Since Huawei announced its new flagship SoC Kirin 980 for the second half of 2018, it already launched three affordable flagships phones with the new 7 nm chipset inside. In this article, we compared them in order to establish which is actually the best phone to purchase and which one is really worth the money asked. We are talking about the Huawei Mate 20 that is the first phone with Kirin 980, the Honor Magic 2 that is the first full borderless slider phone and the new Honor V20, the second Huawei phone with a punch hole display.
Huawei Honor V20 vs Honor Magic 2 vs Huawei Mate 20
| Huawei Honor V20 | Huawei Honor Magic 2 | Huawei Mate 20 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| DIMENSIONS AND WEIGHT | 156.9 x 75.4 x 8.1 mm, 180 g | 157.3 x 75.1 x 8.3 mm, 206 g | 158.2 x 77.2 x 8.3 mm, 188 g |
| DISPLAY | 6.4 inches, 1080 x 2310p (Full HD+), IPS LCD | 6.39 inches, 1080 x 2340p (Full HD+), AMOLED | 6.53 inches, 1080 x 2244p (Full HD+), IPS LCD |
| PROCESSOR | Huawei HiSilicon Kirin 980, octa-core 2.6 GHz | Huawei HiSilicon Kirin 980, octa-core 2.6 GHz | Huawei HiSilicon Kirin 980, octa-core 2.6 GHz |
| MEMORY | 6 GB RAM, 128 GB – 8 GB RAM, 128 GB – 8 GB RAM, 256 GB – micro SD dedicated slot | 6 GB RAM, 128 GB – 8 GB RAM, 128 GB – 8 GB RAM, 256 GB – micro SD slot | 4 GB RAM, 128 GB – 6 GB RAM, 128 GB – nano memory card slot |
| SOFTWARE | Android 9 Pie, EMUI | Android 9 Pie, EMUI | Android 9 Pie, EMUI |
| CONNECTIVITY | Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac, Bluetooth 5.0, GPS | Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac, Bluetooth 5.0, GPS | Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac, Bluetooth 5.0, GPS |
| CAMERA | Dual 48 MP + TOF 3D camera, f/1.8 25 MP f/2.0 front camera |
Triple 16 + 16 + 24 MP, f/1.8, f/2.2 and f/1.8 Triple 16 + 16 + 24 MP f/2.0, f/2.4 and f/2.4 front camera |
Triple 12 + 16 + 8 MP, f/1.8 + f/2.2 + f/2.4 24 MP f/2.0 front camera |
| BATTERY | 4000 mAh, fast charging 22.5W | 3500 mAh, fast charging with Magic Charge | 4000 mAh, fast charging 4.5V / 5A |
| ADDITIONAL FEATURES | Dual SIM slot, in-display camera | Dual SIM slot, slider design | Dual SIM slot, splashproof (IP53) |
Design
Huawei Mate 20 has an anonymous and not so brilliant design compared to other flagships. But it has the best build quality: its display is protected by Gorilla Glass and the phone is dust resistant and splash resistant with the IP53 certification. Honor Magic 2 is a very innovative slider phone which comes with a screen-to-body ratio close to 100 percent without needing a notch and with front cameras and sensors embedded in a slide that users can manually open. Honor V20 is the one I love because of its in-display camera allowing a high screen-to-body ratio without sliders and notches, as well as its glass back with awesome light effects which changes its colors depending from the angle from which you look at it.
Display
While Honor V20 is equipped with a midrange-class IPS display, Honor Magic 2 and Huawei Mate 20 offer something more. The former has the AMOLED technology, an in-display fingerprint reader and 100 percent DCI-P3 coverage, while the latter comes with DCI-P3 and HDR technology for outstanding color reproduction, but it has a waterdrop notch.
Hardware/Software
We got an excellent hardware side on each of these devices and their performances are more or less equivalent. They have the new Kirin 980 SoC, a chipset that is considered superior to Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 845, and they come with up to 8 GB of RAM (except Huawei Mate 20 offering up to 6 GB RAM). Honor V20 and Huawei Mate 20 feature an expandable storage, but only Honor V20 has a dedicated micro SD slot to use it without renouncing to the dual SIM capability. All of them come with Android Pie out of the box customized by EMUI 9.
Camera
We still had no chance to try it as it is not on sale yet, but Huawei Honor V20 offers the best rear camera department on the paper. It sports the new 48 MP sensor by Sony paired with a secondary 3D stereo camera able to capture depth info. Honor Magic 2 offers the most interesting front setup with a triple front camera including two depth sensors. Huawei Mate 20 is an excellent camera phone as well and it is the lonely device with an ultrawide lens in its triple camera.
Battery
With Honor V20 and Huawei Mate 20 having exactly the same battery capacity (4000 mAh), the software optimization will surely make the difference. Usually, Mate devices are optimized better than Honor phones, but we can not say the same for these devices until we test Honor V20.
Price
These devices belong to three near but different price ranges. Honor V20 will hit the shelves with a starting price of €460/$526, Honor Magic 2 costs €550/$630 and Huawei Mate 20 is available for €640/$732. With the actual prices, Honor V20 is surely the most interesting and it has the best value for money, even though, excluding the design, the best handset overall is the Huawei Mate 20.
Huawei Honor V20 vs Honor Magic 2 vs Huawei Mate 20: PRO and CONS
Huawei Honor V20
PROS
- Great design
- Good price
- Big battery
- Great cameras
- Nice hardware
- Micro SD dedicated slot
CONS
- Worse display
Honor Magic 2
PROS
- Slider design
- In-display fingerprint reader
- Outstanding hardware
- Six good cameras
CONS
- Smaller battery
Huawei Mate 20
PROS
- Bigger screen
- Bigger battery
- Good display
- Stereo speakers
CONS
- Expensive
