Huawei Ascend Mate 7

“The elegant and solid casing of the Ascend Mate 7 does not need to fear comparison with contenders from Apple. The screen-to-body ratio should even be superior to the iPhone 6 Plus (although it is thinner). The fingerprint sensor can be listed as a striking feature. GPS is available everywhere, but rarely with such a good reception performance. Objectively, our Huawei Ascend is technically almost equal to and otherwise fully on par with the Apple rivals, but the iPhone 6 Plus with the same storage capacity costs 60% more. However, experience shows that regular Apple customers will not be open for these factual arguments. Buyers who can adapt to the size and to Android receive a clear purchase recommendation from us. This much phablet for this price is not found everywhere.”

“The Ascend Mate7 is probably a logical next step for Huawei after a couple of solid midrange attempts in the same genre. The Mate7 will mix with the big boys in a niche, which has only been getting busier and has a prominent newcomer this season.The premium looks of the Huawei phablet will get enough attention and the build quality will live up to the resulting expectations. That's one important box duly checked. Huawei even probably over-delivered here, considering theirs is a much bigger screen - and battery - in the same space as the iPhone 6 Plus. The Note 4 goes there too.The company indeed succeeded in manufacturing a high-end device made of aluminum alloy, with good looks and excellent handling despite its massive footprint. What we're not sure about is the resemblance to the HTC One Max. Parts of the design are nearly identical and that may be interpreted the wrong way. We'll say it again though, whatever the design inspiration, the Mate7 looks and feels amazing and the build is impressive.The fingerprint scanner was a very pleasant surprise. More than just a line on the spec sheet, it works better than the Samsung solution and can do more or less the same as what you would on an iPhone or a Galaxy handset. The Mate7's fingerprint scanner is very quick and comfortable to use for things like screen unlock, securing content, limiting access to selected app and authorizing payments.The display may not be a QHD unit but the pixel density is more than Retina-grade, with sharp images, great contrast, color reproduction and sunlight legibility. Even better, it can work with gloves if need be.The new Kirin 925 chipset is reasonably fast, but not Snapdragon 801 fast - and there's 805 now, with 810 around the corner. Worse still, while the CPU performance is solid, the Mali-T628 GPU delivers underwhelming results and will soon be kicked out of the major league. At least you get 3GB of RAM, which will put heavy multitaskers at ease. Something to watch out for though - the 16GB version comes with only 2 gigs of RAM.”

“There's no escaping the Huawei Ascend Mate 7's physical size. This may be one giant phone, but it's also the embodiment of Huawei coming of age. It's big meets beautiful with premium design flair, a great fingerprint scanner, ample performance and a battery life that will last for many hours of use. We can see where the Mate name comes from.But it will divide opinion because it's undeniably huge. Assuming you are on board with the massive 6-inch screen size then only relatively small things about the Mate 7 frustrate. Take the often hideous EMUI 3.0 skins as one example - not always Huawei's fault, given the community downloads available - or the feeble vibrate function, irksome default keyboard and navigation buttons layout, or occasional software oddities. Not giant issues to moan about and many can be tweaked to suit your needs anyway.Despite thinking a 6-inch phone would never cut it in our pockets, we've ended up living with the Huawei Ascend Mate 7 for a couple of weeks longer than anticipated. It has embedded itself in our lives and we've been content with that despite expecting the total opposite. In phablets terms the Mate 7 is a contender for the best on the market, no doubt about it.Now all Huawei needs to do is transfer much of that into a smaller, more mass-market consumer device with a touch more power and some user interface tweaks. But make no bones about it, Huawei is catching up with the current front-runners and will be marching its way into more Western pockets over coming months and years based on this kind of performance.”

“The Huawei Ascend Mate7 isn't for everybody. Certainly, the 6-inch screen will put off a sizable portion of potential customers, as that's obviously way into phablet territory. On the bright side, however, the Mate7 is a really compact device relative to its screen size, and, design-wise, leaves very little to desire. It's a well-built, sturdy metal phone that leaves no room for doubt concerning its high-end, premium status.In fact, looking at the full picture, it's hard to pinpoint any one segment in which the Mate7 under-delivered on its high-end promise. That doesn't mean it's perfect – the camera could use some work, and the UI has some kinks to straighten out. But in every other way, this is a great pick, especially if you're looking for a phablet.So how much is Huawei expecting for you to part with, and when and where can you pick one? To start off, the number is EUR 499/EUR 599, respectively for the 16GB/2GB RAM and 32GB/3GB RAM models, and a number of European and Asian markets will get the chance to get their hands on one. Of course, considering its high price tag, picking the Mate7 shouldn't be considered a trivial decision, but it has definitely won our support. This honestly is a great piece of tech, so the only question that remains is whether that's enough to make up for the company's relative unpopularity in the West.”