Huawei Nova 9

New Design

The Huawei nova 9 has a premium feel and unique looks. At least as far as the back is concerned. But its glossy plastic frame is a bit of a fingerprint magnet. Other than that, the back is made of glass and in Kenya, you can get it in Starry Blue, Black, Green, or Violet. This phone feels great in the hand especially since it weighs just 175 grams. It’s one of the lightest phones of this size. Both its front and back have an aggressive curve. Generally, this design is great, striking, and head-turning. Adding Gorilla Glass protection for more durability would have carried the day away. The nova 9 has a single downward-facing speaker. It’s decently loud, and it sounds clean as long as you don’t turn up the volume too much.

Cameras

There are four cameras on the back of the Huawei nova 9 with a 50 MP, f/1.9, 23mm (wide), PDAF main sensor. Present here also is an 8 MP, f/2.2, (ultrawide), 2 MP, f/2.4, (depth) and 2 MP, f/2.4, (macro) . When it came to daylight photos, you will get okay results. Except for a few outliers, the photos are all sharp with good dynamic range. Generally, these photos are not very competitive for the price point. Unless you are buying this one for its 32-megapixel selfie camera that snaps some pretty good selfies.

They had plenty of fine detail, a wide dynamic range, and natural colors. The subject’s face will always be well exposed too. The nova 9 records videos up to 4k at 30 FPS with both the main and ultra cameras. The main cameras footage has an interesting low contrast look which helps for the nice wide dynamic range. Stabilization is impressive. And no matter if you’re running or walking, the software evens out every vibration.

Performance

With the Li-Po 4,300 mAh, non-removable battery, the nova 9 gets an average score on battery life tests of 96 hours. To be frank, its battery life isn’t at par with the competition. But the chipset it uses is less power-hungry. Speaking of which, Huawei nova 9 sports the Qualcomm SM7325 Snapdragon 778G 4G and 8GB RAM. The lack of 5G on this phone, isn’t much of a loss since 5G isn’t yet rolled in Kenya. There are some neat productivity and connectivity options on EMUI.

Like the device plus feature. It offers easy connection and file sharing with your MatePad or MateBook. And multi-screen setup mirrors the phone on your tablet or notebook for an uninterrupted workflow. But hey there is a disclaimer here. There are no Google mobile services here. So make sure that you know what that limitation entails.

Probably the thing to miss most here is Google play. You can use Huawei’s app store. Otherwise, you can also sideload the apps through APKs and the search function can directly find the APKs online for you. This phone comes with these storage options: 128GB 8GB RAM, and 256GB 8GB RAM. It is not expandable not even via NM (Nano Memory). Its GPU is Adreno 642L depending on the region you buy it.

OLED Display

The 6.5-inch OLED panel of Huawei nova 9 has a 120 Hertz fresh rate, HDR 10 support, and a full HD resolution. It scores 433 nits in manual mode and a max of 600 in auto. You’ll have no issues with it on a sunny day. The high refresh rate control is simple and most effective. It features three settings – dynamic, high and standard. Dynamic, and high act pretty much the same while the standard-setting keeps the screen at 60 Hertz. The system will also limit the refresh rate to 60 Hertz when watching full-screen videos.