Huawei Mate 30 Pro review

On one hand, we have the best of the best in terms of hardware and innovation, all wrapped in a beautiful package. As I said when I first met the Mate 30 Pro, Huawei launched a 2020 phone in 2019. Yes, it’s that good. But on the other hand, if you’re relying on the Google ecosystem, with its apps and services, you have a tough decision to make. You won’t go wrong if you buy this phone, but everyone will understand if you skip it, at least until there’s a GMS solution out there. Pitty, again, but it is what it is…

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The HUAWEI Mate30 Pro is one of the best Android phones in 2019. From its unique design to the features on the phone, Huawei has become the leader in pushing the limits of Android smartphones. However, because of the ban, they will need to change their strategy fast. No consumers will wait for a phone manufacturer for too long. There are many brands out there for them to choose from.

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All things said and done, the Mate 30 Pro looks and feels like a slice of the future. It’s bold, is arguably the best-looking phone of its generation, has a champion of a camera, stacks of power and an engulfing screen. Getting it with no Play Store is an expensive gamble, though, which makes it impossible to recommend to almost anyone in the west.

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Huawei's created the best Mate yet, and we're really liking the 30 Pro. Too bad that's happened in a year when the company doesn't get to pre-install Google apps for its users, essentially making the phone unusable in the Western world out of the box. Otherwise the Mate 30 Pro has it all - spectacular display, exemplary endurance, picture quality to make others jealous, class-leading performance.

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The new Mate does not show any real weaknesses in the camera department and delivers good still image and video quality in most situations. Its photo quality is very good across the board, but its texture/noise balance is truly outstanding, with excellent detail rendering in almost all conditions while keeping image noise at low levels. The wide-angle camera’s comparatively narrow field of view could be a criticism, but the wide-angle cam delivers good image quality; moreover, the Mate 30 Pro is one of the best for bokeh and zoom as well.

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With an overall DXOMARK Selfie score of 93, the Huawei Mate 30 Pro makes it into the top five in our current ranking and delivers images with good exposure and color as well as a nice texture/noise trade-off in most conditions. The fixed-focus lens means that the camera is not ideal for close-range and selfie-stick shots, and video clips could do with slightly better stabilization, but the Mate 30 Pro is capable of recording decent still and video selfies overall.

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The (admittedly forced) lack of support on Google’s end is potentially disastrous for the company, and while Huawei’s smartphone division may still stay afloat in China – where it doesn’t use Android – the Mate 30 Pro’s software experience is sorely limited elsewhere, and that’s a really big deal. It’s certainly a shame because in every other aspect the Mate 30 Pro is as good as they come. The cameras manage to go toe-to-toe with the lofty capabilities of the iPhone 11 Pro, its performance and stamina is much improved over last year’s phone, and the new curved screen is positively gorgeous.

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Even with amongst the best design around, the most innovative camera and a fancy-pants processor, the odds are stacked firmly against Huawei's latest, likely greatest smartphone to date.

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All this drama with the blacklist and Google support steers the conversation away from the device, which has the potential to become the best Android smartphone of 2019, and even 2020 in part. Simply put, it is gorgeous.

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From our brief hands-on, this feels like a top performing handset, with very impressive photographic and hardware capabilities. The key problem is in the software, or lack of it: without Google apps, this will be a tough sell to the general market. This was always going to be the big issue with the new Huawei phones, and we'll have a more fully formed recommendation after our full review.

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