Huawei proved it isn’t afraid to take on Apple with the launch of its own 5.5-inch phablet, the Honor 6 Plus. The Chinese company teased the Honor 6 Plus launch just a few days before the event, and it’s been available in China and India for a while. Now, the Honor 6 Plus is finally making its way out of Asia.
Updated on 04-01-2015 by Malarie Gokey: Added news of UK launch and pricing for the Honor 6 Plus.
Huawei announced that the phablet will arrive in the UK next month, with a May 1 launch date planned, according to Android Central. The Honor 6 Plus will be available from UK carrier Three for a special price of £300/$445, which is pretty cheap, given its great specifications. Amazon will also offer the phone with pre-orders on April 16.
Huawei packed a massive 5.5-inch LCD screen with a 1080p resolution onto the Honor 6 Plus, matching the size of Apple’s first phablet perfectly. However, Huawei was quick to point out that its bezels are smaller, which in its mind means you get more screen for their money with the Honor 6 Plus, Engadget noted.
It’s not the screen that makes the Honor 6 Plus interesting, it’s the new dual camera setup. Much like HTC’s Duo Camera feature, Huawei’s Honor 6 Plus has two 8-megapixel cameras tacked on the back of the device. The company says the combination of the two cameras increases the pixel size to 1.98 microns, resulting in sharper images. You can also take advantage of many different photo effects including aperture adjustments from f/0.95 to f/16, and filters such as tilt shift, sketch, and comics. Huawei also had selfie takers in mind when it made the Honor 6 Plus, as it added an 8-megapixel camera on the front of the device.
The phablet is powered by Huawei’s Kirin 925 octa-core processor, alongside 3GB of RAM and an energy efficient I3 coprocessor, which tracks fitness metrics. While Huawei offers up to 32GB of internal storage, the Honor 6 Plus also has a MicroSD card slot, so up to 128GB of storage can be added to the device. A large 3,600mAh battery is built in, making it larger than the one found in the iPhone 6 Plus.
In terms of connectivity, the Honor 6 Plus features NFC, TD/FDD-LTE Cat 6, and dual-SIM slots. There’s also an infrared transmitter that allows your phone to double as a remote control for your TV, Hi-Fi system, and air conditioner. As with every Huawei phone, the Honor 6 Plus is running the company’s Emotion UI 3.0 on top of Android, which makes the phone look more like an iOS device than an Android handset.
To sweeten the deal, Huawei is adding 100GB of cloud storage and free access to more than 8 million Wi-Fi hotspots, most of which are located in China. Even though the Honor 6 Plus has all the high-end specs you’d expect from a $600+ smartphone, Huawei kept the price down. The 16GB, 3G-only version sans NFC will cost just CN¥1,999 or $320 off-contract. This version comes in black or white. Huawei also made a 4G version with all the bells and whistles, which costs CN¥2,499 or about $400 unsubsidized.
