2017 finally looks to be taking the shape in terms of smartphone launches in India. After Xiaomi launched its Redmi Note 4 last week, Huawei has today played its card with the new Honor 6X. Both the smartphones have a different selling point but one thing which is pretty similar between the two of them is the price. While the Redmi Note 4 is available via Flipkart and Mi.com for starting at Rs 10,999 for the 3GB RAM variant and Rs 12,999 for the 4GB RAM variant, Honor 6X will be up for grabs on Amazon India for a price of Rs 12,999 for the 3GB RAM variant and for Rs 15,999 for the 4GB RAM variant. We happened to have had both the Redmi Note 4 and the Honor 6X with us and here are our thoughts when putting them side by side. Note that, we have taken the 4GB + 64GB variant in both the cases.
Design and Display
Though built out of the same material (aluminium), both the smartphones does differ in the way they are designed. The Redmi Note 4 comes with a slightly curved back with flat edges while the back of the Honor 6X curves around the edges as well till the front bezels. The flat edges on the Redmi Note 4 make the device much comfortable in the hand while on the other hand, the Honor 6X feels a bit smaller due to curved edges.
The front of both the devices features a 2.5D display, both of which are a 5.5-inch (1920 x 1080p) IPS LCD display. The display on both these devices is top notch and you won’t be disappointed either way. Coming back to the design, Redmi Note 4 comes with three capacitive touch buttons below the screen, while we get on-screen buttons on the Honor 6X. Both the devices sport a fingerprint scanner at the back and the one on the Honor 6X is a tad bit faster than the Redmi Note 4. While there is nothing more astonishing for the Redmi Note 4, Huawei Honor 6X sports a dual-camera set up at the back which will turn heads. The implementation and the setup placement seems to have been inspired by the Huawei’s Mate 9. The button placement on both the devices is similar as well. The Honor 6X measures at 150.9 x 76.2 x 8.2 mm and weighs at 162g while the Redmi Note 4 measures 151 x 76 x 8.5 mm and is slightly heavy at 165g.
Performance and Memory
Going a little inside is where these smartphones tend to differ even more. While both the smartphones feature 4GB of RAM and 64GB of internal storage, the devices differ in terms of the chipsets that power these devices. The Redmi Note 4 is powered by a 2.0GHz 64-bit Octa-Core Qualcomm Snapdragon 625 Processor coupled with Adreno 506 GPU. On the other hand, we get Huawei’s own HiSilicon Kirin 655 Octa-Core processor clocked at 2.1 GHz along with Mali-T830MP2. Now here is the choice to make. Xiaomi Redmi Note 4 is much more power efficient than Honor 6X while it does lack a bit in terms of overall performance. On the other hand, the GPU on the Honor 6X does render games pretty well but when compared to Adreno 506, the graphics does lack a little bit of detailing here and there.
Barring this, both these smartphones are anabsolute pleasure to use across the entire user interface. We didn’t find any major lags or hiccups while using both the devices. Multi-tasking is pretty good as well, thanks to the 4GB RAM. Both of them run on Android 6.0 Marshmallow and we expect both of them to get Android 7.0 Nougat soon. The Redmi Note 4 comes with MIUI 8 on top while Honor 6X runs on EMUI 4.1 skin. Also, the internal storage on both the devices is expandable via microSD card slot which sits inside a hybrid Dual SIM tray.
Camera
Things get even more interesting. To start with, the Honor 6X comes with a dual-camera setup having a combination of a 12-megapixel sensor and a 2-megapixel sensor. The set up comes with phase detection Autofocus (PDAF), LED flash etc. At the front, there is an 8-megapixel sensor for selfies. Whereas the Redmi Note 4 comes with a 13-megapixel rear-facing camera f/2.0, phase detection autofocus, dual-LED (dual tone) flash coupled with a 5-megapixel front facing camera.
The camera is one of the USPs of the Honor 6X and looking at the camera samples of both the devices, the Honor 6X takes the lead in this department. When we move into low-light, the difference is increased further as the dual-camera set up at the back of the Honor 6X manages to click some impressive shots in thelow or dim light. On the other hand, Redmi Note 4 though does a decent job in good lighting conditions, but the smartphone somewhat struggles when compared to the Honor 6X. To sum up, Redmi Note 4 isn’t that bad for photography at this price, but Huawei Honor 6X is just better in our opinion.
Huawei Honor 6X Camera Samples
Xiaomi Redmi Note 4 Camera Samples
Battery, Connectivity and Audio
While the camera was Honor 6X’s forte, Battery is where Redmi Note 4 stands tall. Not only the overall capacity is big on the Redmi Note 4, the battery efficiency capabilities of the Snapdragon 625 on Redmi Note 4 further helps extract more juice from the 4100 mAh battery on the Note 4. On the other hand, the Honor 6X is packed with a 3340 mAh battery which is no way bad in our opinion. The SOT (Screen On Time) on the Honor 6X ranged between 5.5 hours to 6 hours, however, we managed to get a SOT of as much as 10 hours on the Redmi Note 4.
Connectivity options are pretty common to both the smartphones including Wi-Fi 802.11, Bluetooth v4.1, GPS with A-GPS, Infrared Blaster, Micro USB 2.0 etc.
Lastly, audio performance on both the devices is pretty average at best. The audio output from speakers on both the devices does get adequately loud but the quality is just not there.
Wrapping Up
For the conclusion, the decision really gets tough if we just look at the specs. Both the smartphones come with their own pros and cons, however, one thing which is apparently in favour of the Redmi Note 4 is the price. The 4GB RAM variant of the Redmi Note 4 is priced at Rs 12,999 whereas the 4GB RAM variant of the Honor 6X is priced at Rs 15,999. Ignoring the price, if thecamera is your priority, pick the Honor 6X.