Honor 50 Lite
RM999
Pros
- Cool design
- Good battery life
- Affordable
- Good main and macro camera
- Gorgeous full screen display
Cons
- Outdated chipset
- Not 5G ready
After the release of Honor 50, now comes the time for the “lite” version. Introducing the new(er) Honor 50 Lite which is targeted towards budget users but wanting something premium-like. The glossy back is a fingerprint magnet but the colours are nice. I do prefer the chrome/silver colour option. It looks kinda sleek and a little futuristic.
Apart from the aesthetics, there are many other features to look at with the Honor 50 Lite. First of all, will it be able to compete with the more exclusive Honor 50 or will this Lite version remain as being a budget device without any perks? That is what this review is for.
First Look and Design
As I mentioned earlier, the Honor 50 Lite that I’m using comes in a nice chromatic colour option but by being glossy, it is a massive fingerprint magnet. This colour option is called Space Silver. There are two other colour options which are Deep Sea Blue and Midnight Black. Between all the available colour options, I still prefer this Space Silver.
On first look around the back where the most glossy part is, my thoughts of a GT racing car comes to mind. Due to the sleek colour with thin stripes going across from top to bottom through the rounded camera bump, it looks rather sporty. And being “sporty”, it has that premium look to it.
The Honor 50 Lite comes with a 6.67” fullview display and it has a really thin bezel around the top and the sides. The bezel near the bottom is also considered thin in my opinion as compared to some other phones that I have used previously. This thin bezels portrays a good example on how a budget phone can be made to look and feel premium. A big thumbs up for this.
There is also an elongated punch hole selfie camera at the top left side of the display. The selfie camera is a 16MP shooter while there’s maybe a depth or light sensor next to it. I said “maybe” because I don’t have much info on it, yet.
Around the back, there’s the sporty looking round camera bump that does not protrude that much. I’m glad that the camera modules being in the middle area. Overall it looks clean and tidy. There are a total of 4 cameras here. First up is the 64MP wide angle camera, and then there’s the 8MP ultra wide angle camera, a 2MP macro camera and a 2MP depth camera. The LED flash is located outside the round bump, kinda at a suitable location if you ask me.
Looking around the right side, the Honor 50 Lite comes with a power button that doubles up as a fingerprint sensor. It is slightly indented in the frame that made it easy to scan for fingerprints. There’s also the volume rocker right above it. They leave the left side to be minimal and clean so there’s nothing there.
At the top, there’s the 3.5mm audio jack, an upward firing earpiece speaker and a tiny mic hole. And at the bottom, there’s the SIM card slot, another tiny mic hole, a USB-C charging/data port and the bottom firing speaker grille.
The Honor 50 Lite has a flat front surface while around the back, there’s a waterfall-like design curved towards the front display, creating a comfortable grip when holding it in one hand. The Honor 50 Lite feels quite light, weighing at 192-grams.
But the shiny surface made it a fingerprint magnet and a little slippery to hold especially when your palm is sweaty. It’s a good thing there’s a clear silicone case that comes together in the box. Now you can have a good grip + extra protection.
Performance and Daily Use
The Honor 50 Lite is considered as a budget phone. But in terms of my daily usage and multitasking, the Honor 50 Lite fares well throughout the day. I have not encountered any problems with it thus far.
Just like its exclusive brother, the Honor 50, this lite version also comes with Google Mobile Services. This is a huge plus point for Honor moving forward. I dare to say that most of us have a Google account in any way and will need to access GMS from time to time. And I’m happy that the Honor 50 Lite supports that. I foresee a good market jump for Honor in 2022 because of this too.
As for battery endurance, the Honor 50 Lite can go about its business comfortably for close to 48 hours. I normally use the phone for most of my social media browsing and emails. I also use it for my WhatsApp and Telegram chats too.
With all that daily routines, the Honor 50 Lite held up well with its battery life. It also comes with a 66-watt fast charging capability that can charge up to 40% within only 10 minutes.
On the downside, the Honor 50 Lite does not support 5G connectivity as it is powered by the older Snapdragon 662 chipset. It is a good chipset, but it doesn’t come with 5G. But it’s okay, we won’t be having a publicly accessed 5G network just yet.
Supporting the Snapdragon 662 SoC, the Honor 50 Lite also comes with a generous 8GB of RAM and 128GB of internal storage. And to push the full ability of the phone, we need to fully test it with gaming and benchmarking. For that, I will test it with a few games and Antutu 3D benchmark.
Running light graphical games like Mario Kart is more than great. The graphic rendered smoothly and there’s no glitches or lags throughout. But when playing higher graphic demanding games, in this case – Botworld, I notice some slight lags and stutter within the game.
The Snapdragon 662 is a capable chipset. But for today’s game standards, we need a better chipset to cope with higher demand in graphic processing. When it comes to PUBG Mobile, I can only set the graphics to medium level or use the low quality game play mode. That is the best setting that I can go with this game. But the overall gameplay, however, is playable.
To end my benchmarking of the Honor 50 Lite, I finished it off by running the Antutu 3D benchmark on the device and got the score of 214134. That is considered low in today’s standards. But I understand that the Honor 50 Lite is targeted towards the entry level users. Therefore, I don’t expect it to perform like a mid-range or any of the flagships. At this price point, the Honor 50 Lite is actually doing great.
The Honor 50 Lite comes with Android 11. The OS is known to work better with budget phones as it uses less memory than its predecessors. This is true because I have used many Android phones before and I find that Android 11 feels “lighter”. Therefore, the budget friendly Honor 50 Lite works really well even while multitasking.
Photography and Camera
The Honor 50 Lite has a 4 camera setup around the back. I like the ring in the middle where the 4 camera modules are sitting on. If you’re looking at the Honor 50 Lite for the first time, you may think that it’s a premium phone. I do feel like that when I take the phone out of the box the first time. But I do wonder how this premium-looking budget phone can really do in the camera department.
Let’s recap. We have a main 64MP shooter, an 8MP ultra wide angle camera and two 2MP macro and depth cameras. I always set the phone to capture with its main camera. I managed to capture a few good ones. On the ultra wide angle shooter, there is some obvious blurriness around the corners due to distortion. But subjects in the center are well focused.
I don’t have much problems whenever it’s bright or outdoors. Colours are a little bit washed out, not as vibrant as the one shot on Honor 50. When shooting in ultrawide mode, the edges and corners will be slightly out of focus. However, the close-up or macro shots are commendable. I can get as close as 3-4 cm from the subject and the shot turns out good with enough details and clarity. But make sure you have steady hands.
Selfie camera is okay. There are some good shots that I managed to capture with the front selfie camera but most of the time it is a little blurry especially when taking indoors. Overall camera performance has its hits and misses but most of them are usable.
So let the photos do the talking.
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Conclusion
The Honor 50 Lite is an entry level smartphone in its own special ways. Although the price tag is low enough to entice new users or those who need a secondary device, it also screams premium. The colour options, the look, the camera bump and the display made it look like a flagship device. It has very thin bezels around the top and sides, with minimal bezel at the bottom that elevate the standard of an entry level phone.
Really. I have not seen any entry level phone that has these thin bezels.
Looking at the back of the phone, the “sporty” look of the pattern and the location of the camera bump made it look even better. My only qualm with this Honor 50 Lite is, the back panel is so shiny that it attracts your fingerprints. Sure, you can always slap on a nice casing on the phone but that will hide the natural beauty of the phone.
Case or no case, that is up to you. What you will get here is a very capable phone that delivers good enough performance to let you breeze through your daily tasks easily. Just stay away from any heavy graphic demanding games and you’re good. You won’t have any problems with any “normal” games.
The ample storage and large RAM size made it worth the purchase. If you’re looking for a second phone or for your children or someone who wants an upgrade from an older device, then you will be happy with the Honor 50 Lite. But if you’re looking for extra power, just spend a little more for an Honor 50.
Now, if you wish to make the purchase, you can head over to HiHonor website to find out more about the Honor 50 Lite and make the purchase. It is available now for only RM999.
