Honor 9 lite or something else for similar money?

Soldato
Joined
29 Feb 2004
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Looking to upgrade from my cheap windows phone. I'm not looking for anything special, really just want to move over to android due to lack of support for windows phone and a few other things. Android side, I'm not looking for anything special just:

1080p screen
Decent peformance for general usage/video playback. No interest in games etc.
Decent battery
Can be rooted and unlocked for custom roms, so when official support is dropped I still have options.
NFC

I know they offer value, but don't want to order from China as I want a proper warranty.

Honor 9 lite seems to fit what I want from reviews and can get it for £153 (Argos+staff discount). Anything else/better to consider?

£150-200. Would prefer near the £150, but will keep for a relativly long time, so if £200 is something much better, I can strecth.

Thanks.
 
I'm no expert on phones but I've literally just bought one of these after weighing it up against the similarly priced Moto G6 Play (lowest of the G6 models). The G6 (mid model) and G5S Plus are a small step up, as is the Honor 6/7X, IIRC.

I don't know if there's a clear winner out of the two but I'm very happy with it so far. I bought mine from Carphone Warehouse for £169.

I almost went for the P8 lite but reckoned on the 9 lite being worth the extra £39.
 
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Also interested in this, my Windows 10 Lumia 640XL is now over 3 years old and reboots itself whenever it gets a knock. Sometimes just putting it down on a desk is sufficient. But I'd be after 5.7" screen size minimum and Dual SIM. (OK, Honor 9 Lite is 5.65", close enough !)
 
I'm no expert on phones but I've literally just bought one of these after weighing it up against the similarly priced Moto G6 Play (lowest of the G6 models). The G6 (mid model) and G5S Plus are a small step up, as is the Honor 6/7X, IIRC.

I don't know if there's a clear winner out of the two but I'm very happy with it so far. I bought mine from Carphone Warehouse for £169.

I almost went for the P8 lite but reckoned on the 9 lite being worth the extra £39.

I was also looking at the g6 as well after I originally posted, fits what I want as well, but at the other end of budget. Was it just price that made you pick this over the g6? or something else?. Can get the g6 for £200 (same deal argos + staff discount). Not much in it, but £50 more for 5Ghz wifi, usb c and fast charging, so thinking it might be worth to stretch considering I will keep it for a few years.

How do you find the glass back? Never had a phone with that construction (cheap windows phone is plastic), read a few people saying it's slippery and can easily slide of the desk.

Hard to pick, few phones around this price, that all seem to be very similar :).
 
Was it just price that made you pick this over the g6? or something else?

As silly as it might sound, it was probably down to the colour (the specs appear to be very similar). I was dead set on not picking up a black or grey phone this time, so was considering gold, silver, or otherwise.

I suppose (this won't make any sense at all) that because it was the lowest of the three G6 models, that put me off a little, yet as I say, the specs of that and the 9 lite look to be alike anyway. Go figure. :D

If I was in your shoes and could get a discount, then the G6 or G6 Plus/G5 Plus might be more of a consideration (e.g. USB-C), but I can't say that I've noticed anything on the sites I've visited which suggest that the above phones are that much better.

https://www.carphonewarehouse.com/honor/9-lite.html#!colour=blue&capacity=32GB&dealType=pm


How do you find the glass back?

Too early to say, I've barely touched it so far because I'm waiting for my sim card.
 
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Ok, so I've spent a bit of time with it now and there have been no problems with regard to holding/handling (being a slippery kipper). Hope that helps. :)
 
Had my P9 Lite for about 6 weeks. Sounds like the OP was looking for a similar phone (this replaced a Vodafone Ultra 6). I've had absolutely no issues with it. The EMUI takes no time at all to get used to. Photos are better than my previous phone. Battery life is good (usually between 40-50% left each evening). Earphone jack. SD card. There are better phones around, but this is a pretty good deal tbh

I've had the clear case that wasprovided on the phone since I took it out of the box so can't cooment on how slippery it is.
 
I have the Iphone Se at the moment, before that I had the MOTO G4, great phone apart from the fact that the side buttons used to fall out of its socket which caused turning the phone off and on difficult.

Ok, so I've spent a bit of time with it now and there have been no problems with regard to holding/handling (being a slippery kipper). Hope that helps. :)

Would you recommend the Honor 9 Lite?, many reviews have praised the phone as being the best budget smartphone available.

PS im looking to change phone
 
I have the Iphone Se at the moment, before that I had the MOTO G4, great phone apart from the fact that the side buttons used to fall out of its socket which caused turning the phone off and on difficult.

Would you recommend the Honor 9 Lite?, many reviews have praised the phone as being the best budget smartphone available.

PS im looking to change phone

Yes, I would, though I've come from a much lower grade phone than what you're currently using, so whether it would be a good choice, I don't know. I'm not familiar with the iPhone SE specs, though I assume it's the most cut down version?
 
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Yes, I would, though I've come from a much lower grade phone than what you're currently using, so whether it would be a good choice, I don't know. I'm not familiar with the iPhone SE specs, though I assume it's the most cut down version?

Don’t get me wrong the iphone se is an excellent phone in terms of specs.

But in terms of it being practical for
Me personally is another thing...

The thing is the battery struggles to last me all day. I barely use the phOne during the day at work and when I get home it barely has 20-30% Battery left if I’m lucky meaning I have to charge it or use it as little as possible until I go bed (as I charge it at night).

And if I was to go out all day, it’s likely that my phOne would be dead by the time I come back.

Yes I’m sure I could charge it, but really this day in age no one should be charging there phone more than once a day on average phone usage.
 
The Honor 9 lite is superb, I came from an S7 Edge which I decided was getting a little long in the tooth as the battery was starting to suffer noticeably.

Performance wise in day to day use there wasn't anything I felt I'd lost, camera wasn't quite as good but for most quick snaps the 9 lite is perfectly serviceable, I did pop Nova launcher straight on as it's been my launcher of choice for years and it's always my first install no matter which phone I buy.

I got mine from Very, after looking around I found a £25 off voucher which meant I only paid £144 which was a snip.

I've since picked up an S9 simply because the offer on one was too good not to go for but I could have honestly carried on using the 9 lite without regret or remorse.
 
Well, I haven't been using it an enormous amount (tinkered with it over coffee when out earlier), but it's been on for a fair chunk of the day and the battery is still over 70%, though I do have it set to lower power usage. So, although early days, it seems like it's quite a lot better in that regard over the last phone I had.
 
The Honor 9 lite is superb, I came from an S7 Edge which I decided was getting a little long in the tooth as the battery was starting to suffer noticeably.

Performance wise in day to day use there wasn't anything I felt I'd lost, camera wasn't quite as good but for most quick snaps the 9 lite is perfectly serviceable, I did pop Nova launcher straight on as it's been my launcher of choice for years and it's always my first install no matter which phone I buy.

I got mine from Very, after looking around I found a £25 off voucher which meant I only paid £144 which was a snip.

I've since picked up an S9 simply because the offer on one was too good not to go for but I could have honestly carried on using the 9 lite without regret or remorse.

just out of interest how much did you pick your S9 up for and was the improvement much compared to the Honor 9 lite?
 
just out of interest how much did you pick your S9 up for and was the improvement much compared to the Honor 9 lite?

For a comparison I was on a sim only deal paying £10 for 5gb with 500 mins and 5000 texts which was more than ample for my needs, I saw an offer (might have been here on ocuk) for the S9 with 30gb unlimited mins and texts for £33 per month.

I figured that for what was less than the price of a meal from Mc D's a week I may as well have complete overkill on my contract with a spanky new toy.

I can honestly say that the screen being amoled and having better clarity when outdoors is possibly the biggest gain the S9 has over the 9 lite. I'm not a bench freak and in day to day use there's little between them.

*edit camera excluded, because the camera on the S9 is incredible to be fair*

I could not justify paying 4.5 times as much for the S9 sim free as the 9 lite.
 
For a comparison I was on a sim only deal paying £10 for 5gb with 500 mins and 5000 texts which was more than ample for my needs, I saw an offer (might have been here on ocuk) for the S9 with 30gb unlimited mins and texts for £33 per month.

I figured that for what was less than the price of a meal from Mc D's a week I may as well have complete overkill on my contract with a spanky new toy.

I can honestly say that the screen being amoled and having better clarity when outdoors is possibly the biggest gain the S9 has over the 9 lite. I'm not a bench freak and in day to day use there's little between them.

*edit camera excluded, because the camera on the S9 is incredible to be fair*

I could not justify paying 4.5 times as much for the S9 sim free as the 9 lite.


Thanks .

I’m pondering weather to get a used s7/s8 over the honor 9 lite.

I would prefer the display on s7/s8 due to the clarity.
 
The S7 is a really nice phone and was one I was looking at, but in the end, I decided to stick to my original plan/budget. Ideally, I probably would have grabbed the S7 Edge, but they still go for quite a pretty penny.
 
ive had my honor 9 lite for about 2 months now . battery life pretty decent . screen is great especially outdoors . it looks great in blue . I dont know what it is but for some reason i just dont like it lol
 
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