One of the latest models from Huawei, the Bee is a steal considering what specs you'll be paying for that are inside this little excellent device. The phone comes in two different colours; black & white . The white one just has a white back cover while the front is still black, which is not something I prefer personally. I'd prefer to have it completely in white, as from looking at both from the front they're virtually identical.
Alongside the phone you get a data cable and a USB wall plug, though sadly you get no no earphones or screen guard for this budget device, and this trend is now becoming the norm with most budget phones. It’s their way of keeping the price of the handset really low, I guess. This dual SIM 3G device comes with Android KitKat (4.4) out of the box with Huawei EMUI 3.0 Lite (Huawei UI) on top.
In terms of design & Hardware the size of the phone is 66.7x134.3x10 mm with the screen size of 4.5”. It’s a FWVGA LCD display with a 854 x 480 pixel resolution and 218 ppi. That's not that great and kind of last year, but that’s what you're paying for here. The back is matte finish and easy to grip while the front is all glossy. It’s a fingerprint magnet and the screen is highly reflective so you’ll need to keep the brightness really high to be able to see the display in bright sunlight. It has a fully unibody design and a circular arch edge design for easy grip. Three buttons on the front are capacitive and non backlit. Specs wise it’s a 1.2 GHz + Spreadtrum SC7731 Cortex-A7, Quad Core under the hood with Dual Core Mali-400 as the GPU. 1 GB RAM & 8 GB ROM (user memory 5.14GB) is the only option available. Expandable up to 32GB via MicroSD card. Perhaps one of the very first phones to provide a Quad Core & 1GB RAM at this price point. The 1730 mAh battery is removable, and promises a talk time of 6 hrs (2G), 7 hrs (3G) while the standby time is 280 hrs (2G), 220 hrs (3G).
The front camera is 2MP and rear is 8MP, with dual LED flash which is more than what you usually get with other brands in this budget category. Low light photos are still a disappointment but daylight ones are good quality and less blurry than expected, even after zooming in. Auto Focus, CMOS Sensor, Snap Capture in Black Screen, Panorama, Touch to Capture and Burst Shoot are some features on this phone. Front cam can be used for Selfies & video conferencing as well. Video recording is full HD (1920x1080) but doesn’t look so promising while its played back on the phone.
Multimedia wise it can support all your audio & video formats and graphic high games run with a little lag. Audio output is not great considering a small rear speaker on the back. Thought he front speaker is loud enough for calls. Lastly ,the Huawei proprietary EMUI is light and works smoothly, has no lags or issues with multi-touch in a week's usage. My mom has been using the Bee on the “Simple Mode” which is an option in the Home Screen style besides the Standard mode. It’s similar to the Zenfone’s “Easy mode” where the screen gives you tile-like big options of only basic apps and settings which are editable. It’s a no fuss option if you don’t want to keep scrolling through tons of pre-loaded apps every time. Overall, a good buy if you’re on a shoestring budget and want all the bells and whistles of a mid-range phone without losing out on any features.
The Huawei Honor Bee gets a bee-autiful 4/5.
The front camera is 2MP and rear is 8MP, with dual LED flash which is more than what you usually get with other brands in this budget category. Low light photos are still a disappointment but daylight ones are good quality and less blurry than expected, even after zooming in. Auto Focus, CMOS Sensor, Snap Capture in Black Screen, Panorama, Touch to Capture and Burst Shoot are some features on this phone. Front cam can be used for Selfies & video conferencing as well. Video recording is full HD (1920x1080) but doesn’t look so promising while its played back on the phone.
Multimedia wise it can support all your audio & video formats and graphic high games run with a little lag. Audio output is not great considering a small rear speaker on the back. Thought he front speaker is loud enough for calls. Lastly ,the Huawei proprietary EMUI is light and works smoothly, has no lags or issues with multi-touch in a week's usage. My mom has been using the Bee on the “Simple Mode” which is an option in the Home Screen style besides the Standard mode. It’s similar to the Zenfone’s “Easy mode” where the screen gives you tile-like big options of only basic apps and settings which are editable. It’s a no fuss option if you don’t want to keep scrolling through tons of pre-loaded apps every time. Overall, a good buy if you’re on a shoestring budget and want all the bells and whistles of a mid-range phone without losing out on any features.
The Huawei Honor Bee gets a bee-autiful 4/5.
★★★★☆
Pritesh Khilnani
Huawei Honor Bee at CeX
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