Huawei Honor 2: 7 reasons to buy and 2 not to buy the cheap Android smartphone

Huawei has a big range of cheap smartphones with good specs that can beat other phones.

Honor 2 is losing the overall top10 of Android smartphones for just one place (it is 11th) and there are a lot of reasons to buy that phone like the strong camera, the strong processor and some features we like. But the number one reason to buy this phone is the price.

Honor 2 has a low price (price group 3) with strong competition and in that category it comes second after Samsung Galaxy S2 Plus. But let’s see why you should buy this phone.

WHY YOU SHOULD BUY IT

Good Specs: If you look at the specs of Honor 2 overall, you will notice that it can be compared to the best phones of the market. It has an 8MP camera (as Nexus 4, Galaxy S4 mini) and older phones like Samsung Galaxy S3 and Galaxy Note 2), a big screen, a quad core processor, great RAM of 2GB, and a big battery of 2.230mAh. So you have a great combination in a low price.

funny-camera-effectsFunny camera effects: I love when the menu on the camera has some smart options. I like filters and other related apps. So I like the filters on Honor 2 because they look like Photobooth app in iOS. You can select from a bunch of filters that will distort your face like the big face, the big nose, Gobbler etc. You can also choose some Instagram like filters to make your photo much better.

Smile Shooting mode: The smile function in cameras is something we don’t see in every phone. We are used to it in cameras and I like it on smartphones too. Honor 2 has a smile shooting mode that tries to get your smile on the photo. So you select Smile mode and then press the shoot button. Then the phone waits until the people on the photo are smiling. If not the photo will never be taken. This is smart.

Radio: Radio is an app that should be in all smartphones. As a technology, it is very cheap and it should be included on every phone, especially when the phone costs over 300 dollars. I like the Radio app on Honor 2 and it has an advantage over other phones like Nexus 4 that don’t have a Radio app.

MicroSD Card slot: When expensive phones don’t have SD card slot, the cheaper Honor 2 has 8GB of memory and a card slot to put your own memory card. That’s a plus point as we need space to store videos, photos and files as I use the Android phone as a USB.

Font size: The font size is something a lot of people complain about as they want to get a bigger font. Most Android phones do not have that option on the menu but you can download an app that will increase the font size is some apps. In Honor 2 you have the choice. In Display Menu you can choose the font size and there are 4 options, Small, Normal, Large and Huge. Choose Huge and the phone will be ideal for your grand parents.

More options: If you take a look at the menu of Honor 2 you will see some options that cannot be found on other devices. I like for example in the display menu you can set the colors of the phone to warm and cold or even choose a power saving mode to make your battery last longer. I also like the option to turn off the proximity sensor so as the screen remains on when calling. What I also like is the keyboard. With right colors and a “slide to next language” feature, it makes typing a lot easier.

WHY NOT TO BUY IT

Design: It is not the most beautiful phone we have ever seen. A bit heavy, a bit rounded, with a big screen that is lost on the big frame. It’s heavier than the competition and wider than most other phones. On the back side there is plastic, not glass but as I always say, design is a personal matter, you like it or not.

Older Android: Honor 2 comes with Android 4.0. This is old compared to the latest Android 4.2 but the matter is not the stuff you can do with Android 4.2 and not with Android 4.0 but whether Honor 2 will be updated to the next versions of Android (like Android 4.3 or Android 5.0). And I bet not. So you will stuck on Android 4.0 as Huawei is slow in updating the smartphones.

VIDEO REVIEW

SO?

The price is good, that’s for sure. It’s a bit confusing though if it is a cheap super phone or an expensive low budget phone. The camera and the quad core processor put this phone on the first category, it can be compared with Samsung Galaxy S3, HTC One X or Nexus 4 but not with the ultimate phones HTC One, Sony Xperia Z, Samsung Galaxy S4. But the old Android, the design and the overall look of the phone will put it where it really belongs, to the 3rd Price Range group. There the Honor 2 phone is really strong, it’s a must buy after Samsung Galaxy S2 Plus but the competition here is really strong. If you don’t mind the design and the older Android version and you look for a smartphone with quad core processor, strong camera, big battery and some great features, Honor 2 is a good choice for you.

Spec Rating of Huawei Honor 2

SpecHuawei Honor 2Compared to:with spec:ScoreBuy now:
Width10.5iPhone 57.662%
Weight145HTC Desire C10055%
Screen PPI326HTC One46970%
Camera MP8Nokia Pureview4120%
2nd Camera1.3Sony Xperia Z2.259%
Processor4 * 1.4Samsung S48 * 1.644%
RAM MB2000HTC One2000100%
Battery mAh2230Samsung Note 2310072%
Android4.0Google Nexus 44.267%
SAR0.32-0.0084%
Release Date2012-11-Today71%
Our view75%-100%75%
AVC rating methodTotal Rating64.8%

You can also see the ranking of this phone compared to other Android smartphones.