The Huawei Mate 9 has a large 5.9-inch screen with an 8 core Kirin 960 (GPU Mali-G71). The machine has 4GB of RAM, 64GB of internal memory can be expanded through the external memory card. There are 2 cameras on the back (20MP and 12MP), an 8MP front camera for selfie, fingerprint sensor and Android 7.0 with Huawei’s latest EMUI 5.0 interface.
Theoretically this is the best Android phone to overlook the fact that the screen is Full HD (while many competitors are Note 7 is Quad HD) and the machine is not waterproof. Huawei confirmed in the multi-core performance test, this machine is leading the current score.
Design and Build Quality
The Huawei Mate 9 has a premium sort of look , the kind you usually see on flagship devices. It comes with a full metal unibody build , so it feels both sleek and sturdy, not just “nice” on the surface. You can grab it in multiple colors too, like Space Gray , Moonlight Silver, Champagne Gold, Mocha Brown, Ceramic White and Black, so people can pick a vibe that matches their own taste.
On the front, you get a big 5.9-inch display, it basically takes over the whole face of the device. Still, for being so large, it’s not overly awkward in the hand , mainly because the bezels are slim and the edges are nicely curved. The 2.5D glass sits there pretty smoothly and it blends right into the metal body, which honestly adds to that expensive feeling.
A highlight in the Mate 9 design is the fingerprint sensor placement on the back , positioned just under the camera module. That’s a comfortable arrangement because your hand naturally lands there when you want to unlock. The sensor is quick and accurate, plus it can do extra actions, like dragging down for the notification shade, or sliding through photos in the gallery.
Build quality wise , it’s really well done. The machining feels precise, and the tiny details seem to be thought through. The metal shell is tough and it resists scratches well, and overall the phone feels solid, like it won’t flex. It’s also not ridiculously thick at around 7.9 mm , and the weight comes in at 190g, which feels pretty sensible for a phone of this size. So overall , the Huawei Mate 9 gives you that top-level design and build, a premium look and feel that holds its own, and even competes with other flagship devices you see on the market.
Display
The Huawei Mate 9 arrives with a 5.9-inch IPS LCD screen, running at 1080 x 1920 pixels, so you land at about 373 ppi. Back around that 2016 era, a few flagship phones were starting to drift toward Quad HD (1440p) displays, but Huawei went with Full HD on the Mate 9. That decision is likely some kind of trade off between smoother operation, longer battery stamina,and the general price tag.
In day to day use the display feels pretty vibrant and crisp, it shows solid color accuracy and viewing angles that don’t really wash out too fast. The IPS LCD tech tends to give colors that look natural, and the brightness level is strong enough that you can still read things outdoors even when the sun is right there. There’s also a color temperature adjustment option, so users can tweak the color balance until it matches what they prefer.
That said, the resolution might be a sticking point for certain people. Full HD is fine for most tasks, but it may not look quite as razor sharp as the Quad HD screens you see on some rival models, especially with high resolution photos or when watching detailed video. Still , the lower resolution does bring benefits too, mainly power efficiency, which in turn can help battery life last longer than you might expect.
Another kinda noteworthy thing about the Mate 9’s display is that it comes with Huawei’s “Knuckle Sense” tech, where you can kinda do actions by tapping or sketching on the screen using your knuckles. Like for example, you can take a screenshot by double tapping the screen with your knuckles , or you can trace a letter to kick off a particular application. Sure, this kind of capability is more of a novelty, not really something you must have, yet it still brings this extra sense of interactivity to the device.
All things considered, the Huawei Mate 9’s display is bright, punchy in color, and honestly more than enough for day to day use. It might not match the same super crisp clarity as some higher-resolution panels, but it lands on a solid compromise between smooth performance and battery longevity.
Performance
Under the hood, the Huawei Mate 9 runs on the Kirin 960 chipset, made by Huawei’s own in house semiconductor division HiSilicon. Back when the Mate 9 launched this was basically the company’s most sophisticated processor, and it offered noticeable upgrades versus the previous generation , not just small tweaks. It’s built using a 16nm FinFET process, and you get an octa-core setup too, with four high-performance Cortex-A73 cores at 2.4GHz plus another four power-saving Cortex-A53 cores running at 1.8GHz.
On the graphics side, the Kirin 960 comes with the Mali-G71 MP8 GPU, which gives a pretty solid bump in graphical horsepower compared with what came before. It’s tuned for heavier workloads like gaming, and smooth multimedia playback as well, so the Mate 9 can juggle those kinds of demands without too much drama.
If we talk about day to day performance , the phone feels quick and pretty responsive. App launches are snappy, multitasking stays fluid, and even resource heavy tasks don’t seem to stress it out. The 4GB of RAM helps a lot here too, because the device can keep several apps alive in the background, without those annoying stalls or visible slow downs.
For gaming, the Mate 9 also holds up well. The Mali-G71 GPU can push even demanding titles with strong frame rates and only minimal hitching. Plus the big display along with responsive touch input, makes the whole play session feel enjoyable. And during longer gaming stretches, the thermal management system works fairly well, keeping the device cooler than you might expect.
The Mate 9’s day to day performance is kinda boosted more by Huawei’s software tweaks, you know, the kind that make the phone feel smoother, over time. It includes a feature like the “Machine Learning Algorithm” that actually keeps track of how you use the device, and then it fine-tunes what the handset does so performance stays balanced. In practice it’s meant to keep the Mate 9 fast and responsive even after months of everyday use, and not just for a little while.
When you look at benchmark testing, the Huawei Mate 9 holds up pretty well against other flagship phones from that same period. The Kirin 960 chipset brings solid CPU and GPU output , so it ends up being a strong rival to parts such as Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 821 and Samsung’s Exynos 8890. It’s the kind of chip that doesn’t just look good on paper, either.
All in all, the Mate 9 delivers excellent performance, and it should handle the real world needs of modern smartphone users without much drama. Whether it’s gaming, juggling apps, or just scrolling and browsing, the Mate 9 keeps things quick, responsive, and fairly on par with the other top-tier devices.
Good battery life and extremely fast charging:
Due to the low resolution (Full HD screen size 5.9 inch) to compensate the machine has a very good battery life. The 4000mAh capacity is sufficient to meet the needs of Huawei’s Supercharge charger, which promises a full 20 minutes of charging time.
About the camera duo on the machine:
Huawei made it before Apple to equip two cameras and they combined the Leica brand. Theoretically Mate 9 overcame the other cameras then with the optical stabilizer, the more advanced bokeh mode and the 20MP sensor.
But the camera resolution of 20MP can only capture white&black picture and 12MP color picture.
Note that the portrait mode of clearing the font only works well in good lighting conditions with the subject near the camera and the background. Otherwise there will be some incorrect deletions.
The camera also has a 2x hybrid zoom mode, though it does not have to be an optical zoom and the latter can shoot 4K video resolution.
Photo quality: White – Black (MonoChrome) is very ‘lively’, color, slightly poor quality in low light environment.
Huawei insists on partnering with Leica to create the ideal combination of a monochrome camera and color camera.
In the dark room. Mate 9 was worse than the Apple iPhone 7 and Samsung Galaxy S7 with a f / 2.2 aperture. You have to use HDR mode to get a slightly better picture.
Software and User Experience
The Huawei Mate 9 comes with Android 7.0 Nougat right away , then Huawei wraps everything in its own EMUI 5.0 style on top. EMUI , Emotion UI, has always been kind of a split topic for Huawei phones, because some people enjoy how much it packs in, while others complain it feels very heavy and it strays too far from the plain stock Android vibe.
With EMUI 5.0 , Huawei made a set of tweaks and upgrades meant to feel more natural and user friendly. A big part of EMUI 5.0 is that the interface looks a bit more organized, and honestly less cluttered too. Huawei went for a cleaner layout, cutting back on some pre-installed apps, and making the whole navigation part simpler , like it tries to keep things calmer in daily use.
User Interface and Customization
EMUI 5.0 gives a bunch of customization angles, so you can tune your Mate 9 pretty much the way you want. The whole interface feels very flexible, sort of lets you shuffle the home screen layout, drop in different themes, and tweak the overall vibe, like a more personal look and feel. And for people who still like a classic Android style, EMUI 5.0 also includes an app drawer option , which honestly wasn’t there in earlier software versions.
It’s also built to feel fast and responsive, with smooth animations, and quick jump- access to stuff you use most. The notification shade along with the quick settings panel have been reworked, making it easier to reach frequently used settings without too much tapping. Plus there’s this “Universal Search” feature, it helps you quickly track down apps, contacts, and other files or content sitting on the device.
A more standout part of EMUI 5.0 is the “Machine Learning Algorithm,” it sort of watches what you do over time, then it leans into what it thinks you’ll need, giving priority to system resources. In practice, the phone can allocate memory and processing power more intelligently toward the apps and tasks that matter to you. Huawei says this helps keep performance steady as time passes, lowering the chances of slowdowns and lag, as the device gets older.
Multitasking and Productivity
The Mate 9 comes with a big 5.9-inch screen ,so it feels pretty good for multitasking and general work stuff. EMUI 5.0 has a bunch of productivity oriented features, like “Split-Screen Mode”. With this, you can keep two apps running next to each other, side-by-side ,which is great when you need to keep doing more than one thing at a time. For example, you might be browsing the web and writing notes at the same time ,or you could watch a video and at the same time message a friend.
Besides Split-Screen Mode, EMUI 5.0 also adds a “Floating Dock” feature. It basically gives fast access to stuff you use often, like back, home, and the multitasking view. The Dock itself can be moved around, placed pretty much anywhere on the screen. That makes it simpler to reach those controls, especially when you are using just one hand.
Then there is “App Twin”, which lets you open two copies of the same app, using different accounts. This is handy for apps where people often juggle identities, like Facebook and WhatsApp, where you might want personal and work profiles. With App Twin you can swap between the two without going through the whole log in ,log out routine.
Software Optimizations and Updates
Huawei has made real efforts to dial in the performance of EMUI 5.0, tryin to reduce power drain and make the system feel more solid overall. The software comes with a handful of energy saving ideas, like “Ultra Power Saving Mode” which basically clamps down on background activity, then tones down the screen brightness to push battery life farther when things get critical.
Huawei also says it will keep the Mate 9 getting regular updates, so there are security patches in the mix, plus some little feature upgrades along the way. When the Mate 9 first showed up, it was one of those early devices to arrive with Android 7.0 Nougat, and later Huawei carried on the rollout for newer Android versions. This includes Android 8.0 Oreo that comes paired with EMUI 8.0.
Now, EMUI 5.0 isn’t totally free of oddities , for example the background app handling can be a bit too strict, and that sometimes messes with notifications. Still, the day to day feel is polished and packed with functions. If you like a more plain Android vibe, you might need to spend a little time getting used to EMUI, but between the deep customization , and the extra tools it brings, a lot of people will probably feel it offers just enough flexibility to be worth it.
Connectivity and Networking
The Huawei Mate 9 is kind of a flexible device as far as connectivity goes, you know, it gives a lot of options for staying connected to the web and other devices. It also supports dual SIM, where one of the SIM areas can act like a microSD card slot for that extra expandable storage. So you can either run two SIMs at the same time, or you can swap things around and add more space instead, depends what you need.
For the network side of things, the Mate 9 covers a broad set of LTE bands, so it tends to work with a lot of carriers worldwide. On top of that it has VoLTE support (Voice over LTE) and also Wi-Fi calling, which can help improve call clarity and also make calls less likely to drop when you’re in spots with iffy cellular signal.
Then you get Bluetooth 4.2, NFC, and an infrared (IR) blaster in the mix. That IR blaster can be used to nudge, control, home appliances like TVs and even air conditioners, pretty handy. And with NFC, the phone can support mobile payments through services like Google Pay, but also it helps with quick pairing, with other NFC-enabled gadgets.
As for Wi‑Fi, it’s pretty solid too, the Mate 9 has dual-band Wi‑Fi (2.4GHz and 5GHz) plus Wi‑Fi Direct and hotspot features. The connection performance is strong, with fast and steady links, so it’s good for streaming, gaming, and other stuff that eats a lot of bandwidth.
The Mate 9 also comes with a USB Type-C port for charging plus data transfer, which i s kinda becoming the standard thing on newer smartphones. That Type – C port supports USB 2.0 speeds, and you can use it to connect the phone to a bunch of peripherals, like external storage devices , external keybards, and even displays. All in all, the Huawei Mate 9 gives you a pretty full set of connectivity options, so it feels like a flexible gadget for staying linked, and for juggling with other gear.
Other details:
Software on Huawei Mate 9 has improved quite a lot more than sleek than Mate 8. Machine runs on Android 7.0 platform with EMUI 5.0 interface is optimized so that you can do anything with just a few clicks.
Huawei reports that the machine has software that learns the habits of the user to help make the experience smoother.
The machine has stereo speakers for excellent sound quality on the smartphone. Can even hear the sound without fear of other infiltrations.
Mate 9 still comes with audio jack which could be advantage over iPhone 7 and some other phones like HTC Bolt does not have. Huawei Mate 9 is the best screen phone (Apple iPhone 7 Plus, Google Pixel XL, Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge only 5.5 inches). If you want a bigger screen with a better experience then Mate 9 is the right choice.
Conclude:
Pros: Good configuration – Very good stereo quality – Superior finish – Good monochrome picture quality – Good battery life and fast charging
Cons: The design is not outstanding – the price is quite high.
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Tech Reviewer & Product Analyst
Định Bia has spent over 10 years testing consumer electronics with a focus on smart technology. He work as a product advisor at Biareview where he helped customers find the right devices for their needs. He personally tests every product featured on this site using a consistent evaluation framework covering quality, durability, and value. All reviews are based on experience, not influenced by the manufacturer.