You all have probably heard of Huawei, the Chinese technology giant. What you might not know is that in July 2017 the company became the second largest smartphone manufacturer after Samsung, with Apple coming in third. Let's see the detailed review of Huawei Nova 2, an upper mid-range priced phone with high-end performance, specially designed for the selfie and social media lovers.
Unblock any international website, browse anonymously, and download movies and Mp3 with complete safety with CyberGhost, just for $2.75 per month:
Who is Huawei
Huawei is undoubtedly one of the top multinational companies based in China. It is considered the leader in digital information and communications in Asia.
The company was established in 1987 with a shared capital of just $5680. In 2016, their annual sales exceeded $75 billion.
The Chinese giant has more than 180.000 employees worldwide. The innovative products and the services of Huawei are available in more than 170 counties and territories, serving over one-third of the global population.
Huawei Nova 2
When Huawei designs a phone, they apparently like to "get inspired" by other well-known handsets. For example, Nova and Nova Plus look suspiciously close to Nexus 6P and OnePlus 3 respectively.
The newer Nova 2 and Nova 2 Plus are clearly clones of iPhone 7 Plus.
2017 was the year Huawei started getting design inspiration from Apple.
But we shouldn't consider Nova 2 just as a clone of iPhone 7 since both devices have their distinct personality.
Huawei Nova 2 has a metal unibody. Inside we find the octa-core Kirin 695 and a battery of 2950mAh.
Design and Quality
The phone has a metallic unibody. The back side is matte and the sides glossy.
The screen is 5 inches with a 2.5D glass, and the edges of the devices are slightly curvy.
On the back side, we will find two cameras, the LED Flash, and the fingerprint sensor.
On the left side there is a SIM slot and on the right side the volume and Power buttons.
Lastly, on the front side, we can find a speaker, the front camera, and the notification LED.
Screen
Huawei Nova 2 has a 5-inch display, Full HD resolution 1920x1080, and a 443 PPI density. The type of panel is IPS, with 16 million colors, something that offers us an incredible experience with bright colors.
Speaker
We will find the speaker on the bottom part of the device, hidden underneath the grills on the right side.
Huawei uses the Listen Sound Algorithm to improve the device's sound. This algorithm indeed creates the feeling of theater quality, a much as this is possible from a phone speaker.
The microphone on Nova 2 is on the left side on the bottom part of the device.
Camera
The phone has three cameras, one at the front, and two at the back.
The main back cameras are a wide-angle 12MP camera, with f/1.8 aperture and high ISO, that allows the capture of magnificent scenery photos. The telescopic 8MP camera with 2x optical zoom and f/2.4 aperture helps capture close distance objects, without losing quality.
The combination of these two colored cameras offers us perfect high-resolution pictures with vibrant colors.
For the full resolution image click here.
The most exciting feature is the ability to focus on a specific object.
With this feature, we tap on the objects we want to focus, and anything behind it gets blurred. This way, we get a more artistic and detailed picture.
For the full resolution image click here.
The front camera was designed for those who love to share selfies with their followers on social media. The resolution of the camera is at 20MP, with a special filter that improves selfies through the camera app.
For the full resolution image click here.
The cameras on the device can record a video up to 1080p and 30fps. Last, but not least, the camera app on Nova 2 has several modes, from simple filters to a creation of a 3D Panorama.
Hardware
The phone comes equipped with 4GB RAM and 64GB storage space, which is expandable to 256GB with the use of a microSD card.
Nova 2 features Huawei's octa-core Chipset HiSilicon Kirin 659, with Cortex-A53 cores. The four cores are clocked to 2.36GHz and the rest to 1.7GHz.
Apart from the processors, the smartphone has the graphics chip Mali-T830.
Connectivity and buttons
Huawei Nova 2 supports all the modern connections, such as Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, and low energy Bluetooth 4.2 with A2DP and aptX.
On the bottom part of the device, we can find the 3.5mm audio jack port, and the USB-C port to charge and connect our phone to other devices.
On the left side, we find the SIM and SD cards slot. The slot can either have two nano SIM or one SIM and one microSD card.
Finally, on the right side we will find the volume and power buttons, and on the top part, there's only a noise cancellation microphone.
Sensors
Huawei Nova 2 has a fast fingerprint sensor on the back side of the device.
Meanwhile, it also has an accelerometer, gyroscope, proximity sensor, and compass.
Autonomy and EMUI
As all Huawei devices, Nova 2 comes with EMUI, which is Huawei's user interface.
Getting used to the UI is easy. The good thing is that the custom ROM offers a lot of features and the Android version is 7.0.
The 2950mAH battery of the device is not removable. Even though we might think it has a small capacity, it lasts quite a lot for an average daily use.
Unboxing
The packaging of Nova 2 matches the company's aesthetic, but even more the concept of the device.
A metallic magenta board states the name of the model, which we can also see on the other side of the device with metallic letters.
On the bottom part of the device, there are stickers with the barcode, serial numbers, etc.
Inside we find two smaller boxes and the phone sandwiched between them
The larger box has the charger, the charging and data transfer cable, and the earbuds. Also on top of it, there is a needle to help us change the SIM/microSD.
On the smaller package, we will see a clear silicon case and the instructions in Chinese.
First impressions and boot
The quality of Nova 2 is excellent and the feel is pretty good. The design of the device is lovely and the edges rounded. The dimensions allow a comfortable grip without having a hard time to use the phone or the fingerprint sensor.
We got it with the official Global ROM that runs Android 7.0 in an EMUI 5.1 environment.
The settings we had to do when we boot it for the first time where quite a lot, but not that tiring. When we finished, our phone was fully functional with an entirely English environment.
Performance
We pushed Nova 2 to the limits of its abilities with the help of the most trusting benchmarks. In this section, we will present you the results of our tests.
In these tests, we compared Nova 2 with Xiaomi Mi Max 2, which costs about the same.
On the image below you can see the overall score; click here to open the full-size image. In this race, Huawei Nova 2 comes first, but Xiaomi Mi Max 2 has a quite better memory management and 3D graphics.
Value for money
As a device, Nova 2 is relatively new, since it launched in June 2017. It is definitely a high-quality phone; it has an excellent design and offers a firm grip. The official Huawei ROM has it's extras, as every other custom ROM does.
The most prominent feature of the Nova 2 is its cameras, especially the front one. We would say it's a phone designed for women since it's petite and focused on getting the perfect selfie. But that shouldn't prevent anyone from buying it.
If you want a stylish smartphone with a great camera that does well in daily use and allows games, then Huawei Nova 2 is for you.
Where can I find Huawei Nova 2?
We can buy Huawei Nova 2 from the Gearbest at a price that starts from a bit less than $290, as of this writing, and with free shipping to the United States.
Do you intend to buy Huawei Nova 2?
Are you interested in buying Nova 2 or do you already have it? Do you have any questions we didn't cover in our presentation? Let us know in the comments below.
Leave a Reply