Today, Huawei has finally unveiled the P40 Series which are their new flagship smartphones that are known for their camera prowess. These are the Huawei P40, Huawei P40 Pro and a new P40 Pro +.
They sport a new design, improved finishes and of course have that massive camera hump at the back that sport new cameras.
Starting off with the design, they all feature hole-punch displays with the hole punch containing the selfie camera and/or an infrared camera.
They all sport OLED displays of different resolutions, refresh rates and sizes. The P40 has a 6.1″ display with a resolution of 2340 x 1080. The P40 Pro and the P40 Pro+ both have 6.58 inch displays with a resolution of 2640 x 1200 and have a 90Hz refresh rates. This is the first time we have seen high refresh rates being added to flagship Huawei phones. They have an overflow display which curves on all the 4 sides to give it a trippy look
They share the same amount of RAM (8GB) and the same homegrown Kirin 990 SoC which supports 5G. Storage size is different with 128GB internal for the P40, 256GB for the P40 Pro and 512GB for the P40 Pro+. The P40 has IP53 water/dust resistance while the Pro versions sport the better IP68 water resistance rating.
The battery sizes are also different. The P40 Pro and the Pro share the same 4,200mAh battery but the P40 has a smaller 3800mAh battery. However, the P40 sports 40W wired charging while the P40 Pro and the Pro+ share both 40W wired and an incredible 40W wireless charging.
The cameras is where the party is at. The P20 Pro made the world know that Huawei is serious with cameras and the P40 series continues with the heritage.
Interesting enough, the three phones share the same main 50MP Ultravision sensor with the largest sensor in modern smartphones (1/1.28″). This sensor is bigger than the already massive 1/1.33″ sensor on the S20 Ultra and has half the number of pixels. This sensor also has f/1.9 aperture. 100% of its pixels support phase detection autofocus which means focusing with it is super quick and has optical image stabilization.
They start to differ with the other cameras. The P40 has a 16MP ultra-wide camera while the Pros each have a 40MP ultra-wide camera. The P40 has a 8MP telephoto camera with OIS and a f/2.4 aperture. The P40 Pro has a 12MP telephoto camera with an f/3.4 aperture. The P40 Pro+ has a 8MP 10X optical ‘periscope’ telephoto camera and another 8MP 3X optical telephoto camera.
The selfie cameras are pretty standard. They all share the same 32MP f/2.2 cameras but the Pros each have an infrared depth sensor.
They all run on EMUI 10.1 based on Android that does not feature Google services, just like the Mate 30. This is not a problem in China where they don’t use Google services, but can prove to be a problem in other markets that rely on Google services to use the phone.
The P40 is priced at €799 while the P40 Pro is priced at €999 and the top dog P40 Pro + is priced at €1,399. The P40 and the P40 Pro will go on sale starting April 7th while the Pro + will go on sale starting June.
These are still pretty high end phones, save for the 8GB of RAM (it should have been at least 12GB) but they seem to push the camera tech forward for smartphones.
