Huawei Y9 2018 review: A threat for midrange players?

If you are familiar with the Huawei Nova 2i, the Huawei Y9 2018 is not something new for you. Like the Nova 2i, this one packs industry’s top features like a bezel-less display with 18:9 aspect ratio, quad cameras, an FHD+ screen, etc. But all these come for a price of just Rs. 25,900 whereas the Nova 2i comes for seven thousand more that too with almost similar specs. So, is this phone really as good as it looks or is there something fishy going on? Let’s find out in on our Huawei Y9 2018 review.

Huawei Y9 2018 Specifications:

• Display: 5.93-inch FullHD IPS LCD multi-touch capacitive 2D curved glass
• CPU: Octa-core clocked at 2.36 GHz
• Chipset: Kirin HiSilicon 659
• GPU: ARM Mali- T8360 MP2
• RAM: 3 GB DDR3
• Internal Storage: 32 GB
• Operating System: Android Oreo 8.0 with Huawei’s own UI 8.0 on top
• Rear camera: 16+2 MP with autofocus, continuous shooting, Geo tagging, digital zoom, HDR, panorama, touch focus, face- detection, etc
• Front camera: 13+2 MP
• Sensors: Light, Proximity, Compass, Accelerometer, Fingerprint, Gyroscope, etc
• Battery: 4,000 mAh non-removable

• Huawei Y9 2018 Price in Nepal: Rs. 25,900

Design

I never had a complaint about Nova 2i’s design, I don’t have a complaint about Y9’s design either. The Y9 2018 looks sleek and stylish with the huge 5.9-inch screen wrapped around an aluminum alloy body with an 18:9 aspect ratio. I am using the blue variant which I have fallen in love with. At the back, you will see a dual horizontal camera set up along with an LED flash and a fingerprint scanner just below it. Everything looks good and in place. I did not use a cover and I was impressed that this one does not attract smudge or fingerprints. The phone is comfortable to hold and looks good on hands. However, one slight concern is that the device is slippery and tends to fall out of hands. It is in such instances that I have felt a need for display protection and as the Y9 provides none, you have to be very careful using it.

Display

The Huawei Y9 2018 has a 5.93-inch IPS LCD touchscreen with FHD+ screen resolution. The display is crisp and viewing content in it is a welcoming experience. If you are suffering from visual fatigue like I am, you will surely find the eye comfort mode useful. Other than that, the viewing angles, color accuracy (slightly bluish tone), and contrast of the display are good and it also provides ample brightness for you even under sunlight.

Performance

Like the Nova 2i, the Huawei Y9 2018 features the Kirin Hi-silicon 659 processor along with the Mali T830 MP2 GPU. The device, I must say has handled all my multitasking needs without breaking a sweat. Never once has it broken down on my use. Although 3GB RAM seems ample for usage, I still would like to have 1GB more on my device because the others are providing it in the same price range. Similarly, Huawei is providing 32GB of internal storage, which is a lot less! I mean, on today’s date, I would not want to do the hassle of getting a separate memory card. So, if you don’t add an SD card, you are certainly going to fall short on storage with the Huawei Y9 2018. Thankfully, Huawei has provided a dedicated microSD card slot. There are a lot of apps onboard that weren’t useful to me, some I had an option to uninstall, some I didn’t. It would have been better if the company had chosen to keep the onboard apps to a minimum considering the low storage it provides, but seems like Huawei has not thought about this. Gaming was fun in this device, well at low to medium settings. When you go higher on settings, you will feel lags.  When I played Asphalt 8, at very low settings, the game ran well but at the medium to high settings, the game lagged. Low and midrange games ran quite well. If you ask me about heating, I would say that this device does get warm after gaming. At normal use, I have not felt the temperature rise. However, I don’t mean that the temperature rises to become unbearable, but yes, it gets warm. It’s only common for devices to have that tendency.

Software and UI

The Huawei Y9 2018 comes with Android Oreo 8.0 coupled with EMUI 8.0. I feel like the UI on Huawei devices is very simple and same is the case with this one. There are customizable notification icons when you swipe downwards, you can change sliding transitions. You can get to the smart care feature by Huawei by swiping to the left, which well was not useful to me. Like the Nova 2i, this one too supports smart gestures like swiping three down to take a screenshot or swiping a finger down the fingerprint sensor to get access to notification icons, tapping twice on the screen to turn it on, etc. I like it when companies include such features, I mean these are not very essential or extraordinary but still, it’s fun using them.

Back Camera

The Huawei Y9 2018 has a dual 13+2 MP camera setup at the back. If you look at the pictures I have clicked on this device, the images have a bit more contrast and the images are darker than normal. Similarly, when you are focusing on an object with a white background, it looks overexposed. So, the images are sharp indeed but come out over slightly exposed in a bright environment. Something that I wanted to test was the portrait mode of this device. The images from the Nova 2i are very bright and punchy whereas from the Y9, they are bit dark and high in contrast. Similarly, both the phones do not have proper edge detection when it comes to portraits shots. I tested covering the secondary lenses of both the front and back camera, and yes like the Nova 2i, they properly function to create depth of field. So, you can be ensured that it’s the software that produces the blur, it’s the cameras themselves.

Front Camera

I have quite liked the selfies form this device mainly because it does not make your skin look fairer then it is. Mostly, when you take selfies from smartphones, your skin tends to look brighter, fairer and somewhat beautified. But this one is not at all like that. Again I would say that the images are a bit dark but it preserves the right amount of details. So, I have quite liked them. Not to forget, there is a dual 16+2 MP camera setup at the front too. Again, the images have slightly inaccurate edge detection. Overall, I would say that I liked the cameras but when you compare it with Nova 2i, I would prefer Nova 2i.

Security

The fingerprint sensor is snappy on use but I have used it only a few times because I got used to using the facial unlock. It works 90% of the times but when its dark, it may not recognize you sometimes. Other times, its swift.

Audio & Call Quality

The speakers are positioned in the lower portion and are decently loud. But the fact that they get covered most of the times while playing games ruins the fun, so I had to be careful to avoid covering them. Other than that, call quality and network coverage are good.

Battery

Something that has thoroughly satisfied me about the Y9 2018 is the battery. The device has a huge 4,000 mAh battery that can back you up for a day entire after intense usage like gaming and watching videos. At light usage, like for social media, clicking pictures and the like, you get a life of nearly two days on a single charge. The device took me 2 hours and around 10 minutes to get charged and a screen on time of 8 hours. I know the inclusion of fast charging support is fancy on today’s date but I think the addition of a battery this large in capacity is a balanced effort by Huawei.

Conclusion:

The Huawei Y9 is an affordable version of the Nova 2i which pretty much similar everything except for the cameras and storage option. Summing up, the things I have liked on this device are the display, design, and the most certainly the Battery life. The cameras, though are not as same as the Nova 2i, but still, perform good enough for the price you are paying. The performance section, like the Nova 2i is decent and will suffice the need of an average user like me. But if you are a heavy gamer, opting for the Galaxy J7 Duo would suffice the need as it comes with a powerful Exynos 7884 chipset. If storage and stock Android experience is your topmost priority, there's Mi A1 with 64GB storage and pure android. So, if you ask me if getting this phone is a good decision, I would say that if storage and gaming performance is not a concern for you, the device pretty much lives up to your expectations.