Review of Huawei P20 Pro

[welshsteve76]

OK, so I've been using my HUAWEI P20 PRO phone for 6 days now.  Here is my review so far.

Interface
The Huawei P20 Pro is more like the iPhone in that there isn't an "Apps" app, that just lists all the apps as icons that you have on most android phone, all the installed apps have an icon on one of the home screens you have.  I personally prefer the OnePlus 3T (and other android devices) interface as it keeps the home screens clear, but the Huawei interface just means you organise you apps into folders and put them away on another home screen. It's all a case of what you're used to, and I'm sure after a while I will just get used to working that way.

Camera
The Huawei P20 Pro supposedly has the best camera available on any smart phone, although I am yet to use it a lot, I plan to give it a good workout soon.

Edit:

Hi all, as some of you asked for some example photos taken with the camera, here are a few I took over the weekend. Not sure how the quality will change because I have had to resize them to allow me to upload them, and then the forum message image insert also resizes them:

Spoiler

Speed
The Huawei is a very fast phone. The control over system RAM etc is good and Huawei's Phone Manager app is really good from what I have seen so far.

Battery
The Huawei appears to have a very good battery.  I charged it to full after initial setup and it lasted 3 days of fiddling and getting used to my phone which I've been very impressed with.  Fast charging is available too so it doesn't take long to charge.

Screen
The screen is fantastic on the Huawei, as you would expect as it supports 4K video.  

Finger Print Scanner
The finger print scanner is excellent and incredibly responsive.

Look

The Huawei has a wow factor with its two-tone casing.  I purchased a cover for it which enhances it and makes it less slippery - https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07CXL6NR2/ref=pe_1572281_66412651_cm_rv_eml_rv0_dp

Now for some cons:

Listening to music

I listen to a lot of music.  The stock music app is not great, but for a while on android phones now I have been using the paid for version of JetAudio.  Something that is disapponting with the Huawei is the lack of a headphone jack.  I use my phone quite extensively for playing music (I don't do spotify etc, I prefer to have music on my phone). There are headphones that comes with the phone, and although they are ok, after wearing them for a while they hurt my ears as they sit on the lobe.  There is an adapter in the box that allows you to use headphones with a standard jack, which is all good and well. However, when at work, this means I can no longer charge my phone and listen to music the same time.  And what happens if you're out and about a lot and need to use you're pocket charger while continuing to listen to music?  Quite simply you can't.

Also, when I use a bluetooth headphone set, despite me setting JetAudio as the default music app, when I press play on my bluetooth headphones, the stock music app fires up and starts playing.

This, however, is a problem generally with android and bluetooth I think.  Nobody seems capabale of producing the capability of somebody choosing the default playback device for a bluetooth headset and music player integration.

Storage

You're also limited to the storage available on the phone as there is not expandable storage, which meant I went with the 128GB model to maximise my available space.

Notification Sounds

One other thing that is an annoyance with the Huawei is the inability to set different notification alert tones for email, text and system notifications.  Despite Android having this capability for years, Huawei have appeared to removed this ability.  YOu can only set a ringtone for phone calls, and a default notification sound for all system messages.  This is extremely annoying in that you don't know if you are receiving an email or a text, or a system notification.  I would hope that Huawei are aware of this and will open up this fundamental android functionality in a (soon) future update.