Design
- Beautiful, premium, glass-based design - arguably the best-looking smartphone in its price range - takes a lot of cues from its expensive brethren (like the Honor 10) in its design which basically means that you are getting a modern looking smartphone for quite an affordable price
- The build quality is great too - the smartphone feels solid in hand and is very well build - the glass on glass construction gives it a premium vibe
- Compact size - the smartphone is perfect for one-handed use and is neither too small nor too large - anyone who appreciates ergonomics will like this phone
- Very good collection of colors, so you can pick to your taste (something not common in the budget price bracket)
Display
- Excellent display - a 5.84-inch IPS LCD panel which has a resolution of 1080 x 2280 pixels and a modern 19:9 aspect ratio (with minimal bezels) which means that you are getting more vertical space which is good for things like reading and social media apps - overall it is one of the best IPS panels in this price bracket - the colors are on point and the display features very good viewing angles - it also gets fairly bright and sunlight visibility is no problem here
Software
- Huawei’s EMUI skin, though somewhat bloated, brings a tons of customizability, features, and theming capabilities which is not found on stock Android (it also uses lots of vibrant colors in its iconography which depending on your preferences you might like or not)
Performance
- One of the main issues with the phone is in terms of performance - day-to-day experience is ok but not always butter smooth - there are the odd stutters, and launching apps takes a tad bit longer than they should - a lot of this might also have to do with EMUI not being optimised, apart from the aging chipset
Camera
- Decent set of dual rear cameras - the phone is able to capture good pictures in bright light conditions - with ample details, low noise, and good dynamic range - even the portrait shots are above average with the background blur not feeling artificial
- Decent selfie camera too, in good lighting conditions
Audio
- Good call quality with effective noise cancellation
- The speaker gets fairly loud (however, it is very easy to muffle with your fingers, so you have to be careful while using the phone in landscape mode)
Battery
- Good (though not exceptional) battery life - with moderate use, you will end up 20% battery left in the tank, at the end of the day
- No fast charging support - takes about 2.5 hours to charge fully
More
- Dual-SIM with dual-4G standby support
- On the whole, the Honor 9N, while it looks gorgeous, is let down a bit by its performance - if you want good all-round devices you should look at the likes of Redmi Note 5 Pro, or ZenFone Max Pro instead - both these phones bring faster processors, better cameras, and larger batteries