The Huawei P30 and Huawei P30 Pro launch event is just weeks away, with a confirmed date of March 26 having been revealed recently.
They're set to be the next flagship smartphones from the Chinese smartphone brand, which has gone from strength to strength in recent years.
The Huawei P20 and Huawei P20 Pro rivaled the likes of the Galaxy S9, Galaxy S9 Plus, Pixel 3 XL and new iPhones, and the P30 duo (or potentially trio) will have the Galaxy S10 and Galaxy S10 Plus in their sights.
We say potentially trio, as Apple launched three new phones back in September, and Samsung did the same in February, so we wouldn't be surprised if Huawei followed suit with a new trio of its own under the P30 name.
Update: Huawei has released a video teasing the Huawei P30 and hinting at features. Plus, the P30 range has now been certified in various countries, with some of these certifications giving us an idea of how much RAM and storage the P30 and P30 Pro will have.
We want to see the Huawei P30 and Huawei P30 Pro continue to build on the momentum from 2018, and we’ve come up with a list of things that would help that happen.
But before that though, here’s what we know and suspect about the phones so far. Rumors are starting to roll in and we now have a good idea of what to expect from Huawei's next flagship phones.
Cut to the chase
- What is it? The successors to the Huawei P20 and P20 Pro
- When is it out? Launches on March 26
- What will it cost? Likely upwards of £599 (roughly $790, AU$1,070)
Huawei P30 release date and price
The Huawei P30 launch data has been confirmed for March 26 after Huawei made the announcement on its Twitter account.
That confirms the one release date rumor we saw before this, which pointed to an announcement in Paris at the end of March.
Note though that if you’re in the US you might not be able to buy the P30 and P30 Pro, as the firm doesn't currently operate in the country.
As for the Huawei P30 price, it’s likely to be at least as expensive as the £599 (roughly $790, AU$1,070) Huawei P20, and will probably arrive alongside the even pricier Huawei P30 Pro.
The P30 may undercut some flagships but it might not launch in the US. Image Credit: TechRadar
Huawei P30 design and display
Hottest leaks:
- Almost no bezel
- A 3.5mm headphone port
- A 1080 x 2340 screen
Our best look yet at the possible design of the Huawei P30 comes from renders shared by @OnLeaks, who has a solid track record.
You can see some of these below. Note that the phone has a gradient color scheme on the back, which appears to be made of glass.
You can also see a teardrop notch on the front, tiny bezels, a triple-lens rear camera, a 3.5mm headphone port and no visible fingerprint scanner, suggesting it's built into the screen. That in turn might mean the screen is OLED, since most in-screen scanners don't work with LCD.
The headphone port in these pictures is slightly surprising, since Huawei didn't include one on the P20 range.
We've seen even more of the Huawei P30 Pro though, as both high-quality renders and real photos of the phone seem to have emerged.
Starting with the renders, which you can see below, there's a notch above the screen and a small bezel below, while around the back there's a quad-lens camera, with three lenses in one block and another to the side.
As for the real photos, those can be seen below and they match the design above, with a quad-lens camera arranged in the same way.
You can also see just how shiny, reflective and seemingly a fingerprint magnet the back of the phone is.
Before those images emerged we saw some case shots, shown below, seemingly showing the Huawei P30 Pro (rather than the standard P30) but with a different camera layout to the shots above. As these are older we suspect they're inaccurate.
As for the screen, on both the Huawei P30 and Huawei P30 Pro it could be a 1080 x 2340 one if leaked user agent profiles are to be believed. That would be a slight boost on the 1080 x 2240 screens of the Huawei P20 range.
Huawei P30 camera
Hottest leaks:
- A triple-lens camera
- A 38MP or 40MP lens
- P30 Pro will have a quad-lens camera
We've heard rumors that the Huawei P30 Pro might have a 38MP camera. Specifically, an unannounced Sony one.
According to another source the Huawei P30 will have a triple-lens rear camera, potentially with a lens of up to 40MP. It could also have a 5x lossless optical zoom and a 24MP front-facing camera.
And we've seen images of cases supposedly made for both the Huawei P30 and Huawei P30 Pro. From these we can see that there are seemingly at least three rear cameras on both models, with the Pro model also having a big flash unit.
The P30 Pro is also shown from the front in one image, with tiny bezels and a teardrop notch, which lines up with the images we've seen elsewhere.
However, it has now been confirmed that the Huawei P30 Pro will have four lenses rather than three, with the company's CEO saying as much.
This was rumored for a long time though, as not only do some of the images above show that, but other reports also pointed in that direction. Additionally it might sport 10x optical zoom and an upgraded 3D sensor for judging distance and creating focus effects.
Elsewhere, Huawei's European boss Walter Ji has talked about the possibility of 10x zoom in an interview with Android Pit, though he didn't specifically say that the Huawei P30 would get this feature.
However, teasers for the phone have included a picture of the moon from a closer perspective than you're likely to get without zoom, so that suggests some level of improved zoom, as well possibly as improved low light skills.
Huawei P30 OS and power
Hottest leaks:
- 6GB of RAM for P30, 8GB for P30 Pro
- 128GB of storage for P30, up to 512GB for P30 Pro
The Huawei P30 is sure to run Android 9 Pie, as not only is that the latest version of the operating system, it has also been specifically rumored.
Elsewhere, a reliable leaker has said that the standard Huawei P30 will come with 6GB of RAM and 128GB of storage, while the Huawei P30 Pro will have 8GB of RAM and a choice of 128GB, 256GB or 512GB of storage. Though he added that other configurations may also be offered.
This rumor has been backed up by leaked certification forms from Indonesia and Taiwan, which stated the exact same specs, although added that there's also apparently an 8GB version of the standard P30.
The P30 Pro has also now been certified in Thailand, as spotted by 91mobiles. No specs were attached, but it shows that the phones are on track to hit stores soon, and all these certifications suggest they will be widely available.
We don't know anything else about the core specs of the P30 yet, but we can also look at the Mate 20 (and Huawei Mate 20 Pro) for an idea of some of the likely specs and features of the Huawei P30.
For one thing, the P30 will probably have the same Kirin 980 chipset as the Mate 20 range. This debuted on the Mate 20 range and Huawei has previously used the same chipset on the Mate range one year and the P range the following year.
That's not necessarily a bad thing, as it will still be fairly new by the time the Huawei P30 launches and it's a good chip. It's the first 7nm Android one and it arguably has any other 2018 Android chip beat. Though of course it's now competing with the likes of the Snapdragon 855.
Huawei P30 other features
One thing the Huawei P30 might offer is improved speakers, as a teaser video which you can see below hints at that.
It's not clear what those improvements would be, but one possibility is a second speaker for stereo sound, as the Huawei P20 has just one speaker.
Huawei P30 name
According to Huawei's CEO the Huawei P30 will be better than the Huawei P20 Pro and Huawei Mate 20.
That's hardly surprising, but what's more notable is that he referred to the phone as the P30. While that would have been our best guess for the launch name anyway, you can now take it as more or less confirmed.
The company has also now mentioned the Huawei P30 Pro by name.
What we want to see
Ahead of the official Huawei P30 and P30 Pro launch, here's what we'd like to see from the new flagship smartphones.
1. A sharper screen
The Huawei P20’s screen isn’t quite as sharp as we’d expect a flagship to be
Huawei has stuck with a Full HD+ screen on its P20 range, but with Samsung, Sony and others upping the resolution it’s time Huawei did the same.
So for the Huawei P30 we want a QHD resolution. There’s probably no need for more than that, but given the likely large screen size a resolution of around 1440 x 2960 really would make a difference.
2. Bring back the headphone jack
Many phones – including the Huawei P20 range – are now ditching headphone jacks, but we’re still not convinced the tech is at the point where everyone will be happy to go wireless, so we’d like to see this brought back for the Huawei P30.
It’s unlikely to happen as it could be seen as a step backwards, or as admitting that removing it was a mistake, but it would be nice.
3. Wireless charging
All flagships should really support wireless charging
While the Huawei P20 range has good battery life and fast charging it lacks wireless charging, which is a feature we’d expect to see come as standard on flagship phones.
So hopefully it’s something that the Huawei P30 – or at least the Huawei P30 Pro – will offer. There's reason to suspect it might, since the Huawei Mate 20 Pro does.
4. Three cameras on all models
Huawei has only just moved on to triple-lens cameras with the Huawei P20 Pro so we’re not in any hurry for that to change, but we do want to see three lenses on the standard Huawei P30, rather than the feature being reserved for the P30 Pro.
And while we definitely don’t need more than three lenses on the back we would like to see some improvements to them as well, perhaps for example improvements to the AI scene recognition.
5. An in-screen fingerprint scanner
Building the scanner into the screen would give the P30 a big selling point
The Huawei Mate 20 Pro and Porsche Design Huawei Mate RS have an in-screen fingerprint scanner, and even the Honor 10 (made by a Huawei sub-brand) has an under-glass scanner, so it wouldn’t be at all surprising if the Huawei P30 had an in-screen scanner of its own.
And it would be a good thing too, since it’s the sort of high-tech feature that would help the phone stand apart from many other handsets, not to mention allowing it to keep the bezels small without resorting to having a scanner on the back.
6. A top-end chipset
The Huawei P20 range uses the Kirin 970 chipset, which is high-end, but it’s older and less powerful than the latest Snapdragon and Exynos chipsets.
For the Huawei P30 and P30 Pro we’d really like Huawei to use a brand-new chipset that makes its debut on those phones and can truly compete with the best around, rather than what it will probably actually do, which is equip them with the slightly older Kirin 980 chip that first appeared in the Huawei Mate 20.
7. No notch or bezels
Like so many of 2018’s phones, the Huawei P20 and P20 Pro each have a notch in the screen, and while you can somewhat hide it with software we’d rather there was no notch at all.
But we don’t want a strip of bezel either, instead we want a truly bezel-free front. If Huawei does build the fingerprint scanner into the screen on the P30 then it could be well on the way to achieving that, so it’s possible, though it will need to hide the likes of the front-facing camera somewhere too.
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