Wrap Upwardly: A Dandy Argument for Last Year's Model

In a vacuum without any contest, the Huawei P10 would be a decent device. It boasts solid performance, decent battery life, a bang-up display and respectable cameras. The design is comfortable thanks to is smaller-than-average display and metal unibody construction. It'southward piece of cake to use and packs a practiced feature set overall.

Unfortunately for Huawei, the existent world isn't a vacuum, and when faced with strong competition this year, the P10 struggles. When a top contender like the Galaxy S8 costs only $100 more, or a solid performer like the LG G6 is available at roughly the aforementioned cost, I see trivial reason to grab the P10 over a phone with a superior feature set.

On the positive side, the P10'southward aluminium unibody, largely unchanged from the P9, is still compact and premium. Information technology has features similar a microSD card slot and USB-C. But its screen to body ratio and large bezels are no longer impressive. Oh, and the P10 doesn't come with an oleophobic coating, which is the almost baroque feature omission I've seen this year.

Operation is decent, cheers to the Kirin 960 SoC that we showtime saw in the Mate nine. However, it's not every bit fast equally the Snapdragon 835 in either CPU or GPU workloads, and falls behind in some areas relative to the Exynos 8895. It's not helped by significant amounts of throttling, more than its same competitors, and weaker wireless connectivity. Storage performance is excellent, simply only if y'all're lucky enough to get a UFS 2.1 model.

The dual camera system on the rear is respectable. Its detail and accuracy is particularly impressive, as is the steadily-improving simulated bokeh effect. Unfortunately, though, the camera simply isn't as proficient as the Milky way S8, LG G6 or Pixel XL, all of which compete in the same cost subclass.

The P10 didn't blow me abroad with its battery life, but information technology's more often than not undecayed equally a mid-table performer, with gains in battery life over the Huawei P9. High-performance usage such as gaming will hammer the battery more significantly than before, but I was happy with battery life in other areas.

Huawei's EMUI software still needs a lot of piece of work, particularly to minimize bloatware, condense the settings bill of fare, and reintroduce features Google has been pushing through stock Android. I'g non pleased with Huawei's update runway record either, which is currently leaving the P10 with security updates from three months agone.

Fifty-fifty though I've mostly discussed how the P10 compares against current contenders like the Galaxy S8 and LG G6, the biggest competition comes from Huawei'south ain P9. The P10 is simply a minor upgrade, with marginally improve operation, a slightly better photographic camera and other small-scale tweaks. But as it stands on Amazon right now, the P10 costs $640, while the P9 is bachelor for nearly $360.

Shopping shortcuts:

  • Huawei P10 on Amazon
  • Huawei P9 on Amazon

If you lot like the Huawei P10'southward feature prepare and what it brings to the table, I'd recommend you salve some cash and grab last year's model at a far lower cost. If you have the cash to spend and y'all're looking for the all-time smartphone, unfortunately you'll discover that elsewhere.

Pros: Great performance with undecayed battery life. Huawei'southward meaty aluminium unibody still feels premium. Improved dual camera system tin take good photos.

Cons: Only minor upgrades over the now much cheaper P9. No oleophobic blanket. EMUI software needs work, and Huawei'due south update track tape is not peachy.