Honor 9 release date, news and features

Update: The Honor 9 is currently available in China, but with the firm holding a launch event in Berlin on June 27 we expect it to arrive in Europe very soon.

The Honor 9 has finally been announced, and it looks very much like this is going to be an accomplished mid-range device.

Highlights include a stylish reflective body and a whole lot of RAM, along with a dual-lens camera and plenty of storage.

We've sifted through all the information on the Honor 9, including its specs, features and the all-important release date and price, to help you find out everything you need to know in one place.

Cut to the chase

What is it? The next Honor 'flagship' handset
When is it out? In China already, rest of world likely July
What will it cost? Probably £379.99 (around $480, AU$630)

Honor 9 release date and price

There’s no news yet on if or when the Honor 9 will launch in the UK or Australia, and Honor has made an official statement saying there’s no plan to launch it in the US, but the firm does have a launch event in Berlin on June 27 where we expect to see the phone revealed for Europe.

The Honor 9 is already available elsewhere in the world though, arriving in China on June 16, where the basic model with 4GB of RAM and 64GB of storage costs 2299 yuan (around $340/£265/AU$450).

If you want more RAM the next model up with 6GB of RAM and 64GB of storage is 2,699 yuan (roughly $400/£310/AU$525), and the top-end model with 6GB of RAM and 128GB of storage sets you back 2,999 yuan (approximately $440/£350/AU$585).

These prices aren’t likely to work out as a direct conversion. If anything, the Honor 9 will probably start slightly higher priced than that, as the Honor 8 started at $399/£369.

That falls in line with a leaked pre-order page on Amazon UK which had the Honor 9 price as £379.99 (around $480, AU$630).

Pre-register for Huawei Honor 9
UK: Carphone Warehouse

Honor 9 design and screen

The Honor 9 has a similar design to the Honor 8, with a metal frame and a glass back. That back is reflective, but not like a mirror, instead it diffracts light at various angles to eye-catching effect.

In terms of general upgrades to the way the phone looks the main design difference from the Honor 8 is the fingerprint scanner, which has been moved to the front.

The phone is 147.3 x 70.9 x 7.45mm and 155g, and contrary to some rumors the 3.5mm headphone port is intact.

It comes in Glacier Grey, Sapphire Blue and Midnight Black – though we don’t know whether all those options will be available in all regions.

The Honor 9 has a 5.15-inch 1080p display, down ever so slightly from the 5.2-inch screen on the Honor 8. It comes in at a crisp 428 pixels per inch.

Honor 9 camera and battery

There’s a dual-lens camera on the back of the Honor 9, giving you both a 12MP color sensor and a 20MP monochrome one.

Like the Honor 8 it can combine image data from the two lenses for more detailed, better lit shots. There’s also an 8MP camera on the front and there are a variety of shooting modes, such as panorama, HDR and light painting.

The battery is 3,200mAh, which makes it slightly bigger than the Honor 8’s 3,000mAh offering, so with the improved chipset should offer a longer-lasting battery.

Honor 9 OS and power

The Honor 9 has an octa-core Kirin 960 chipset built by Huawei, in fact it’s the same chip as you’ll find in the Huawei P10. Four cores run at 2.4GHz and the other four are clocked at 1.8GHz.

There’s either 4GB or 6GB of RAM, which in the latter case is more than even most flagships have, though doesn’t necessarily mean the Honor 9 will instantly perform better.

There’s also 64GB or 128GB of built-in storage and a microSD card slot with support for cards of up to 256GB.

The Honor 9 runs Android Nougat, overlaid with Huawei’s Emotion UI, which is quite a heavy skin, so don't expect anything close to a stock Android experience.