Geek Lifestyle Review | Huawei P40 Pro

Looks like Huawei did it again!

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If you think Huawei already peaked when they released the Mate 30 Pro’s cinema-like quad-Leica shooters, then prepare to be wowed yet again with the incredible Huawei P40 Pro. Part of Huawei’s latest flagship line, the P40 Pro offers the pinnacle of Huawei’s smartphone optics expertise — at least for now. Having reclaimed the throne on DxOMark, the Huawei P40 Pro’s camera is the company’s best offering to date. Coupled with powerful internals, beautifully sleek design and overall packaging and you have what seems to be another winning combination from the tech giant.

After tinkering with the device for a couple of weeks now, here’s our FULL REVIEW on the Huawei P40 Pro.

 

Geek-sthetic

Design-wise, we’re floored. We absolutely love the new display that Huawei employed with the P40 Pro and the P40 Pro Plus. The new OLED Quad Overflow display gives the phone a signature style much like Huawei’s initial Edge-to-Edge Full View display setup with the Mate 30 Pro.

One of the key differences, however, is that the screen extends above and below, chipping off more chrome side bezels to expose more screen. But unlike the Huawei Mate 30 Pro’s Edge-to-Edge Full View display, the P40 Pro (as well as the entire Huawei P40 line) still retain a bit of bezel on the sides. This houses a physical volume rocker key, a feature removed for the Mate 30 Pro; as someone who’s used both, the ease of use of a physical volume key trumps any virtual button integration any day of the week.

Moving towards the rear, we have the huuuge camera module on the P40 Pro. And while it’s eye-catching, the P40 Pro’s color profiles are even more so. The colors that the Huawei P40 series are available in are absolutely gorgeous! One of the few that pushed gradient colors on smartphones (which everyone started to copy), it seems that Huawei is going back to its roots of a singular color signature per smartphone with the P40 line.

We were given the Deep-Sea Blue colorway as our review unit, and it reminded us of Huawei P-Series phones of old but with a very refined finish. Colors refract in such a way that it gives the phone much depth. If that’s not too your liking, you can opt for matte finishes like the black or Silver Frost colorway.  Personally, I am very much partial towards the Blush Gold color – a soft yellow/orange gold variant that screams luxe without being too ostentatious.

 

Binge-watching Factor

Equipped with a 6.58-inch OLED Overflow Display, the Huawei P40 Pro should give you wider viewing angles; and because of the cute dual punchole camera, you should get more screen than most Huawei devices we’ve seen.

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When watching movies or videos however, the screen auto cuts the movie in such a way that it will not necessarily fill the entire screen. To be fair, the P40 Pro’s priority is to preserve the right aspect ratio of what you’re watching instead of stretching it out just because you want to fill the entire screen. Still, because of the screen’s large enough size, you should have no problems enjoying your favorite clips and movies online. As for sound, the P40 Pro has decent audio powers but the problem is, it only has one set of speakers. If you block them, you pretty much isolate all noise.

Gaming Prowess 

Powering the entire P40 line is Huawei’s flagship processor, Kirin 990 5G! Yup, your P40 is 5G ready! We even ran a quick benchmark test on the Huawei P40 and we almost racked up to 500,000 in score.

This pretty much means that the phone can play any game you throw at it at high to max setting without slowing down. Even with the same SoC, the Huawei P40 Pro scored a better benchmark than the Huawei Mate 30 Pro 5G, though ever so slightly. This pretty much solidifies the unit’s gaming prowess. Equipped with 8G of RAM and a whopping 90Hz display refresh rate, the Huawei P40 Pro is a device you can definitely game on!

 

Geek Photoshoot Capabilities 

The key selling point of the Huawei P40 Pro is most definitely its rear camera setup which includes a 50MP Ultra Vision wide camera, a 40MP SuperSensing Ultra-Wide Cine Camera, a 12MP SuperSensing Telephoto Camera and a 3D Time of Flight camera for better depth effect (better, more naturalistic bokkeh). The combination of these 4 cameras working together should give you stunning photos regardless of shooting conditions. If that’s not enough, your front-facing camera setup also has a depth sensor and a 32MP shooter so you can take better selfies for both photo and video format!

We tested the supposed lossless 5x Optical and 10x Hybrid Zoom of the Huawei P40 Pro and we’re quite happy with the result. The caveat, of course, is you need ample lighting.

Yet, even on challenging lighting conditions, Huawei has always been on top of their game.

Shot on the Huawei P40 Pro using normal mode at evening. Weather Conditions: slightly windy

Huawei is the first company that introduced a separate and dedicated Night Mode feature on mobile photography and, being the progenitor, allows them to improve upon their past tech. The P40 Pro can surprise you even with very minimal lighting.

Darkness taken in a darkened room

Darkness taken at night, in a darkened room with very minimal lighting

And even without using the dedicated Night Mode, on normal setting, the phone can easily compensate on rendering images with challenging lighting conditions.

Main Camera – low light, afternoon shot indoor

On the video front, I could not be happier with the Huawei P40 Pro. As a geek and gaming media site that solely relies on mobile phones when we do our coverages, the Huawei P40 Pro has superb optical image stabilization and AI-assisted stabilization working hand-in-hand to ensure smooth tracking and panning shots. You can check more on this in our Quick Video Test below:

You can also watch our Unboxing and First-Impression video below!

Everyday Reliability

Regardless of how powerful your device is, if it runs out of space or juice in a short amount of time, it will definitely affect your productivity. Luckily, the Huawei P40 Pro comes with a standard 256GB internal memory that’s also expandable via Nano memory card. Sure it’s not your usual Micro SD, but we’ve come a long way in terms of availability and you may find a couple of these on various online sellers.

Battery-wise, the Huawei P40 Pro comes with 4200mah non-removable battery with 40W Supercharging capabilities and 27W wireless fast-charging capabilities.

Perhaps the best addition to your daily productivity though is EMUI 10.1, the P40 Pro’s user interface. The new updated UI is amazing! Aside from a more streamlined look, the new EMUI 10.1 also allows you to truly open multiple usable floating windows on screen.

The floating window function was first implemented on the Huawei Mate X, so it was a pleasant surprise to see that it is now on the P40 Pro as well. How it works is that you can select apps from a side-window.  If you click on the app, it opens a floating window that you can use and close without opening another separate app window. You can customize which apps you could put on the quick-access panel.

Open the gallery menu without switching out the phone’s camera.

Speaking of apps, as with most Huawei Phones that came out in 2020, the Huawei P40 Pro does not come equipped with the Google Play Store. Instead, it’s equipped with Huawei’s AppGallery, an app store that’s constantly adding more and more app partners to its growing selection. A lot of people have apprehensions to get a Huawei device because of this. They fear that they won’t be able to access majority of the top apps that they enjoy using which is not entirely true nowadays. With workarounds and with these same apps going into the official Huawei AppGallery,

If side-loading Google Play Store is cumbersome for you, you can simply opt to clone your existing phone and Huawei should more or less copy a lot of pertinent files, contacts, calendar history, and apps directly to your new phone. I did that for my Mobile Legends account and I was amazed at how fast the process was. We’re talking less than 5 mins here and it was able to copy my ML account fully.

If you want to know how to download your favorite apps using Huawei’s own AppGallery, check out the video below.

 

Final Geek Lifestyle Verdict – 9/10

When Huawei released the P30 Pro last year, we quickly found it to be one of our favorite flagships at the time of its release. Now, with the P40 Pro, Huawei has delivered yet again with a flagship phone that delivers all the features you could ever want, and then some. And while it may not be cheap at PHP 50,990, we believe that it’s worth it if you want the cutting edge of smartphone tech.

Thanks to an incredible set of cameras, a UI with innovative features, and powerful performance, the P40 Pro is definitely a strong flagship contender for 2020!

Huawei P40 Pro Specs:

  • HiSilicon Kirin 990 5G octa-core processor
  • 8GB RAM
  • 58-inch OLED Quad Overflow display, 90hz refresh rate (1,200 x 2,640 resolution)
  • 256GB internal storage, expandable via Nano memory card
  • Quad Leica rear cameras: 50 MP f/1.9 UltraVision Main Camera, 40 MP f/1.8 Supersening ultra-wide Cine-Camera, 12 MP f/3.4 SuperSensing Telephoto Camera, 3D ToF Camera, OIS/AIS
  • 32MP f/2.2 front camera with Depth Sensor and can take 4K selfie video
  • 3G/ 4G/ 5G Dual SIM
  • WiFi 6+, Bluetooth, NFC
  • In-display fingerprint scanner, 3D Face Unlock, IP68 rating
  • 4200mAh battery with 40w wired SuperCharging, 27w wireless charging
  • Android 10 with EMUI 10.1
  • Price: PHP 50,990