect, to say the least, but all these modes are – as we’ve said of Apple, HTC, et al.

The Highlights reel adds another interesting feature, co-developed with GoPro, the action cam makers. Similar to that company’s Quick app, the P10 can utilise your picture highlights to produce a video showreel, cut it to music of your choice, and allow for you to make adjustments too. This, we suspect, is a glimpse of the third-party association that Huawei is looking to employ to drive the brand forward in the west. Nice idea too.

First Impressions

The Huawei P10’s biggest success might be the one thing we’ve barely discussed: its size. At 5.1-inches, it’s nearer to palm-size than many of the current giant phones on the market and that, irrelevant of greenery/dazzling blue colours, we suspect will be the feature to lure punters in.

If the price is right – an area in which Huawei is typically competitive – then the P10 packs in all the power and usability that you’re likely to ever need form a phone. The improvements in power, reliability and software over the years have placed the company in a strong position – and the P10 epitomises that.