Honor 8 Pro review: Screentrooper

Introduction

Huawei's Mate 9 and the P10's have set the scene nicely for a variety of sequels and - doing what everybody else does - Huawei is looking to maximize the flagship impact wide across the field. It's a well-practiced routine and the Honor 8 Pro looks fit to play.

It's an Honor smartphone, a sub-brand, and Huawei didn't even up the model number. A bump in both screen size and resolution, the top chipset of the house, 4K video and the latest Android did warrant the Pro moniker but it hardly tells the whole story.

Yes, the sequel is very different from the original. In fact, it shares a lot more features with the P10 Plus flagship than with the preceding Honor 8.

For starters, there is a bigger IPS display of 1440p resolution, while the latest Kirin 960 chip with 6 gigs of RAM is trusted to handle anything that may come its way. The design is all metal, P10-like, with some subtle curves in the right places.

What the Honor 8 Pro inherits from the Honor 8 is Huawei's first-generation Dual Camera, which lacks Leica's film modes, but still offers native monochrome photography. There is also the rear-mounted fingerprint scanner, which is comfortably familiar if not as special as the multipurpose home button on the P10.

Honor 8 Pro key features:

• Body: Aluminum unibody, 2.5D Gorilla Glass 3;
• Screen: 5.7" LTPS-IPS LCD of 1,440 x 2,560px resolution (515ppi)
• Camera: Dual 12MP camera with hybrid AF, RGB and monochrome sensors, f/2.2 aperture; dual-tone flash; 2160p and 1080p @ 30/60fps video capture; EIS in the 1080p videos
• Selfie cam: 8MP f/2.0; 1080p @ 30fps video capture
• Chipset: Kirin 960, octa-core CPU (4xCortex-A73@2.4GHz + 4xCortex-A53@1.8GHz), i6 co-processor, octa-core Mali-G71 GPU
• Memory: 6GB of RAM, 64GB of storage; microSD slot (hybrid)
• OS: Android 7.0 Nougat with Huawei EMUI 5.1
• Battery: 4,000mAh Li-Po (sealed); 18W fast charging
• Connectivity: Dual-SIM; LTE-A (Cat.6 200/50Mbps); USB-C; Wi-Fi a/b/g/n/ac; GPS/GLONASS/Beidou; Bluetooth 4.2; NFC; Infrared port
• Misc: Rear-mounted fingerprint reader

Main shortcomings:

• Non-removable battery
• No FM radio
• The older USB 2.0 standard on a Type-C connector
• No water proofing

It's probably out of line to expect flagship toppings such as water proofing or full-blown USB 3.0 support from an upper-midranger when the flagship itself didn't quite deliver the goods either.

The Honor 8 Pro is indeed an interesting mix of new and old hardware, without the latter compromising the entire package. Huawei's first Dual Camera for one - it's already been upgraded but the original is still more than relevant.

The Honor 8 Pro is capable of more than it reveals at first glance, so get ready for some nice surprises, as we go. The first one is hiding right inside the retail box, so hit the next page to find out.