Huawei unveils the Mate 9 with dual Leica camera, Kirin 960 chipset

Huawei Mate 9 was just introduced at a dedicated event held in Munich, Germany. It has leaked numerous times before and we knew almost everything upfront, but we are glad Huawei managed to keep some things under wraps for the event.

The Mate 9 is built of metal around a big 5.9" IPS display of 1080p resolution. The screen is covered with a piece of the 2.5D glass. The phablet is just 7.5mm thick and weighs the 190g.

Huawei Mate 9 indeed runs on the new Kirin 960 chipset, which offers a powerful octa-core processor with a quartet of the new Cortex-A73 cores clocked at 2.4GHz and another four Cortex-A53 cores ticking at 1.8GHz. The chipset has finally gotten a proper flagship GPU this time with the latest (Bifrost gen) ARM Mali-G71 MP8. Finally, there are 4GB of RAM onboard.

The Mate 9 highlight is, of course, the second-generation Leica camera. It's a dual-camera setup with a 20MP f/2.2 monochrome and a 12MP f/2.2 color sensors. Those two snappers are enhanced by optical image stabilization, and they can make use of the new 4-in-1 hybrid autofocus that includes laser, phase-detect, depth, and contrast detection. There is also a dual-tone dual-LED flash around.

Quite interesting, Huawei claims the camera supports a new Hybrid Zoom feature, which should allow you to zoom without (significant) loss of quality. We'll have to wait and see how this works in real life, though.

Finally, the Huawei Mate 9 is capable of 4K video capturing, a first for a Huawei flagship.

The selfie camera features an 8MP sensor with f/1.9 aperture and autofocus - quite a treat for selfie fans.

The rest of the Mate 9 specs include 64GB expandable storage, dual-SIM and LTE connectivity, and a 4,000 mAh battery with supports for Super Charge with a 5A charger.There is also a rear-mounted fingerprint scanner with gesture support, of the always-on variety.

The Mate 9 runs on Android 7.0 Nougat out of the box and comes skinned with the latest EMUI 5.0. It will launch in six colors - Space Gray, Moonlight Silver, Champagne Gold, Mocha Brown, Ceramic White, and Black.

Huawei is going to release the Mate 9 phablet first in China, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Kuwait, Malaysia, Poland, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Thailand, and United Arab Emirates. Even more markets will join these soon after. The suggested retail price is €699 for Europe.