Build, Design and Display
Build, Design and Display
If you have seen Honor 8 of the Chinese phone maker, you would not be surprised by the looks of this Honor 8 Lite. Both the phones match exactly at the outfit, their physical sizes, their displays and the build style and quality.
Well, Honor 8 has got a lot more with a high-end package – the dual-camera (not Leica branded though), premium processor, better RAM and storage and it costs around double the price of what we have here with us.
First thing first, visually the Honor 8 Lite lacks the dual-camera configuration and it comes with single primary camera on the back. Everything else is just similar to what we have seen on Honor 8. The 2.5D curved glass on both the sides. Don’t know why, but the rear glass seems to be smoother than the front glass. It’s enough smooth to slip down from even a millimeter slope of the surface you put it on.
Honor 8 was just a like that as we have cover in a previous review – you might need to take extra care about that. The front glass on this Honor 8 Lite doesn’t seem to be enough smooth to impress at all. I am not sure but for some reason both glasses front and rear are not identical. I’d have preferred smoother glass on the front instead.
The truth is that handling of the device is also similar to how we we felt with the Honor 8. You will be pleased to use it all day long. Just like the premium model – the single glass, on the back of Honor 8 Lite, covers the camera lens however the LED flash is apart from the glass with the silver wall around it.
Aligned exactly to the glass, the isolating wall prevents light-bleed into lens when taking photographs with flash-on. That’s a very common approach of using flash with the lens.
If you remember the clickable fingerprint scanner of Honor 8 – the Smart Key, you will miss it on this phone. Of course it’s not the only thing you will miss after all it’s a half valued similar looking phone.
Both the front and the rear glass panels with the 2.5D curves on their ends join at the middle rounded aluminium frame with chamfered edges. Although the glass doesn’t blend directly into the chassis – there is a thin plastic frame in-between before the glass and faux metal actually join in.
The plastic body, however leaves the antenna stripes adoption to mold into the metal. Weighing at 147 grams, the Honor 8 Lite is only few grams lighter than the glass-metal piece of Honor 8.
Even thought the screen size is identical to Honor 8’s screen, the profile of the Lite model is a little large. Hence the screen-to-body ratio is only ~69% unlike the ~73% of the costly Honor 8.
Ports and Components
Like most smartphones, Honor 8 Lite has power button and the volume rocker on the right side of the phone whereas on the left, there is a hybrid SIM slot.
The hybrid SIM slot serves to install either two SIM cards simultaneously or a micro SD card along with a single SIM.
Bottom of the phone hosts a mono speaker and a micro USB port – sadly it’s not a Type-C reversible. A primary mic (or mouth piece) is placed in side the speaker grill while a secondary mic for noise reduction and stereo audio recording is provided on the top side of the phone.
On the top, in addition to the secondary mic, a 3.5mm audio jack is there and that’s it about the keys and components. These are the ones you would find on any smartphone today.
Display
The 5.2 inch display on Honor 8 Lite is enough sharp with 1080p resolution. The pixel density of approximately 424ppi is more than enough for all kind of content on the screen to view with human eye.
Reading text, watching videos/movies or playing games – all was impressively good on Honor 8 Lite. It’s vibrant and clear.
The display is “combined with dynamic backlight adjustment and color enhancement technology.” With the help of software customization, Honor 8 lite includes “eye-care” mode “which is developed with technical support from the Chinese Ophthalmic Engineering and Technical Research Center” is supposed to reduce blue-light radiation and provide customized-warm feel to the eyes.
Even when set at least warm level, the eye comfort feature still gives yellowish feel on the screen which is much better in dark environments. For the exact purpose, you can set the time when you want this feature automatically turned on.
Huawei has not disclosed technical detail about the display, but it’s an IPS display whether or not the IPS-NEO like on Honor 8. Even though, the glass reflections are not impressively controlled, it’s an all situation contender. Outdoor performance is too good for the price factor. There is also a software controlled feature to increase readability under sunlight.
Sunlight readability option is supposed to work when you try this outdoors. In a room or in controlled lighting condition, you won’t feel a change. Overall, I am impressed with the display performance whether it’s inside in dark or outside under direct sunlight.
What I didn’t like are the fingerprints that will easily snap to the screen within in minutes. Even bad is that you can’t clean it unless you use a wet piece of cloth. That makes it terrible with not so smooth experience on the screen. Remind you that the rear glass is smoother but it is not anti-glare as well but this white unit of Honor 8 Lite makes them less or in fact no-visible.
