HONOR View 20: smartphone review

Publication date: 02/27/2019

HONOR View 20: smartphone review
Specifications of HONOR View 20
HONOR View 20 photo features overview
HONOR View 20. Conclusions

HONOR View 20 is the first flagship smartphone that was announced in 2019. However, all of his technologies were presented at a special event in advance. Then he came to CES 2019, and the official announcement happened on January 22. Check the price of HONOR View 20 HONOR View 20 was the first smartphone on the Russian market with a “leaky” design: there are no bangs or edges in the front, only a small hole in the upper left corner, where the front camera lens is located. Thanks to this, there is a large and almost frameless display with a diagonal of 6.4 inches. Only a small chin stands out against the background of the same side and upper frames. The gadget was also very stylish: glass and metal, bright colors and a V-shaped pattern on the rear panel. You will definitely recognize such a smartphone in a crowd or on a shelf in a store. By the way, the so-called premium version with 8 GB of RAM and a 256 GB drive came to our office. It is made in two flickering colors (blue and red), and also differs in collaboration with the fashion house MOSCHINO (a pair of branded wallpaper for your desktop and a special box). But you can save money and take the version of black or blue with 6/128 GB. Although flickering solutions look an order of magnitude more interesting. But the main thing for us is the camera. The Honor View 20 has a new Sony Exmor IMX586 sensor with a physical size of ½ inch (8 mm diagonal). The resolution of this matrix is 48 megapixels. The equivalent focal length of the lens is 26 mm, and the aperture is F1.8. There is autofocus and flash. Plus, a 3D ToF camera module is implemented, which is responsible for measuring the depth of field, and is also capable of capturing motion and making the silhouette slimmer on the fly in video mode. Thanks to this camera, you can play interactive video games, turning your smartphone into a console with a motion sensor. A curious innovation, but you can’t test it without a special dock. The front camera is hidden in the "hole" of the display, called the All-View. Its resolution is 25 megapixels, and aperture F2.0.

Specifications of HONOR View 20
Screen	6.4 inches, IPS, 2310 × 1080 pixels, 398 ppi
CPU	octa-core Kirin 980, 2.6 GHz
RAM	6/8 GB
Built-in memory	128/256 GB
Memory card	dual SIM support
SIM	dual SIM support (universal slot)
Main camera	48 MP, Sony Exmor IMX586, 1/2 ?, 26 mm (equiv.), F1.8, PDAF, LED flash + 3D ToF camera
Front-camera	25 MP, 26 mm (equiv.), F2.0
The fingerprint scanner	behind
Communications	LTE Cat.13 (up to 400 Mbps), Wi-Fi 802.11ac (dual band), Bluetooth 5.0, USB Type-C, NFC
Audio jack	there is
Battery	4000 mAh non-removable

HONOR View 20 photo features overview

PCT-L29 Installations: ISO 50, F1.8, 1/541 s, 26.0 mm equiv.

Almost all the frames in our test were shot at 12 megapixels: a hybrid zoom and all smart functions work in it, primarily artificial intelligence. You can shoot in 48 megapixels (6000 × 8000) in the usual way or by choosing the option "Ultra-sharpness with AI". Later we will test these modes. We start with good daylight conditions. HONOR View 20 proved to be a great fellow: high detail and clarity of images, correct color reproduction. But not without a resharp, which is noticeable on one hundred percent crop. If you increase the hair of a horse, you can see this.

PCT-L29 Settings: ISO 50, F1.8, 1/501 s, 26.0 mm equiv.

PCT-L29 Settings: ISO 50, F1.8, 1/145 s, 26.0 mm equiv.

PCT-L29 Settings: ISO 50, F1.8, 1/1116 s, 26.0 mm equiv.

PCT-L29 Settings: ISO 50, F1.8, 1/1745 s, 26.0 mm equiv.

PCT-L29 Settings: ISO 250, F1.8, 1/100 s, 26.0 mm equiv.

PCT-L29 Settings: ISO 50, F1.8, 1/565 s, 26.0 mm equiv.

Then we went on to indoor shooting and got similar results: all the same excellent detail and sharpness, the correct color reproduction and accurate focus. Peresharp, unfortunately, remained.

PCT-L29 Settings: ISO 250, F1.8, 1/100 s, 26.0 mm equiv.

PCT-L29 Settings: ISO 250, F1.8, 1/50 s, 26.0 mm equiv.

PCT-L29 Settings: ISO 50, F1.8, 1/100 s, 26.0 mm equiv.

PCT-L29 Settings: ISO 320, F1.8, 1/100 s, 26.0 mm equiv.

PCT-L29 Installations: ISO 400, F1.8, -1294967296/1000000000 s, 26.0 mm equiv.

PCT-L29 Settings: ISO 400, F1.8, 1/100 s, 26.0 mm equiv.

Also in the room, we tried the camera in a maximum resolution of 48 megapixels. Here we just put two photos next to each other. As always, high resolution is unnecessary. But the technology of combining pixels works well, and in the resolution of 12 megapixels, the image seems to us better.

PCT-L29 Settings: ISO 1000, F1.8, 1/25 s, 26.0 mm equiv.

It's time for the night hunt for bright shots. Like HUAWEI smartphones, the HONOR brand has a “Night” mode, which takes pictures using multiple exposure. In automatic mode, the camera copes well, usually setting the shutter speed in the region of 1/33 or 1/50 of a second. It turns out sharp and detailed images with the correct color reproduction. But here, one hundred percent cropping shows re-sharping and the operation of algorithms. In the dark, oversharping is more noticeable.

PCT-L29 Settings: ISO 400, F1.8, 1/50 s, 26.0 mm equiv.

PCT-L29 Settings: ISO 400, F1.8, 1/33 s, 26.0 mm equiv.

PCT-L29 Settings: ISO 50, F1.8, 1/486 s, 26.0 mm equiv.

PCT-L29 Settings: ISO 50, F1.8, 1/384 s, 26.0 mm equiv.

HONOR View 20 feels great in the dark, and in the "Night" mode the pictures are even more spectacular: the details are emphasized, the light and shadows are aligned. And most importantly, this mode can be used not only at night, but also indoors, during the day. The 3D ToF camera plays a supporting role: it accurately determines the depth of the scene and at the same time calculates the trajectory of the objects so that the frame is sharp and all objects are in focus. The operation of this camera is especially noticeable in portrait mode and with classic objects: it copes with the shooting of faces of men and women, animals at a high level. The situation changes when, for example, a soft toy in the frame. Despite the lack of hair, the doraemon cat's round head outline is not trimmed correctly.

PCT-L29 Settings: ISO 400, F0.95, 1/33 s, 26.0 mm equiv.

The surprise was the exact separation of the foreground and background in the picture with the horse: pay attention to the tree that fell into the frame on the left.

PCT-L29 Settings: ISO 50, F1.8, 1/550 s, 26.0 mm equiv.

The HONOR View 20 has a front-facing camera with a resolution of 25 megapixels and an aperture lens F2.0. As always, switching to the front camera, you get into portrait mode with the default background blur and beauty. Go to photo mode, and everything turns off.

HONOR View 20. Conclusions

HONOR View 20 did not surprise us, but showed that the first announcement of the year could be a really interesting flagship with a bright design, modern power and a good camera. We warmly recalled the HONOR View 10, which was presented in December 2017 in London, although we recognized that with all its capabilities, the device could not be called beautiful. Everything turned out in View 20, and we got a spectacular and relatively affordable flagship of 2019. There are no chips that would call it a super flag, and this model cannot be called uncompromising: there is no wireless charging, the ability to insert a microSD, optical zoom or wide-angle lens, protection against dust and moisture, a fingerprint scanner under the screen. All these are the features of the flagships of 2019 with the prefix “super”: no compromises, only advanced technologies that are sometimes not used. In HONOR View 20 they collected everything they needed (there is even a 3.5 mm audio jack), put a large battery and an advanced processor, added new chips, such as an All-View display and a 48-megapixel camera. And he was packed in a beautiful case. The result is a really interesting product. The camera in the HONOR View 20 proved to be a solid four. There is no optical zoom or wide-angle lens, the 3D ToF camera still does not always do its job, and, as is usually the case, too much resharping and the work of algorithms are often striking. But the rest is a universal camera that works well regardless of the shooting conditions. Pros: