Review of the HUAWEI Pura 80 Smartphone
So, after the tablet, it's time for a Huawei smartphone. The Pura 80 model belongs to the mid-range price segment with the most balanced features, but the company emphasizes the quality of the camera the most. And I already had the opportunity to test it in action at several events in addition to regular testing.
However, of course, I couldn't miss trying out games on a smartphone as well. Nevertheless, let’s go through everything in order.
Design
First, let's walk through the design. Moreover, with the plastic case on, the HUAWEI Pura 80 looks quite stylish — the volume and power buttons are integrated into a special cut-out. There’s a similar cut-out for the power/data exchange port. On the top and side edges, there are two grooves each that enhance its look, although they're not very noticeable under the case.
Otherwise, the smartphone looks fairly standard. It feels a bit thicker than average, plus on the back, you can see a triangle-shaped arrangement of the main camera lenses with a flash. Interestingly, the camera actually has four lenses, although two are combined under one glass, giving the impression that there are three. And the flash is placed separately, although it is smaller and does not stand out on the triangle.
Aside from the USB Type-C port and the adjacent SIM card slot, there are no other ports on the smartphone. Earphones with a 3.5 mm jack will need to be connected via an adapter; however, nowadays, wireless earbuds are more common, so even models from other manufacturers with the old jack are rarely seen.
The display of this smartphone is flat, with a slight gap from the edges. If it weren't for the rounded corners, it would measure 6.6 inches. The OLED LTPO matrix supports 1.07 billion colors, has an adaptive refresh rate of 1–120 Hz, PWM dimming at 1440 Hz, and a touch sampling rate of up to 300 Hz. The maximum resolution is 2760 × 1256 pixels (again, not counting the rounded corners).
Features
Most of the promotional materials for the HUAWEI Pura 80 focus on the camera, and for good reason. Thanks to its four lenses (a 50 MP main with optical image stabilization, a 13 MP ultra-wide angle, a 12 MP periscope telephoto, and a lens for ultra-realistic photography with support for 1.5 million spectral channels), the smartphone takes high-quality shots even at 50x zoom.
Here are several more videos taken with the Pura 80 camera.
The camera also has all the necessary modes, including fast and slow motion, panorama, a mode for shooting documents, a dual view with the main and front cameras simultaneously (either as picture-in-picture or split-screen), and a variety of filters. There is also the option to connect to the camera on another Huawei device, but unfortunately, this mode cannot be combined with the "dual view" (and not all devices support this feature).
I can also praise the audio system. If you happen to not have earphones on hand, the smartphone's speakers provide quality and clear sound, whether for calls, games, or even music.
Hardware
The smartphone is equipped with an octa-core Kirin 9010S processor (with an integrated Maleoon 920 graphics chip), 256 GB of storage, and 12 GB of RAM, running on EMUI 15.0 (based on Android 12).
A complete list of specifications for the HUAWEI Pura 80 can be found here.
Like other Huawei mobile devices, most applications are installed from the proprietary AppGallery store, but with the Gbox application, you can also install Google Play and many of its apps (provided there are no issues with regional restrictions).
Regarding performance, the smartphone handles demanding games like Arknights: Endfield and Call of Duty Mobile well. In Endfield, even at maximum settings, there were no lags compared to the tablet (likely due to the lower screen resolution here). In fairness, it still falls short of top smartphones (in tests, it ranks somewhere between the Samsung Galaxy S23 and Xiaomi Poco F5), but for all the tested applications, its power was more than enough.
Test results can be found here, along with photos taken with the smartphone camera.
As for the battery life, it lasts for about 17 hours of "light" tasks (internet browsing, video viewing), while for games, the battery is sufficient for 4-5 hours. The smartphone fully charges in 55 minutes. It turns on in 24 seconds (of which 5 seconds are needed to hold the power button). Overall, these are standard performance metrics.
Conclusion
With a price of 50,000, the HUAWEI Pura 80 falls into the mid-budget category, and its features are quite impressive for that range. Even modern games (as long as they are not blocked, which is often the case these days) run smoothly on it with maximum graphic settings, and it hardly heats up the device.
Don't forget about the high-quality camera with a variety of modes. It will serve as a good aid for bloggers, streamers, amateur journalists, and even aspiring filmmakers. It's a pity that Huawei didn't think to combine the dual view mode with the ability to shoot from two devices. But that’s a minor issue compared to the wealth of already available capabilities.
Overall, my impressions of the device have been entirely positive. Both as a gaming smartphone and as a camera for reporting and personal video shoots. If you have similar requests and free funds, the Pura 80 would be an excellent choice.