Honor 10 announced with a 5.84″ notched display and dual cameras

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Honor’s last flagship, the Honor View 10, was announced for international markets in December after a November announcement in China. It went on sale in a number of markets such as India and the U.K. in January, and in March it finally went on sale in the U.S. Since then, we have seen multiple rumors about a new Honor device called the Honor 10. At an event in China on Thursday, Honor officially unveiled the Honor 10 for the Chinese market.

The Honor View 10 was a hybrid of the Huawei Mate 10 and the Mate 10 Pro, but with its own design identity. The Honor 10, however, takes some design inspiration from the Huawei P20 as it features a glass back with alternating colors and a display notch. In terms of specifications, the Honor 10 features the flagship HiSilicon Kirin 970 system-on-chip and a new dual camera setup. So let’s take a deeper look at the device:

Honor 10 — Specifications at a glance

Specifications Detail Dimensions and weight 149.6 x 71.2 x 7.7mm, 153g Software EMUI 8.1 on top of Android 8.1 Oreo CPU Octa-core HiSilicon Kirin 970 (4x ARM Cortex-A73 clocked at 2.36GHz + 4x ARM Cortex-A53 clocked at 1.8GHz), Neural Processing Unit, i7 coprocessor GPU Mali-G72MP12 RAM and storage 6GB of RAM with 64GB/128GB of storage Battery 3400mAh with 5V/4.5A Huawei Super Charge support Display 5.84-inch Full HD+ (2280×1080) notched IPS LCD with a 19:9 aspect ratio and 2.5D glass Wi-Fi 802.11ac Bluetooth Bluetooth 4.2 + LE Ports USB Type-C (USB 2.0), Dual Nano SIM slots, 3.5mm headphone jack Rear cameras 16MP RGB camera with f/1.8 aperture, phase detection autofocus, LED flash; 24MP monochrome camera with f/1.8 aperture Front-facing camera 24MP front-facing camera with f/2.0 aperture

The Honor 10 is the first Honor device to feature a display notch, like the Huawei P20 series. In terms of design, the phone looks very similar to the P20, apart from the placement of the rear cameras. It has a metal frame and a 3D glass back that has alternating colors and a highly reflective finish.

The phone features small side bezels, a notch at the top, and a chin at the bottom. The phone is 7.7mm thick, and it weighs 153 grams. It ships with EMUI 8.1 on top of Android 8.1 Oreo, just like the P20 series. The phone has a front fingerprint sensor, which has support for gesture navigation. There is an IR blaster on the top of the device.

The dual rear cameras are horizontally placed on the top left, with “AI Camera” branding on the top right. There is a camera bump. The Honor View 10 was made of metal, but the Honor 10 foregoes a metal back cover in favor of a glass back, which could be a plus or a minus, depending on users’ perspectives.

Display

The Honor 10 has a 5.84-inch Full HD+ (2280×1080) notched IPS LCD with a 19:9 aspect ratio. The display is the same as the Huawei P20 Lite, and it has 2.5D glass. It should be noted that the display size is smaller than the Honor View 10’s 6-inch Full HD+ (2160×1080) 18:9 IPS display, which does not have a notch.

The display notch contains the earpiece, sensors, and the front-facing camera.

Performance

The Honor 10 is powered by the HiSilicon Kirin 970 system-on-chip. At this point, we are well familiar with this chip, as it’s found in the Honor View 10 along with the Huawei Mate 10 series and the Huawei P20/P20 Pro. The chip has four ARM Cortex-A73 cores clocked at 2.36GHz and four Cortex-A53 cores clocked at 1.8GHz, along with the Mali-G72MP12 GPU and a dedicated Neural Processing Unit (NPU). The phone’s CPU and GPU performance match the performance of last year’s Qualcomm Snapdragon 835, which means that it can’t go head-to-head with the newer Snapdragon 845.

The SoC is paired with 6GB of RAM with either 64GB or 128GB of storage. Unfortunately, there is no microSD card slot on the device.

Cameras

Rear Cameras

The Honor 10 features a new dual camera setup. As expected, the camera module doesn’t have Leica branding. The cameras are different from the cameras of the P20. The phone has a 16MP RGB camera with a f/1.8 aperture, PDAF and LED flash, paired with a 24MP monochrome camera. The camera module is branded as “AI Camera,” and it has intelligent image stabilization via software.

The camera software is capable of a “semantic image segmentation mode.” Like previous Huawei and Honor devices such as the Honor View 10, the Honor 10 is capable of real-time object and scene recognition. However, the new camera technology also allows the phone to detect multiple scenes in the same photo and apply different filters at the same time. It can detect the outlines of objects in an image (such as plants, sky, people, water) to identify their location and apply the correct filter to each object. The image segmentation is done on-device, which means that it can use the NPU in the Kirin 970.

As of now, further details about the cameras’ sensor size and pixel size are not known.

Front-Facing Camera

The Honor 10 has a 24MP front-facing camera with an f/2.0 aperture. For reference, the Honor View 10 had a 13MP front-facing camera.

Power and Connectivity

The phone is powered by a 3400mAh battery, which is the same size as the battery of the Huawei P20. It’s smaller than the 3750mAh battery of the Honor View 10, though. It has fast charging support via 5V/4.5A Huawei Super Charge.

The phone comes with the usual connectivity options, including Wi-Fi 802.11ac, Bluetooth 4.2, USB Type-C port (USB 2.0), and dual nano SIM slots. It does have a 3.5mm headphone jack, unlike the Huawei P20, which is a major plus. There is also a dedicated AK4376A audio processor that can output 7.1 sound via the headphone jack. It should be noted that the phone does not have an IP rating, which means it is not water resistant.

Honor 10 – Pricing and availability

The Honor 10 comes in Blue, Purple, Black, and Grey colors. The 6GB RAM/64GB storage variant costs CNY 2599 ($414), and the 6GB RAM/128GB storage variant costs CNY 2999 ($478). The phone will go on sale starting at 10:08 AM on April 27 in China from Huawei Mall and other retail partners.

It will soon be made available in other markets and regions as well, with a global launch date set for May 15.

Let us know your thoughts about the Honor 10 in the comments below.