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Versus the competition, Huawei Y9 Prime 2019 made pop-up cameras affordable

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Making a phone with a truly all-screen design for a more immersive viewing experience is no easy feat, a reason why handsets of such kind are often expensive.
Huawei Y9 Prime 2019 together with F11 Pro and V15, two other mid-rangers with pop-up cameras

Just to give you an idea, the very first phone in the country with a pop-up/sliding camera design is the OPPO Find X. It's a flagship device originally priced at 49,990 in late 2018.

Fast forward in 2019, I'm glad to say that devices with an all-screen design are getting more and more affordable. In fact, there are now devices with such feat in the mid-range category such as PHP 15,990 V15 and PHP 18,990 F11 Pro.

But, what if you want a mid-range worthy device with the said feature for even less?

Enter Huawei Y9 Prime 2019, a true full-screen phone with a pop-up selfie camera and triple-camera setup under PHP 12,990!

Now let's see if it is any good. We also did a quick side-by-side with V15 and F11 Pro.

Materials used

Similar materials
Similar materials

Despite its more affordable price tag, Y9 Prime 2019 is packed with similar materials found with V15 and F11 Pro. The three uses curved glasstic back design with stylish colorways. The Y9 Prime 2019 is a bit more unique as it goes with a two-tone color finish.

Noticeably, Y9 Prime and V15 go with triple-cameras. F11 Pro uses a dual-camera setup. All three phones have the fingerprint scanner at the back as well.
All screen
All screen

In front, all go with a notchless full-screen design with minimal top/side bezels and slightly thicker (yet still considered as slim) chin bezel. In fact, all three phones come with around 91 percent of the screen-to-body ratio.

All-screen phones with no notch and less bezels

Y9 Prime has the slightly larger 6.59-inch screen even if it is the most affordable of the three. Both F11 Pro and V15 are packed with a 6.53-inch panel. All come with FHD+ 2340 x 1080 resolution.

Y9 Prime's downside is the lack of Gorilla Glass protection. Fortunately, it has a pre-installed screen protector. Still not bad.
Top
Top
Bottom
Bottom
Left
Left
Right

The rest of the ports and grip are identical on the three phones as well. Y9 Prime 2019 arguably has the advantage in overall design though. Why? It has a reversible USB-C port. The USB-C port will also allow the phone to enjoy faster data transfers.

Pop-up cam

Pop-up cams
Pop-up cams

The reason why the phones manage to come up to notchless displays is the use of a pop-up camera mechanism. Y9 Prime 2019, V15, and F11 Pro all have a hidden camera on top of the phone.
Y9 Prime 2019 selfie
Y9 Prime 2019 selfie
V15 selfie
V15 selfie
F11 selfie
F11 selfie

Y9 Prime 2019 goes with a 16MP f/2.2 main camera. F11 Pro comes with a slightly better 16MP f/2.0 selfie shooter. V15 Pro has a better 32MP camera f/2.0 sensor.

Triple-cam

Triple-cam for Y9 Prime 2019 and V15, dual-cam for F11 Pro

At the back, Y9 Prime 2019 has a 16MP f/1.8 + 8MP f/2.4 120-degree ultra wide-angle lens + 2MP f/2.4 triple-cam. V15 goes with 12MP f/1.78 + 8MP f/2.2 + 5MP f/2.4 triple-cam. F11 Pro uses 48MP f/1.8 + 5MP f/2.4 dual-cam.
Y9 Prime 2019 normal with brighter exposure
Y9 Prime 2019 normal with brighter exposure
Y9 Prime 2019 ultra-wide with more natural-looking colors
Y9 Prime 2019 ultra-wide with more natural-looking colors

Interestingly, Y9 Prime 2019 has a triple-camera setup that can quickly take images with decent details and respectable colors with bright exposure.

Even indoor shots are quite bright with Y9 Prime 2019

Its camera output soft in low light, but you can always use Huawei's handheld Super Night Mode. Basically, it will allow its users to shoot images with good dynamic range and less noise even in the dark.
Y9 Prime 2019 normal night shot
Y9 Prime 2019 normal night shot
Super Night Mode
Super Night Mode

As you can see, Huawei's exposure is already bright even without the night mode. But we still used the Super Night Mode for more refined-looking night shots with sharper details in the dark.
V15 normal night shot
V15 normal night shot

V15 also has a triple-cam setup but ts primary 12MP shooter looks lower on paper against the Y9 Prime 2019. Its default low light shot is fairly detailed, but the exposure is dark.
V15 night mode
V15 night mode

On night mode, the shot we got is so much better than the default mode.
F11 Pro low light shot
F11 Pro low light shot
F11 Pro night mode
F11 Pro night mode

F11 Pro's main 48MP cam comes with a similar performance with V15. It is just a bit more detailed than V15.

Both Y9 Prime and V15 don't have an option to activate the night mode using the ultra-wide camera. I hope that they can come up with a fix for that.

We liked that all three phones are equipped with this night mode feature for better photos in the dark.

Other specs and features

The scores
The scores

All three phones are powered by 12nm chips. Y9 Prime runs with the improved 2.2GHz Kirin 710F which is a bit faster than the Kirin 710 of P30 lite. At AnTuTu, it scored 142K, a score higher than the 137 to 138K of P30 lite.

Competitive specs

Y9 Prime 2019 has the Mali-G51 MP4 GPU with GPU Turbo technology for improved gaming.

On the other hand, V15 and F11 Pro are both packed with the Helio P70 chip clocked at 2.1GHz with Mali-G72 MP2 GPU.

Benchmark scores of P70 are higher than Kirin 710F, but the difference is minimal even fi the Y9 Prime with Kirin 710F is more affordable.

Y9 Prime 2019's RAM is lower at 4GB, but it has a higher 128GB of expandable storage up to 400GB compared with the 64GB of F11 Pro. V15 has 128GB as well.

Note: F11 Pro with 64GB is priced at PHP 18,990. F11 Pro waterfall gray with 128GB is also priced at PHP 18,990.

All three devices loads with 4,000mAh battery. The device with the speediest charging speed is the F11 Pro. But, we are glad to say that Huawei also has a respectable 10W of charging. At least it is faster than the default 5W charging (without the fast charger) of the iPhone XS.

The three devices run with Android 9.0 Pie OS out of the box. Y9 Prime uses EMUI 9.0 with deep-learning and a lot of optimizations, V15 has the also feature-rich Funtouch OS 9, and F11 Pro goes with the revamped ColorOS 6.0 skin.


The phones are comparable with the rest of the features. All come with speedy face unlock tech, responsive fingerprint scanners, and stable mobile connectivities such as WiFi, 4G LTE, and dual SIM slots.

Our thoughts

Despite its more affordable price tag, Huawei Y9 Prime 2019 comes with the design, specs, and features that can compete with pricier phones such as the Vivo V15 and OPPO F11 Pro.

Y19 Prime retails at PHP 12,990 which is PHP 3,000 more affordable than the PHP 15,990 V15 and PHP 6,000 cheaper than the PHP 18,990 F11 Pro.

It may not be the most powerful of the bunch, but I like the fact that it brings some features like the USB-C port that those devices don't have.

In general, Y9 Prime 2019 brings the true full-screen experience, pop-up camera trend, and triple cameras to the masses without much compromise for less.

If you are the type of person who needs all those above-mentioned features at a more affordable price tag, the Huawei Y9 Prime 2019 is a must consider.

See also: Huawei Y9 Prime 2019 vs OPPO F11 Pro vs Vivo V15 Specs Comparison, pop-up cam battle!
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