Huawei Mate 9: First Impression + Actual Camera Shots - Hungry Geeks

The Huawei Mate 9 is the newest flagship of Huawei Mobile Philippines, sadly the Mate 9 Pro isn’t looking good cause of its projected price point of over 40k. Nevertheless, this new Mate smartphone inherited the dual camera technology from the P9 with major improvements, combined with the strengths of a long battery life, big screen and outstanding performance results to a Phablet smartphone which any other brand have yet to match.

The Huawei Mate 9 in Silver and Gold

Huawei Mate 9 Specifications

5.9-inch Full HD display @ 1920 x 1080 resolution
HiSilicon Kirin 960 2.4GHz octa-core processor
Mali-G71 MP8 GPU
4GB RAM
64GB internal storage – expandable via microSD
Dual camera co-engineered with Leica
- 20MP monochrome
- 12MP RGB sensor with F2.2 aperture, OIS
Dual SIM hybrid tray
4G LTE with 700MHz capability
WiFi 802.11ac / Bluetooth 4.2 /GPS w/ A-GPS, Glonass
Fast Fingerprint sensor
NFC
USB Type-C with USB 3.0 Speed
4,000mAh battery Non-Removable
Android 7.0 Nougat with EMUI 5.0

Huawei Mate 9 with 5.9″ Screen

The Mate 9 is a 5.9″ screen FHD smartphone on a 5.5″ screen, it’s screen to body ratio is ridiculous as we didn’t believe the 5.9″ screen at first. The screen is very vivid and bright, even bright enough to endure outdoor sunlight as seen in the photos.

The Silver Mate 9 has a matte finish at the back, while the gold variant has a plastic coating that protects the delicate matte finish. Don’t worry as it’s only light to avoid it being too slippery like the Google Pixel, we love the texture as it’s grip is now more stable to hold a 5.9″ screen.

Huawei promises 20-30% better performance with the Mate 9’s new Kirin 960 processor as compared to Snapdragon 821 or the Exynos 8890 of Samsung. As well as Huawei fixed a long-term bottle-neck by standardizing a new file system which is 20% faster and has prioritization as compared to old file systems.

Huawei Mate 9 Bottom

As a result, Huawei’s new Processor and machine learning algorithm give you a flawless smartphone experience of up to 18 months with no degrading of performance. This is because the new file system can now take care itself by even doing maintenance to itself as compared to before. Now, we aren’t completely solved to this yet, but we will have to see it more or less in the future.

Huawei also solved their EMUI UI to the new 5.0 version, the new user interfance is now cleaner and less task demanding to navigate. Honestly.the intuitive actions are now alike a lot to the new iOS but with a bit more attitude. Just in case you like the app drawer, you can do so with the settings.

Huawei Mate 9 2nd Generation Leica Dual Cam

But the star feature here is the 2nd generation Leica Dual Camera setup on the Mate 9. It has a dual camera with one 20MP monochrome camera and 12MP RGB camera that binds both photos taken into one photo.

This is crucial as the Mono Chrome sensor sketches out the photos while the RGB sensors fills out the colors, this is a more accurate photo taking as compared to the traditional full color sensor as it can separate glare of light for better indoor / high dynamic range.

This is not to mention the Bokeh capabilities of the Mate 9 is incredibly good, our sample shots were all amazing and able to layer out our shots up to 3 layers. Taking photos were very fast and results to very minimum blur even with shaky hands.

Huawei Mate 9 Multi-Bokeh Shots

Here are also some solo shots that are stunning as well

Huawei Mate 9 Sample Shots

Other Features

Other features worth mentioning with the Mate 9 is that it now supports fast charging with too much heat. It’s able to manage voltage distribution of up to 9V / 4.5A for a fast charging experience.

So aside from the 4,000mAH battery, it will be more than happy to charge you now at less time. Making your smartphone experience more mobile.

Initial Impression

As early as now the Mate 9 runs fast with everything we do, it takes great photos and even has a great screen to display everything. Huawei has a winner with this one in our opinion, plus its only Php31,990 making it very attractive as a flagship device.

If you prefer via a postpaid plan, we love that Huawei just announced its availability via Globe Postpaid plans 1499 (Cashout of 4,800) or Plan 1999 (FREE) with 6GB of monthly data.

Shout out to Intogadgets store for lending us a Mate 9 review unit. You can visit their page via facebook for the latest gadgets and competitive prices.

Lastly, all photos in this article is taken using the Mate 9. Even the product shots are by Huawei Mate 9’s dual camera.