The Honor 9 and the OnePlus 5 are mid-range priced smartphones that offer high-end specs. Presented below is a comparison between the two affordable high end smartphones.
The Build and Design
Unlike a lot of other phones available in the market, the Honor 9 has a stunning build and design, with a glass rear made up of 15 different layers of varied materials. The unique design causes light to get reflected off the body from different angles, thereby producing a ‘northern lights’ effect. The glossy body is however prone to fingerprint and scuff marks. Its dimensions are 147.3 x 70.9 x 7.45mm and it weighs just 155 grams. The posh look and feel is ably complemented by a metal frame. The Honor 9 is available in Sapphire Blue, Glacier Grey, and Midnight Black colors.
The design of the OnePlus 5 is rather traditional and has more similarities with the build of the iPhone 7 Plus. This lack of uniqueness however does not mean that it does not look a high-end smartphone. The body is made of metal and is somewhat rounded with nearly unnoticeable antenna bands running alongside the bottom and top. Its dimensions are 154.2 x 74.1 x 7.3mm and it weighs about 153 grams. The OnePlus 5 is thus somewhat wider, longer, and sleeker than the Honor 9. The phone is available in two colors, i.e., Midnight Black or Slate Grey.
The Screen
The Honor 9 comes with a 5.15 inch Full HD1920 x 1080 screen with a resolution of 428 ppi and output capacity of 16 million colors. The display panel features a 2.5D glass. The Eye Comfort mode on the phone filters blue color light and offers a really good nighttime viewing experience.
The OnePlus 5 comes with a larger 5.5 inch screen with the same full HD 1920 x 1080 resolution. The larger screen with same resolution means that the OnePlus offers a somewhat less sharp viewing experience with 401 ppi. It however has an AMOLED display, which means that it allows for awesome appearing dark hues and true blacks. As compared to this, the screen on the Honor 9 is an IPS LCD panel, which may not display black and darker tones as well as the OnePlus.
Users are most likely to not notice much difference in viewing experience between the Honor 9 and the OnePlus 5. The choice boils down to whether you want a bigger or a smaller screen.
Technical specifications
The Honor 9 comes with a powerful Kirin 960 octa-core processor with 4 cores that clock at 1.8 GHz and other four at 2.4 GHz. The phone comes with either 4 GB or 6 GB of RAM. The 6 GB Honor 9 variant may not be available for purchase in all countries.
The OnePlus 5 comes with a Snapdragon 835 octa core processor with 4 cores that clock at 1.9 GHz and other four at 2.45 GHz. The phone comes with either 6 GB or a humungous 8 GB of RAM.
The storage options also differ between the two smartphones. The OnePlus 5 is available with internal memory storage of 128 GB and 64 GB. It does not have any option for expansion of memory via external microSD card. The Honor 9 is also available in 128 GB and 64 GB variants, but both have the option of memory expansion with microSD card.
Both the phones run on the Android Nougat Operating System with their own user interface on top of it. The Honor 9 has the Emotion 5.1 UI which is a quite heavy skin and very different from stock Android OS. This can be offsetting for some users. This version of the UI however features an app drawer which was missing in the older versions. The OnePlus 5 comes with its OxygenOS interface which is much not as heavy as the Emotion UI. It is also much more intuitive and a perfect match for Android OS.
The above specs indicate that the OnePlus 5 is more powerful as compared to the Honor 9. But both offer more than sufficient power. Also, as compared to their price tags, both offer a lot more when it comes to RAM and chipset capacities.
Battery and Camera
The Honor 9 comes with a 3,200 mAh battery, while the OnePlus 5 has a slighter bigger 3,300 mAh battery.
Both the devices feature a dual-lens camera, but the additional lens has different uses in each device. The Honor 9 comes with a 20 megapixel monochrome lens and a 12 MP color one. It can mix data of images from the 2 lens and produce better shots with increased details. The monochrome lens can also be used by itself for shooting true black and white pictures, or for a blurred background or bokeh effect, wherein the subject remains in focus but the image’s background is blurred. The OnePlus 5 features a 20 megapixel and a 16 MP lens, both of which are color. Each lens allow for bokeh effect or for zoom without loss of focus/background. Cameras on both are capable of shooting videos in 4K resolution quality.
The OnePlus 5 has a stunning 16 MP selfie camera, while Honor 9 comes with an 8 megapixel front facing camera
