The Huawei P40 Pro: «Gary», a speaker, two Watches and a pair of sunglasses
«Hold my Beer», says Huawei. Making a phone without Google will be hard. But new developments on the part of Huawei give rise to at least some hope. Nevertheless, my first impression of the P40 Pro leaves most of my questions unanswered.
Richard Yu seems agitated, more aggressive than usual. The usually chipper smartphone nerd and seemingly accidental CEO of Huawei's mobile division gets onstage and starts talking about the company's plans for 2020. They're ready. The partners are on board. And customers should prepare for greatness.
The first advertising clip plays. Its focus is on the new App Gallery. Apparently, it'll «fundamentally redefine our world». This is where vision and innovation meet. «This is where it starts. Together.»
Then everything happens very quickly. Richard Yu's face brightens up. He talks about what he likes: smartphones. As of today, the P40 dream has come true. And apparently, it seeks to take photography to a new level. This will be ensured by the Leica triple camera setup at the back and an 32 megapixel lens at the front.
Silver. That's it.
Richard Yu turns the phone over. A grey glimmer. The P40 changes colour from white to light grey to dark grey to blue grey. The back is ceramic, which gives the phone a certain warmth. Otherwise, it feels exactly like the P30 Pro. In general, the phone feels like an old friend. Like the P30 Pro. It's slim, the upper and lower edges are flattened to make the phone easier to handle.
Richard Yu silently places the rose gold model – called Blush Gold – in the pocket of his jacket and quickly reveals the silver version. Oh yeah, he knows it looks good. More beautiful and lively than the the bland competition. Huawei calls it Silver Frost.
But colour gradients still exist. The P40 Pro comes in Ice White, a colour that video producer Stephanie Tresch describes as «Unicorn White». The colour spectrum goes from a light blue to purple to white. Then there's Deep Sea Blue, and finally... Black.
The buttons are where you expect them to be, on the side. The P40 is clearly a P-Phone. Its heritage is evident and tangible. But the screen's changed. Somehow. The display has a maximum resolution of 2640×1200 pixels, a refresh rate of 90 Hertz and is curved around its four edges. The screen ratio is 19.8:9 with a 6.58-inch diagonal display. Below that, a Kirin 990 5G makes a bold statement, with 256 GB of internal memory and 8 GB of RAM.
A nice side effect: by default, the phone emits 30% less blue light, which is easier on your eyes. Nevertheless, I recommend switching on the blue light filter in the Device Settings.
The P40 Pro has four cameras installed:
- A 40 megapixel ultra wide-angle Cine lens, f/1.8.
- A 50 megapixel Ultra Vision Wide Angle Lens with one RYYB sensor, f/1.9, optical image stabilizer.
- A 12 Megapixel 5x periscope zoom lens, RYYB sensor, 240mm, f/4.4, optical image stabilizer.
- A Time-of-Flight camera for faster depth focus.
There's also a colour temperature sensor that measures the surrounding warmth via eight channels.
And here's a snap of Aargau to demonstrate:
But wait. The P40 Pro+ has even more cameras.
The P40 Pro+ doesn't just look impressive, even though it hardly differs from the P40 Pro externally. A shame it's only available in either black or white. No Ice White. Only white.
In exchange, this thing has five cameras built in.
- A 40 megapixel ultra wide-angle Cine lens, f/1.8.
- A 50 megapixel Ultra Vision Wide Angle Lens with one RYYB sensor, f/1.9, optical image stabilizer.
- An 8 Megapixel periscope zoom lens, RYYB sensor, 240mm, f/4.4, optical image stabilizer.
- 8 Megapixels of optical zoom, 80mm, f/2.4, optical image stabilizer.
- A Time-of-Flight camera for faster depth focus.
There's also a colour temperature sensor that measures the surrounding warmth via eight channels.
Richard Yu shows off
Now Richard Yu gets to be smug. According to him, the P40 Pro's night mode will pulverise the competition. Its ISO values as well as the long exposure time are unrivalled.
The zoom lens is the first of its kind, he says, being multifocus-capable in the P40 Pro+ and achieving up to 100x zoom with Hybrid Zoom. Then he demonstrates. It looks incredible. But whoever checks digitec tomorrow will see that 100x zoom is a bit too ambitious. Therefore: don't get too enthusiastic before tests are done in real-life conditions. Independent of the manufacturer.
Colour values, optical zoom, hybrid zoom, 4k60fps selfie videos. Low Light Infrared Face Unlock... Richard Yu is in full control. If even half of what he's claiming comes true, Huawei will have pulled off their «Hold my Beer» moment. At least when it comes to the camera.
By the way, a 50x zoom image from the P40 Pro looks like this in real conditions, even though it was taken with camera software that isn't yet finalized.
And that's before adding in the Al of the camera. It uses technology called Golden Snap. Let's say you want to take a shot of some people jumping on a beach. The AI instantly removes unwanted individuals from the pictures and sorts them out in advance, selecting the optimal picture before showing it to you.
Gestures. Now you don't even have to touch your mobile phone to be able to scroll on it. Simply hold your hand in front of the screen after you turn on Air Gestures and then move your hand. But that only works to a certain extent. I eagerly waved across the phone during the keynote and nothing happened. Still some polishing to do on Huawei's part. A distance requirement between 20 to 40 cm is also a bit weird. You cover half the screen with your hand. But even in this case, the frosty silver P40 Pro on my desk is still using test software.
The elephant in the room: Google
As nice as the P40 Pro may be, Huawei finds itself in a precarious position. Since May 2019, US companies have been prohibited from doing business with Huawei. The Trump government issued this decree because it suspects espionage. For reasons that are incomprehensible to the public, experts and hackers alike. As a result, the P40, not just the Pro, but the whole series, will not be shipped with Google Services.
It's always a bit strange being at press events when someone in a suit and tie has to say that installing apps is as easy as ever. And that the range of apps on offer is just as extensive as that of the Google Play Store. That's simply not true. Not yet.
The App Gallery is Huawei's attempt at rivalling Google. But Google has almost a decade of experience, which makes the gallery seem small and insignificant. Although Huawei is investing a lot of money and PR into the «App Gary», even the charismatic Mr. Yu can't make us ignore the fact that this is simply a knock-off version of the Play Store. An example: Clue is probably the best period tracker. Gary has the «Period Tracker – Period Calendar Ovulation Tracker», by app producer Simple Design Limited based out of Singapore. Is Period Tracker worse or better than Clue? Yes, no, maybe. It doesn't really matter, as the de facto standard is just missing.
To make sure that popular apps can still be offered in Huawei's App Gallery, the app sometimes links to official APK downloads by app vendors where the software can be obtained directly. Otherwise, retrofitting a third-party App Store is recommended. I recommend APKPure.
Simple is different. And more complete as well.
I don't see a future in Huawei's current Frankenstein app system. There's just too little comfort, too little choice and too much «good enough, I guess...».
Still, things are looking up. I've been observing the situation around App Gary since the start of Huawei's detachment from Google. Something's going on, but we're in the middle of the development process at the moment. Huawei is trying to catch up to ten years of quality in a few months. Although this seems impossible, they seem to be inching towards the right direction. But this'll takes time.
But the fact is: a second large and widely accepted App Store would do the world good. Competition stimulates business and in the end we win as consumers. Okay, we leave behind some money, but we get better equipment and better software for it.
I'm pretty sure that within a few days, some hacker will find a reliable way to upgrade Google services. Then the P40 Pro has free reign to dominate the market. I myself am also working on this in collaboration with some readers. We'll keep you posted.
The quick stats
- Wireless charging now works with 40 watts.
- The P40 series battery is the same as in the P30 series, 4200 mAh LiPo.
- But the Kirin is more energy efficient.
- Emui is updated to version 10.1
- Emui brings Multi Window Support.
- Emui also provides Floating Windows, which means that messages are displayed over other apps.
- Huawei has a new voice assistant. Her name is Celia, and she's activated by saying «Hey, Celia».
- Similar to Apple, Emui 10.1 lets you remotely control other devices in its ecosystem.
- Huawei publishes its own cases. Among them, one for snorkelling.
- Huawei is releasing a new speaker. It's called Sound X, delivering 144 watts, 40Hz bass and 20mm amplitude.
- The engineering is done by Devialet.
- Two new Watches.
- In cooperation with Gentle Monster, a new pair of smart glasses is coming. They work as a headset and can be charged wirelessly.
Finally, the P40 Pro will be launched in Europe on April 7. The P40 Pro+ will arrive in June.
Still without Google. Damn. No idea what that «One More Thing» was about either. The Speaker? The Watch? The P40 Pro+? App Gary's latest propaganda ad?
Journalist. Author. Hacker. A storyteller searching for boundaries, secrets and taboos – putting the world to paper. Not because I can but because I can’t not.