Huawei Honor 6 review: Virtue in disguise

Headphones missing

The Huawei Honor 6 arrives in an eye-catching cyan box with a shiny Honor logo on top. Below the tray holding the phone, you'll find a thin package containing a user guide and a set of protection films for both the front and the back. Taking that out reveals the powerful 2-amp A/C adapter and a separate USB cable in dedicated compartments. What was sadly omitted, at least in our review unit's bundle, was a headset.

Honor 6 retail package

Huawei Honor 6 360-degree spin

The Honor 6 fits in 139.6 x 69.7 x 7.5mm, pretty much the same footprint as Huawei's latest Ascend P7 flagship, but a whole millimeter thicker. At 130g, it's also marginally heavier than the P7, but the heft of the massive 3100mAh battery had to show up somewhere. That said, the Xiaomi Mi 4 is a similar all-glass 5-incher with a 3080mAh battery and weighs a tangible 19g more.

Design and handling

The average user could easily mistake the Huawei Honor 6 for a Sony Xperia Z-series compact. It's got a shiny glass back, slightly rounded corners and a frame, that appears to be brushed aluminum. It's even got a similar flap covering the SIM and microSD slots.

Honor 6 body and design

However, a more discerning observer will quickly notice Huawei's touch in certain places. For example, the aforementioned surrounding frame (which in fact is made of plastic, but you won't notice from a distance) stops at the bottom of the sides, a design we've seen on the P7 and G6 Ascends. The lone speaker slit on the back also comes straight from the Ascend P7.

Honor 6 and Ascend P7 side by side

The glass panels obviously provide little grip and the outer frame is quite slippery too. That would have been more of an issue on a larger device, where you'd need to let go of one side to be able to move your thumb across. The 5-inch Honor 6 has no such problems and only the extreme top requires some stretching.

Holding the Huawei Honor 6

The smartphone is tightly put together and shows good resistance to bending and twisting. No annoying sounds are produced in the process. You wouldn't call the finish premium, but it is of adequate quality considering the price of the smartphone, so no complaints are to be made here.

The one gripe we have with the design is that the miniscule gap between the frame and the glass panels gets filled with dirt and requires the occasional cleaning.

Controls

The top of the smartphone features the 3.5mm headphone jack, a noise-cancelling mic and the IR blaster. The USB port is centrally placed at the bottom, where it is accompanied by the primary microphone.

Top and bottom of the Honor 6

The right side of the Honor 6 is more densely populated. From top to bottom we have the volume rocker, power button, SIM and microSD slots. Both compartments share a plastic flap. While typically flimsy, it shouldn't be an issue, as it won't see as much action as the USB port, which is left exposed. The left side is entirely vacant.

Right side with power and volume buttons, SIM and microSD slots

The top left corner houses the 13MP camera module with the dual-LED flash alongside. The single speaker is aligned with the lens and is in the bottom left corner. Flipping over to the front you get nothing below the display. The earpiece is above it, joined by the front facing 5MP camera and a barely discernible ambient light/proximity sensor window.

13MP camera with dual-LED flash • 5MP front snapper