Review and technical specifications of Huawei Honor 7A Pro

Huawei Honor 7A Pro is the most budget model in the brand’s range, which, despite the affordable price tag, received a full-length screen, high-quality sound, a good main camera and a number of other features, which I will talk about in a full review of the smartphone in Russian.

The manufacturer wants to strengthen its position in the budget segment, where at least Xiaomi will provide it with worthy competition. This is the only thing in which the manufacturer has not yet succeeded, because in the mid-range and flagship segment it feels great, being among the first to introduce technologies and set new trends. For example, it was after Mate 10 that everyone began to actively introduce artificial intelligence into their smartphones, and now the brand has started the fashion for a triple main camera. But in the budget segment, everything is not so good yet and he is trying to correct this by offering Honor 7A Pro with facial recognition technology in 24 parameters, a separate slot for MicroSD and other features that you will learn about during the full review. This is a good option for those who have a small purchasing budget, but at the same time want to get a high-quality product with a good set of modern functions at a price of 9,000 rubles, or even cheaper.

Specifications:

• Operating system: Android 8.0 Oreo, EMUI 8.0
• Screen: 5.7 inches, IPS, FullView, HD+ 1440 x 720, 282 ppi, 75.4%, 2.5D glass
• Processor: 8-core, Qualcomm Snapdragon 430, up to 1.5 GHz
• Graphics accelerator: Adreno 505
• RAM: 2/3 GB
• ROM: 32 GB, microSD up to 256 GB
• Camera: 13 MP + 2 MP (only version with 3 GB RAM, and only 13 MP in version with 2 GB RAM), f/2.2, PDAF, LED flash
• Front camera: 8 MP, f/2.0, LED flash
• Wireless interfaces: 4G VoLTE, Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, Bluetooth 4.2, GPS/A-GPS/GLONASS/BDS, FM radio
• Sound: Huawei Histen 3D
• Additionally: fingerprint scanner
• Connectors: mini-jack 3.5 mm, microUSB
• Battery: non-removable, 3,000 mAh
• Number of SIM: 2, Nano-SIM
• Dimensions: 152.4 x 73 x 7.8 mm
• Weight: 150 grams

Equipment

Honor 7A Pro comes in a durable cardboard box containing the following contents:

• Charger;
• MicroUSB cable;
• A paperclip for quick access to SIM card trays;
• Display protective film;
• Small instructions and guarantee.

The only thing missing is a bumper, which can be purchased separately, so that the smartphone is already protected from all sides and you don’t have to worry about it during use.

Speaker, sound quality

The speaker of the smartphone pleasantly surprised us. Despite the fact that there is no stereo sound here, it turned out to be very loud - if you turn the slider to the maximum level in the room, the sound literally begins to “hit your ears.” The quality is also good, it is not flat, without a metallic tint, there is even a hint of low frequencies.

Honor 7A Pro has a standard 3.5 mm audio jack, so listening to music on headphones will not be accompanied by additional inconvenience.

Honor 7A Pro design

The review of Honor 7A Pro 16 gb showed that they didn’t bother too much with the design of a budget smartphone, as is usually the case. In this regard, Huawei Honor 7A Pro can hardly be distinguished from previously released models - Nova 2i and P Smart. It’s good when a brand has a recognizable design, but it’s never a bad idea to create devices that are really interesting from the outside, so that each new smartphone stands out with its design, and not turn production into a continuous assembly line.

The front side is made as simple as possible and does not offer any design frills. There are frames and they are quite large, even on the sides of the screen, which is not very good, but forgivable for a budget employee. There are no keys at the bottom, but the Honor family logo flaunts, which looks nice. The front panel is covered with protective glass with an oleophobic coating, but of very mediocre quality. Whether it is there or not, the fingerprints remain permanently, and removing them will not be so easy.

As the review of Honor 7A Pro 16 GB showed, sensors, a selfie camera, a flash for it, a speaker, and an indicator were placed above the screen, thanks to which you will always know about missed events. The Huawei Honor 7A Pro smartphone also has face unlocking, but it only works in good lighting and there is a noticeable delay.

All corners are rounded, due to which the body does not dig into the palm and does not try to slip out. The material for the manufacture of the side frame was metal, the surface of which can be black, blue or gold. The version in the blue case looks the most original; we are all already accustomed to classic colors and want something new.

In the review of the Huawei Honor 7A Pro smartphone, I found out that its back is flat and made of plastic, which was used in order to save money. Yes, it’s not the best option, because for this price you can find a budget phone with a metal body, but Huawei always sets the price at a level higher than its competitors and tries to compete with the strongest market players such as Apple and Samsung.

There are plastic antennas at the top and bottom of the cover, but the solution is questionable, because the plastic case has no problems with signal reception quality. This was done rather in order to create the appearance of a metal case, because it is precisely in it that such a design is needed. In my opinion, it would be much better without them, the backdrop would seem much more attractive.

In the upper left corner there is a single main camera, an additional microphone and a flash. Closer to the center there is a fingerprint scanner and a corporate logo at the very bottom.

The Huawei Honor 7A Pro phone turned out to be quite compact - 152x73x7.8 mm, and also weighs a little - 155 grams. It is not as pleasant to hold in your hand as models with a metal or glass body. You immediately understand that this is a budget device, for the assembly of which one of the most affordable, but less reliable materials was used. The build quality is impeccable, and the plastic itself is quite durable. In any case, during testing it remained in perfect condition, not a single chip or scratch appeared.

The bottom edge is occupied by the MicroUSB port, the main microphone and speaker, hidden under the perforation.

The good news is that the smartphone retained the classic 3.5 mm headset jack, which was installed on top.

On the right is the volume rocker and power button. They are not particularly convenient to use, since they are thin and made almost flush with the body. They press easily and have a clear movement.

On the left there is a tray in which you can put two SIM cards and a separate one for MicroSD. This is a very convenient solution, because there is not much built-in memory, and not everyone is ready to give up a second operator card.

Cameras

Both devices have 13 megapixel main cameras, but looking ahead, you shouldn’t think that they shoot the same way. At the same time, the “Camera” application is the same and is well known from other Huawei/Honor smartphones.

Both phones do not shine with the quality of shooting, everything is clear here, a budget phone is a budget phone. At the same time, Honor 7A takes pictures that are rich in colors, but there are problems with detail.

The Honor 7A Pro camera is slightly better in terms of detail, but is inferior to the Honor 7A in color saturation, even in HDR mode.

The front camera of Honor 7A Pro is 8 megapixels, while the Honor 7A is 5 megapixels. Selfie camera lovers won't like it.

4.5

ITC.UA rating

Pros: affordable prices, separate slot for two NanoSIM and memory cards, fingerprint scanner and face unlock (Honor 7A Pro), current version of Android; good displays, like for budget employees

Cons: lack of versions with large amounts of RAM and user memory

Conclusion: The heroes of the review are, in fact, slightly cheaper Huawei Y5 2020 and Y6 Prime 2020 smartphones, which only plays into their hands. With the release of these models in the budget segment, a truly serious struggle for buyers begins, because the company has produced good smartphones for little money.

Specifications

Honor 7A Pro display

A full review of Honor 7A Pro turns to its screen, which has an 18:9 aspect ratio, which is high time for all new smart phones, regardless of price category. The 5.7-inch display operates at HD+ resolution (1440x720 pixels) - not the best result, with a pixel density of only 282 ppi.

You can see individual pixels, but during normal use they do not cause any discomfort. Although, of course, the Honor 7A Pro display is very far from flagship level. This is an IPS matrix with wide viewing angles and natural color reproduction, supporting up to 10 touches simultaneously.

Smartphone review: Honor 7A Pro 16 Gb black showed that the maximum brightness level of 450 cd/m2 makes it comfortable to work with the phone under any conditions, even if you are in bright sun. Considering the cost, this is a very good indicator. With a significant tilt, the color rendition goes into warm tones and the colors are even slightly inverted, but this only appears at a strong tilt, as no one uses a smartphone. As for a budget employee, the screen is very commendable, but the matrix itself and the quality of its calibration are at an average level.

Screens

Both smartphones are equipped with IPS screens with a resolution of 1440x720 pixels, but the diagonals are different. Honor 7A has 5.45 inches, and Honor 7A Pro has 5.7 inches. Of course, these are not all the differences. Let's start with the fact that the Pro version has a 2.5D protective glass screen, while the 7A model has a regular, flat one.

Only Honor 7A Pro has an oleophobic coating.

Honor 7A

The brightness of the Honor 7A display varies from 2 to 350 cd/m², the contrast is 1 in 1008. The color gamut is slightly wider than the sRGB triangle, the color temperature is slightly higher than the reference value - which means the colors are only a little cooler than they should be. If we talk about subjective impressions, then the screen is decent. It is contrasting, the colors on it are saturated and not pale, but the black is deep.

Honor 7A Pro

The display brightness of the Honor 7A Pro varies from 2 to 341 cd/m², the contrast is 1 to 1287. According to measurements, the screen temperature is significantly higher than the reference value. Subjectively, the screen is also not bad, but the colors are cooler than necessary, but here it all depends on personal preferences. The rest of the screen is also very good.

By the way, if you don’t like the standard display calibration, you can customize it yourself. Yes, it will be difficult to achieve ideal parameters, but some things can be corrected.

Performance and synthetic tests of Honor 7A Pro

Alas, the technical characteristics of the Huawei Honor 7A Pro do not shine, because it uses a weak Snapdragon 430 processor, made using an outdated 28-NM process technology. It includes 8 cores that accelerate to just 1.5 GHz. This is enough to avoid any delays when working with the interface, but there is nothing to count on in games. Most of them will run on minimal graphics, but not all of them; this is what reveals the budget orientation of the device.

The processor works in conjunction with the Adreno 505 graphics accelerator. If it is not heavily loaded, it works fine, but under high loads brakes appear. I conducted a test in games in PUBG and the result was disastrous - stuttering occurred even on the lowest graphics.

Huawei Honor 7A Pro test in Antutu and GeekBench

There is 16 GB of memory installed inside, which also works slowly - the read speed is 113 MB/s, and the write speed is 53 MB/s. This volume will not be enough, so it can be expanded with MicroSD up to 256 GB, for which, fortunately, a separate slot has been allocated. RAM is also in short supply - only 2 GB; in terms of characteristics, Huawei Honor 7A Pro is inferior to Xiaomi, which offers much more sophisticated characteristics for the same price.

Performance

The 18:9 screen is great for watching movies. Naturally, they don't look particularly chic, but the clarity is high enough that there are no complaints. For multimedia, only 5 GB of disk space is very little, so you can add a microSD memory card up to 256 GB.

Obviously, the games will not go well. Unusually for Honor devices, Huawei processors are not used here. Instead, it uses a Snapdragon 430 with eight 1.4 GHz Cortex-A53 cores. The RAM capacity is 2 GB, as a result the operating speed is far from astronomical.

In Geekbench 4 multi-core testing, the result was 2745 points. This is on par with the 2020 flagships OnePlus 2 (2756) and Sony Xperia Z5 (2714).

When used intensively, the device heats up noticeably and begins to slow down even more. From time to time there are graphical glitches and application crashes, not only in games, but also when working with a smartphone in general.

Multitasking and switching between applications is difficult, so it is better not to run many programs at the same time. The device had to be rebooted several times to try to get rid of the errors, but this did not help. Applications, especially large games, launch too slowly, if at all. One could say that there is no need to suffer and try to play Assassin's Creed, only the game is pre-installed.

Simpler games like Angry Birds and Candy Crush shouldn't have any problems. They came out when 2GB smartphones were ubiquitous.

Huawei Honor 7A Pro interface

The Honor 7A Pro 16 GB smartphone review introduces you to the fact that it runs on Android 8.0 OS, on top of which the EMUI 8.0 shell is applied, which not everyone likes. You can evaluate it from the screenshots that I will leave below.

Multimedia

Honor is targeting this smartphone at a youth audience, which is evident from some of the functionality. There's a karaoke mode that supposedly provides real-time audio monitoring through headphones and supports SWS3.1 virtual bass. This simulates studio recording and makes it possible to hear your own voice while recording music. The general public is unlikely to need this.

There is a party mode where you can combine up to eight Honor 7A Pro smartphones and play the same music on everyone. Theoretically this is interesting, in practice you will never find eight people with the same thing with the Honor 7A Pro smartphone. It would be much better if it were possible to combine different smartphone models.

The emphasis on surround sound on this device seems an odd decision, since there is only one speaker. To get good stereo sound, you need two such smartphones. There are two sets of six holes on the bottom edge, but there are speakers on only one side.

For such a price the quality is good. The music is quite rich and the volume is quite high. Of course, at maximum volume there is distortion. The sound is not ideal, but even on more expensive devices it can be worse.

This smartphone can simultaneously connect two Bluetooth devices. This can be useful when listening to music; you can connect a wearable device like a watch and a speaker.

Wireless communications Huawei Honor 7A Pro

Huawei Honor 7A Pro can work with two Nano SIM cards, which feel confident in 4G networks. The rest of the characteristics are typical for a modern budget Android device - Wi-Fi is only 2.4 GHz, Bluetooth 4.2, as well as support for OTG adapters, so you can connect a regular computer flash drive and watch movies from it on the road, for example.

For navigation, GPS and GLONASS resources are used with a location accuracy of 9 meters. Sensitivity is at the highest level - even indoors, the smartphone can easily find satellites, and in open areas there are up to 35 of them in the field of view, and it connects to 15.

Communication and Internet

Honor 7A Pro supports dual SIM cards, LTE communication is available from both slots. The smartphone holds the operator's signal well; there were no problems with communication during testing of the device.

All wireless interfaces - Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and GPS navigation also work without any complaints. An indisputable plus is full support for two SIM cards and a memory card, the slot is separate, so you don’t have to make any compromises.

Autonomy of Huawei Honor 7A Pro

Huawei Honor 7A Pro review shows that it has a built-in 3000 mAh battery. Yes, the capacity is far from record-breaking, but taking into account the low screen resolution and weak processor, we get about 4 hours of display operation with active use. In video playback mode, the smartphone sits down in 7-8 hours, and in games about 5, although the list of games on it is very limited due to insufficient performance. The Huawei Honor 7A Pro smartphone battery was tested at maximum brightness.

It takes 1 hour 45 minutes to fully charge the phone from a charger with parameters 5V/2A.

Cameras and photos

The main camera is represented by one 12 megapixel module with an f/2.2 aperture. The full gallery of photos on Honor 7A Pro is posted on Yandex.Disk. On the website we provide examples of illustrative and illustrative photographs.

Photo with flash

The front camera shoots with a resolution of 5 megapixels and is equipped with support for photo enhancement and face recognition. Selfie shots come out average—noise appears in difficult conditions, and photos are often blurred.

Camera overview

The manufacturer didn’t play tricks with the cameras and although it seems that there is a double module installed at the back, in reality there is only one and this is better than shoving a second one just for show. It shoots in 13 megapixel resolution and has an f/2.2 aperture. The optics include five lenses, and the front camera is represented by an 8 megapixel module with a slightly better aperture ratio - f2.0.

Huawei is one of the best manufacturers, which is especially successful in terms of cameras. This is visible not only in the flagship segment, where it competes well even with Samsung flagships, but also in the budget category. The Huawei Honor 7A Pro review makes it clear that it is no exception to the rule. Yes, the photo taken with it cannot be called ideal, but in the budget category everything looks decent - there is minimal noise, the white balance is determined correctly. Huawei uses good software algorithms that get the most out of the camera. The detail of objects in the frame is average, and autofocus quickly focuses on the subject. But at night, due to the low aperture, a lot of noise appears.

Example photo on Huawei Honor 7A Pro

Selfies turn out good if you take them during the day. The only thing is that, at least on the current firmware version, the white balance fluctuates. This should be corrected in the future.

Honor 7A Pro can shoot video in FullHD with 30 frames per second for both cameras. The quality is standard for its price category. The sound is quite pleasant and is recorded in stereo format.

Conclusion

It is quite possible that Huawei Honor 7A Pro will become a successful model, because on board it has everything you need for comfortable work. Yes, it performed poorly in games and is inferior in performance to its competitors, but it has decent battery life and cameras. Also among the shortcomings are the plastic body and the average quality of the screen, which is not calibrated from the factory in the best way. For 9,000 rubles you get a reliable smartphone that will be a good choice for everyday use if games are not that important to you.

The main competitor will be Xiaomi Redmi 5, which outperforms the hero of our review in all respects. For its price, it will be much more interesting, offering a more powerful processor and battery, and not only that.

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Design and screen

Smartphones at such a low price often resemble a toy, but in this case that is not the case. It weighs enough to feel solid. The device also looks good, especially the blue version discussed in this review.

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The metallic blue finish and silver antenna stripes don't grab the eye like flagships like the Honor 10. Plus, the body is actually made of plastic, but it still looks good enough that it wouldn't be a shame to show it off without a case.

As is usual for many Honor smartphones, this one received a round fingerprint scanner on the back of the case. The camera and flash protrude slightly beyond the body in a horizontal oval at the top.

At the bottom there is a small blue inscription with the name of the manufacturer. On the lower front frame there is a more prominent logo in silver on a black background. The bezels around the screen are quite thick, but the screen itself is quite long and large. The corners are rounded and their shine makes the phone look a little cheap, but younger buyers should like it.

The left edge can accommodate two SIM cards and add a microSD card at the same time. At the top left is the 3.5mm headphone jack, although it’s more common to see it in the center. On the right is the volume rocker and power button. There is no pattern on the latter so that you can feel it without looking, but this does not cause any particular problems. Between two sets of holes at the bottom, only one of which marks the speaker, is the charging port. Unfortunately, it's just microUSB.

This is a cheap smartphone, but even in them it’s time to switch to the more modern USB-C standard. In the meantime, many such devices are content with the old interface.

The screen quality also shows the low cost. It has a good size of 5.7 inches and an 18:9 ratio, but the resolution is only HD. Many smartphones, even at lower prices, have 1080p screens.

With this size and resolution, the pixel density is only 282 ppi. This is far from the best value and results in a slight blurring of text and images, especially when viewed up close.

The brightness level is good, color rendering and sensor performance are also satisfactory. Many people will simply not pay attention to the low screen resolution, so this cannot be called a big disadvantage.

Another drawback is the lack of an NFC communication standard. This means it won't work with contactless payment systems like Android Pay. This is bad even at this price.

On the other hand, it is one of the cheapest smartphones with face unlock support, if you're interested. Reviewers tried to cheat the system with different hairstyles, makeup and glasses. She still recognized the user, although slowly. As usual, the facial unlock system is not as reliable as the fingerprint scanner. Facial recognition support was added in a software update, as if the developers thought of it at the last minute. This doesn't bode well for quality. In any case, it was not possible to deceive the system using photographs.

Net

Supports China Mobile, China Telecom and China Unicom on 2G/3G/4G networks*

* The main and secondary SIM cards can be inserted into the slot in any order, as any SIM card slot can be used for the main SIM card (the main SIM card supports China Mobile, China Telecom and China Unicom in 2G/3G networks /4G), at this time the second SIM card slot automatically becomes an additional SIM card (the additional SIM card supports China Mobile, China Telecom and China Unicom in 2G network), but the simultaneous operation of two SIM cards of China Telecom operator is not supported , although Honor Play 7A supports any other combination of SIM cards from China's three largest operators.

— page about the smartphone on the official website of Honor

Honor Play 7A perfectly catches 3G and 4G (LTE) networks from the Beeline cellular operator in the city of Voronezh. The speed of mobile Internet on the 4G network is also excellent. But sometimes there are problems with switching from a Wi-Fi network to mobile data transfer. Solution: turn Airplane mode or restart your smartphone.

Several times, for unknown reasons, the mobile Internet stopped working. There is only one solution: restart your smartphone.

Hardware + EMUI 8.0.0 shell

The smartphone is equipped with a Qualcomm® Snapdragon™ 430 chipset, the processor of which is generally sufficient for everyday tasks - the EMUI 8.0.0 shell interface works quickly and the speed of opening applications or web pages is fast, but not lightning fast. In addition, when running resource-intensive applications, it turned out to be a “cold” chipset - the back of the smartphone heats up slightly, becoming a little warm. The exception was the Google Translate in on-the-fly translation mode, using the main camera to point at the text - in this case, heating in the area of ​​the main camera is already felt.

When it comes to gaming, the Qualcomm® Adreno™ 505 graphics chip lacks the performance to keep it smooth— Real Racing 3 slows down when racing against rivals, and Subway Surf can freeze for a second at the most inopportune moments.

There is also a lack of 2GB of RAM, which affects the comfort of using the smartphone - applications running in the background may close automatically; viewing a feed of posts with video files and GIF images in the VKontakte can lead to the application freezing, and often when opening links and returning to the feed, the VKontakte is restarted; copying information from one application to another leads to a restart of the previous one; Seamless updating of applications in the Play Store is possible only when the application store is open, otherwise the update is suspended and will resume only when the Play Store .

But there is enough memory for storing data, the volume of which is 32GB. After activating the shell, ~24GB is free, and it can be slightly increased by deleting partner applications and games: Google Sheets , Google Docs , Google Presentations , Messenger , Truecaller , Z Camera , Asphalt Nitro , Spider-Man , Dragonmania , Kingdoms , Puzzle Pets , Assassin's Creed . You can also remove the following standard EMUI 8.0.0 shell applications: FM radio , Mirror , Game Center , Backups , Phone Clone , Tips , Party mode , Honor store .

But there are no complaints about the GPS and GLONASS modules - it quickly picks up satellites and accurately determines the location.

Facial recognition Young people love their faces

Smartphone face recognition and unlocking, 1024 sets of facial size features, quick identification of facial features with support for eye position detection.

— page about the smartphone on the official website of Honor

Unlocking a smartphone using face recognition works well in good lighting and when the face is properly registered, although the screen brightness is automatically increased for recognition. It takes 2-3 seconds to recognize a face. Smart Lock Screen Notifications is enabled, the contents of notifications are hidden, but once the camera recognizes a face, the contents of the notifications are shown. There is a protection that, if face recognition fails 5 times, disables this unlocking method and requires entering a PIN code, password or pattern. But this protection does not work very well - the protection may not turn on even when the 15th attempt to unlock the smartphone using facial recognition has begun.