The Battle of Huawei’s Mid-Ranged Devices
Now that Huawei has finally made the more affordable, mid-ranged version of their flagship device — the Huawei P10 Lite — official, one has to wonder which of the two devices they offer within the same price point should you choose to purchase? Should you wait it out for the P10 Lite to be launched in the country or should you go ahead and get their dual cam equipped GR5 2017? Hopefully, this little head-to-head will clear things up a bit. Let’s take a look at their spec sheets side-by-side first.
Huawei P10 Lite Specs
- Kirin 655 octa-core processor
- 4GB of RAM
- 5.2-inch full HD IPS display, 1920 x 1080 resolution
- 32GB of expandable storage
- 12-megapixel rear camera with f/2.2 aperture, LED flash
- 8-megapixel front camera
- Dual SIM
- 3G, LTE
- WiFi, Bluetooth, GPS, A-GPS, fingerprint scanner
- 3000mAh battery
- Android 7.0 Nougat
Huawei GR5 2017 Specs
- 2.1GHz Kirin 655 octa-core processor
- 3GB of RAM
- 5.5-inch full HD IPS display, 1920 x 1080 resolution
- 32GB of expandable storage
- 12-megapixel rear camera with 2-megapixel secondary camera
- 8-megapixel front camera
- Dual SIM
- 3G, LTE
- WiFi, Bluetooth, GPS, A-GPS, Fingerprint scanner
- 3,340mAh battery
- Android 6.0 Marshmallow, EMUI 4.1
- SRP: Php13,990
A Draw In Terms of Design
Design can be a bit subjective, but we certainly think it’s a draw in this department. There’s not much of a difference between the two devices when you look at them from the front, but its a world of difference on the back. The Huawei GR5 2017 has a dual camera setup, something that’s certainly hard to miss, but we have a bit of fondness for the that strip of glass that houses the camera on the P10 Lite.
they absolutely look premium despite their more affordable price point.
We’re really glad Huawei has kept this design element from the previous iteration of their flagship. It certainly a contrast between a more minimalist approach for the P10 Lite and the in-you-face setup that the GR5 posseses; again, it boils down to preference. We’ll talk about the actual cameras later.
Since Huawei didn’t change much on the outside of the P10 Lite, both devices have pretty much the same ergonomics and feature gentle curves on its frame with rounded edges. The materials for the GR5 2017 and Huawei P10 Lite are certainly up to snuff; meaning they absolutely look premium despite their more affordable price point.
Screen Size: Bigger is Better?
If you like consuming a lot of video content on your phone or just happen to prefer a bigger screen size, then the Huawei GR5 2017 is the phone for you. The GR5Â has a 5.5-inch Full HD IPS compared to the Huawei P10 Lite’s 5.2-inches, which is also at Full HD. You’ll lose out a bit on pixel density with GR5, but unless you’re that particular with the display and can really tell the difference — we’ll have to give this one to the Huawei GR5 2017.
More Wiggle Room for Multi-tasking on the Huawei P10 Lite
There’s a slight similarity to the processing package of the Huawei GR5 and the Huawei P10 Lite. They’re both sporting the same 2.1GHz Kirin 655 octa-core processor and 32GB of expandable storage, but the P10 Lite edges out the GR5 in terms of RAM; it has 4GB of RAM, compared to its dual cam equipped counterpart that only has 3GB. We’ve seen this amount of RAM make the world of difference, and it will certainly give people who use their smartphones  heavily a little more wiggle room to work with.
In terms of battery life, the GR5 2017 looks to be the clear winner since it has a 3340mAh battery, compared to the 3000mAh battery on the P10 Lite. Yes, it does have a slightly bigger display, but we think that it’ll still out last its mid-ranged counterpart.
The Camera is a Toss Up… For Now.
It would be easy if we said that the GR5 2017 wins the camera portion of this head-to-head simply because two cameras are better than one. But, to quote John in his review for the Huawei GR5 2017:
Dual cameras produce good photos, though software bokeh is mostly a gimmick
We’ve done a bit of digging, but we’re unsure if both devices use the same main shooter on the back; a camera with 12-megapixels. The Huawei did disclose the aparture size of the P10 Lite with sits at an f-stop of f/2.2, which means you’ll still get a pretty decent amount of bokeh without the aid of software like the images the GR5 is capable of producing. We’ll have to hold out on a verdict till we can see sample photos from the Huawei P10 Lite to declare a winner.
So… Who Wins?
Who does win in this battle of mid-ranged devices from the same brand? Honestly, it boils down to preference and the way you intend to use the device. Since, we’re not sure about the photo quality of the camera found on the P10 Lite just yet but, we can say that if you prefer having a dual camera setup with the capability of adding more boken after the fact, the GR5 2017 is the phone for you; the same can be said if you find yourself consuming a ton of video content on your mobile device. If you want more wiggle room in terms of processing power, than the Huawei P10 Lite is the clear choice.
We also don’t have the local price for the Huawei P10 Lite yet, but it has been priced at around Php 14.6k in Malaysia. We don’t see it going much higher than that when it does land on Philippines shores. This makes it about P1,000 more expensive than the official SRP Huawei GR5 2017; which you can purchase on sale for a limited time by the way.
