The Honor 7 is the latest flagship smartphone that attempts to redefine the concept of value by offering a premium flagship Android smartphone at an affordable price tag.
The Honor 7 is an update to the popular Honor 6 series, and with the Honor 7, you get the best Honor phone launched bettered with a mouth-watering price tag. At Rs. 22,999, you get a premium phone that does not cut corners to achieve the price point. Let’s take a close look at how Honor 7 manages to be such a good flagship Android smartphone that excels in all the key aspects expected from a premium smartphone.
Build and Design:
The Honor 7 is not the first smartphone to have an aluminum body, but it surely is one of the best metal body smartphones out there. It doesn’t feel very heavy in hand and the 8.5mm thickness feels just right, delivering a solid feel that one would expect from a premium smartphone. It really is very well constructed.
The face of the device is clean, with no buttons. The back, home and multitasking buttons are part of the display, ensuring a flush and elegant front. Above the display you have the earpiece, the front-facing camera, and an LED flash. The back has the fingerprint scanner, neatly placed below the rear camera. The bottom of the smartphone has the microUSB port along with two speaker grilles that sport excellent finish.
The power button is to the right, along with the volume rocker. The power button has a textured finish to it, making it easy to identify and locate, without looking at the phone. To the left, you have the SIM tray, that also houses the microSD card slot. Below this, there is another button called the 'Smart Key'. The Smart Key is a handy button the can be customized to open apps and the customization is a lot detailed in terms of the various combinations that one can set to launch app. You can customize it for single tap, double tap and even long press. A very handy feature if you want quick access to some of the most commonly used applications right from the long screen.
Specs and Performance:
The device has a 5.2-inch 1080p IPS-NEO LCD display, and runs on the HiSilicon Kirin 935 chipset. The CPU is an octa-core processor with quad-core 2.2GHz and quad-core 1.5GHz core clusters. It has 3GB of RAM, with 16GB of built-in storage along with a MicroSD card slot for storage capacity expansion. The ability to expand storage is a big plus for power users. The rear of the device has a 20MP camera, and the front has an 8MP camera. A 3100mAh battery powers the smartphone. Above all this, the Honor 7 also manages to integrate a finger print sensor at the back of the device (more on this later).
On the performance front, the Honor 7 feels really fast and fluid across regular usage as well as multitasking and gaming. The combination of Kirin 935 and 3GB RAM ensure enough fire power at disposal for all types of users.
Setting up the finger print reader is a breeze and once done, you’d really find the feature useful. The phone almost unlocks instantaneously via the finger print reader and not once did it fail to register or authenticate the login via the finger print sensor. Impressive!
Moving on to the basic functionality of a smartphone – calling. It works. It just works, and that’s a very good thing. The volume isn’t too loud even at full volume. The dialer app has calendar, notepad and contacts as a part of it, and these are the features that I use the most when talking to someone – take a note, check the calendar, share a number, or add someone to the call. Another interesting feature of the Honor 7 is the built-in universal remote. Yes, the smartphone has an IR blaster, and it comes with a universal remote control app to control various home appliances via the built-in remote. A useful feature for sure. Coming to entertainment, I watched a lot of movies and YouTube videos on the device. The viewing angles of the display are good. The display is crisp and the reproduction of colours is good too.
Camera:
As we’ve mentioned earlier, the rear of the Honor 7 has a 20MP camera, and an 8MP front camera. Both the cameras are accompanied by singule LED flashes. The rear camera takes some brilliant shots in well-lit conditions. In low-lit conditions, you will see a notification which says 'processing', and it's worth the one-second wait, as the images produced look really good. The front-facing camera deserves special mention too, for being crisp and clear with pictures. The flash is of good texture, and is great for selfie-lovers persistent with their hobby even in poorly lit conditions.
Honor 7 camera Sample 1 (Image has been resized to fit)
Honor 7 camera Sample 2 (Image has been resized to fit)
Honor 7 camera Sample 3 (Image has been resized to fit)
Honor 7 camera Sample 14(Image has been resized to fit)
UI:
The Honor 7 runs on Android 5.1 Lollipop with its custom EMUI 3.1 overlaying it. Honor has packed in a lot into this UI. To begin with, there is no dedicated app drawer, which means that just like iOS or Xiaomi’s MiUI, all the apps are listed on the home screen. You can club apps into folders, if you like. Every time a new app is downloaded, it has an eye-catching glitter to it, which remains for a while, at least until you click on the app. The smartphone has voice wakeup, which is very similar to 'OK Google'.
Bottomline:
The Honor 7 is truly an well rounded flagship Android smartphone that will surprise you with its quality, attention to detail and power packed performance. If you are in the market for a premium smartphone that is priced sanely and offers a truly fulfilling experience, the Honor 7 is one of your best options today.
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