Overview: Huawei P20 creates its own smartphone category

Text and photos by Emily Chung

The new Huawei P20 and P20Pro have come out as  solutions for consumers who want the high quality photos of a digital camera within their smartphone. This is one of the first AI powered camera available in a smartphone, and Huawei makes it very clear that it’s not trying to compete in the traditional smartphone category. They’ve gone beyond that, offering Leica’s triple camera system on the P20 Pro.

This system also achieved the highest overall DxOMark Score of 109. Huawei is making the distinction between their ‘professional photography’ versus ‘smartphone photography’ that's available with other brands.

While the specs for the P20/P20Pro are impressive, I wanted to know just how user-friendly and practical the device would be. First off, the selfie function boasts a 24MP camera, AI beautification and 3D portrait lighting which results in pictures of me with healthy-looking skin tone adjustments and realistic 3D feature enhancements. Because this girl needs a bit of help, especially on a blah day!

In the Ultra Snapshot mode, the device can capture a picture in as little as 0.3 seconds, even from an off screen. This proved to be very handy when I was trying to capture unscripted life moments.

The Master AI photography advantage automatically identifies over 500 scenarios in 19 categories (including food, group, waterfall, dog, cat, and stage) and selects modes and camera settings to capture your moment like a pro.

Here’s a shot with the ‘flower’ category automatically selected:

I tried out the ‘blue sky’ option:

Our press event had us up in the sky flying over Toronto for a scenic view of the city. Thank goodness for the AI Image Stabilization! If you’ve ever been in a small plane, you’ll know that it’s not the smoothest ride. Fortunately, I was still able to take very clear shots, and though I wish I could take credit for my steady hands… that’s obviously stretching the truth. Curious how clear? Take note of the BMO logo at the bottom left of the picture.

The Master AI also helped recognize the horizon, so if my shot wasn’t truly horizontal then it will automatically adjust it for me. No more bumping the picture a few degrees in my photo editor.

The Huawei P20Pro includes an impressive Leica lens for long-range photography that is capable of up to 5x Hybrid Zoom, has 3x optical zoom, and high quality 10x digital zoom. Admittedly, I was skeptical even when presented with those numbers.

And then I was wrong. On my laptop, I zoomed in on the picture shown above and I was surprised to see that the Air Canada logo was captured so well. I mean, I took the shot high up above Toronto… how? Wha? Wow.

Yep, that's the short building with the white roof:

Battery life on the Huawei P20 Pro is amazing (incredible, actually) with its 4,000mAh battery.

• 22 hours video playback
• 22 hours web browsing
• 25 hours 3G calling
• 89 hours music playback

The Huawei P20 device has a 3,400mAh battery.

• 16 hours video playback
• 16 hours web browsing
• 19 hours 3G calling
• 75 hours music playback

For most consumers, the Huawei P20/P20Pro could be that one device you want to 1) stay connected and 2) take professional photos. No more carrying your digital camera for those special shots.

Did you know that globally, 5 Huawei smartphones are sold every second? This major player is definitely raising the bar with the Huawei P20/P20Pro release.