Test Huawei Nova 9

Huawei Nova is a new phone aimed at customers who appreciate good quality and equipment, but also put emphasis on the price, which is at the level of mid-range phones. The manufacturer offers 2 variants of this phone: the standard version and the Pro version - the latter, however, is only available on the Chinese market. We check how the phone works in everyday use and whether it is worth spending about PLN 2,300 on it.

Kit Contents:

In the new set, we get a phone, a fast charger, a USB-C cable for charging and a pin for opening the slot for 2 Sim cards. So the standard. As for the software, the phone is controlled by EMUI12 - an Android system developed by Huawei. What is associated with it - there are no Google services, i.e. access to the Play store, Google maps, Gmail applications, etc. Instead, we have alternatives in the form of maps and the Petal search engine and a set of additional applications from Huawei.

Basic information:

Construction and appearance

If we pick up the phone, we have the impression of holding a high-quality product. Although the housing is made of plastic, it is of good quality. The screen is curved which, combined with the narrow bezels, makes it fill 90% of the front surface of the phone. The selfie camera is placed in the hole at the top of the screen.

nova 9 camera

nova 9 from under

On the right side you will find the volume and power buttons. At the bottom there is a slot for SIM cards, a microphone, a USB-C port and a loudspeaker.

The phone, despite its large dimensions (160x74x7.8mm), is quite light - only 175 grams. The island with 4 rear cameras stands out quite significantly from the housing - about 3mm. So if you want not to accidentally damage or scratch the lenses or their protective glass, it is worth getting a case. The manufacturer adds a silicone case in the set and it is really worth using if you want to protect the phone from scratches and damage.

Nova 9 is available in blue and purple. The housing is made of materials that change color depending on the angle of incidence of light. Thanks to a special treatment, we have the impression that the rear cover is covered with frost. This has a nice effect and prevents visible fingerprints.

Camera:

The "island" with four cameras sticks out quite strongly from the phone. The main wide-angle camera has been accentuated by the manufacturer with a large, silver border. Its objective lens is, however, the same size as in the other cameras. In total, we have at our disposal:

The photo quality is good, but it's not at the level of top-of-the-range photo phones. I was much more satisfied with the photos taken with the "photographic" Huawei P40 Pro or iPhone.

The main 50 Mpix wide-angle camera was manufactured by Sony. In bright lighting, the photos are quite clear, but you can see some interference of the algorithms from improving the quality of the photos. It gets worse when we want to take a photo in a night scenery. Compared to other phones with night mode, the Nova 9 can take a photo in less than a second. This could be considered an advantage if not for the fact that the photos are average. You can see a lot of noise, details are not visible. If we additionally use the digital zoom function, the photos will be blurry and we will not want to show them. However, it cannot be said that the night photos are bad. They are still better than the competition of most phones (a lot thanks to the RYYB sensor used), but the comparison to the P40 Pro is pale.

Night photos

Photos in the ultra wide angle mode are of lower quality than those taken with the main camera. There is also no telephoto lens and we are doomed to digital zoom.

Pictures at different approximations

For consolation, there is also a macro camera that can take pictures with a very high zoom. The only question is - how often will we use it?

Macro shot

Huawei Nova 9 allows you to record videos in resolutions:

Summarizing the capabilities of the Nova 9 camera, it can be said that their quality will be better than that of most mid-range phones. However, the top Android phones are still a bit behind.

Screen

The Nova 9 display is an OLED panel with a refresh rate of up to 120 Hz. Usually such screens are found in the most expensive phones. Thanks to the 10-bit color mapping, colors, shades and gradients look very good. The brightness is not the highest, but in daylight we will be able to read the content of the screen calmly.

If necessary, we can change the color temperature of the display or choose one of two modes: normal and expressive. In the latter, whites and grays had an unnatural blue color, so I quickly returned to the standard mode.

The display is dynamically refreshed at a rate of 60 - 120 Hz. When we actively work with the phone - scroll the screen content or use applications or games, the refresh rate is higher. In static pictures or while watching video, e.g. from Netflx, it drops to 60 Hz, saving the battery at the same time.

A fingerprint sensor is hidden under the screen. Along with the face recognition function, it allows you to quickly unlock the phone. In Nova 9, the fingerprint sensor works smoothly and quickly. Much faster than the flagship MI11 from Xiaomi.

Battery

4300 mAh is enough for 1.5 to 2 days of work with moderate use. This is largely due to the economical, but also less efficient than the top models (eg Snapragon 888) Snapdradgon 778G processor and the aforementioned active adjustment of the screen refresh rate. I was pleased with how much autonomy Nova 9 gives.

It takes more than half an hour to fully charge the battery with the 66W charger included in the set.

Audio

Nova 9 is equipped with one speaker located at the bottom of the screen. It will not provide you with stereo impressions while watching movies and its power is average. If necessary, we can always connect Bluetooth headphones - the phone supports the Bluetooth 5.2 standard.

Performance

The Snapdragon 778G chip installed in Nova 9 is manufactured on the basis of a 6nm technological process and consists of an eight-core processor (4x Kryo 670 2.4 GHz and 4x Kryo 1.8 GHz) and an Adreno 642L graphics chip. The performance is high, but it is not the level known from flagships. The Geekbench 5 test gives 773 single core results, which places this phone in the top 30 Android phones - just like the Samsung Galaxy S20. The results for the multithreaded benchmark are better - 2963 is the top twenty and is comparable to the result achieved by the Samsung Galaxy S21. The result of the Open CL test (integrated graphics chip) is 2210. This is much less than the top Android phones - for example, the Galaxy S21 + 5G scores 6990 points here.

The processor is supported by 8 GB of RAM, which is enough for most tasks. 128 GB for data is also a lot, but if this memory is not available, it will not be possible to increase it by buying a microSD card - Nova has no memory card slot.

Software

EMUI 12 is another version of Huawei's proprietary system. In everyday use, I was satisfied with it. The lack of Google services does not bother me that much, because I do not use them intensively. Youtube, which I often use, can be viewed in the browser, and Google Maps can be uploaded, for example, using the APKPure service or another with Android applications. Similarly with many other applications that cannot be found on the Huawei AppGallery, such as Netflix, HBO GO or Paypal. However, the offer of applications dedicated to the Huawei system is constantly growing and more and more often we can download them from the manufacturer's store, instead of looking in other sources.

Summary

A very good screen, light weight and long battery life are the undoubted advantages of the Huawei Nova 9. If we want an elegant appearance and a good image, we will be pleased. The photo quality is good, but not up to the level of top photo phones. The speed of the Snapdragon 778G processor used is satisfactory and places this model, if not in the forefront, then quite high. The question remains, is it worth buying this phone for PLN 2,300? (In the pre-sale, the manufacturer adds headphones for PLN 500, which compensate for a non-expense). For a similar amount, we will get, for example, a Motorola Edge with 5G, and less - because about PLN 1700 we will pay for the mid-shelf Samsung Galaxy A52s. These phones will have Google services that some users may not have in Nova. By choosing this strong medium, we get a good product, but we have to think carefully about what we want from it, because not all requirements can be met.