HTC One A9 review: A once flagship phone for just £200

The HTC One A9 was once a flagship device. Released in 2015, the phone was rather expensive at £470. It’s now a lot cheaper at around £200 brand-new. This makes it a much more tempting proposition, as it’s faster than the Motorola Moto G6 and Honor 9 Lite, and a lot cheaper than the G6 Plus that houses a similar chip.

Being a 2015 phone, it doesn’t have an elongated 18:9 display, nor runs on the latest iteration of Google’s operating system. Still, this phone is well worth considering if you’ve got a tight £200 budget.

Below, you’ll find Katharine’s original review.

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HTC One A9 review: Design

If it wasn’t for the prominent HTC logo on the back of the handset, you might mistake the One A9 for another smartphone altogether, as the clean lines and simple metal chassis are eerily reminiscent of Apple’s iPhone 6 and iPhone 6S. HTC told me it’s flattered that Apple has chosen to mimic its metallic design – it did, after all, make the move to metal smartphones first – but this time it’s a little more obvious who’s imitating who.

Still, the One A9 actually feels much more comfortable to hold than the iPhone 6S, thanks to the subtle ridge on the back of the handset which gives you something to hold on to when gripping the phone in one hand. It’s a fraction thicker than the iPhone 6S, measuring 146x71x7.3mm, but, despite dwarfing the 6S in almost every respect, the One A9 still weighs just 143g.

It’s a beautiful smartphone, with the eye-catching Deep Garnet model being particularly gorgeous. However, this version (along with the Topaz Gold model) won’t actually be available at launch. Instead, thes ehave come later (but hopefully before the end of the year, HTC promised) and will be exclusive to certain networks. For those that can’t wait that long, you’ll have to pick between the standard Carbon Grey and Opal Silver models, which have a black and white front panel respectively.

HTC One A9 review: Display

My review sample came in Carbon Grey, and I have to say it’s immediately more appealing than the M9, not least because of its 5in 1,920×1,080 AMOLED display. Again, the display on the M9 was something of a let-down when I tested it earlier this year, as its colour accuracy just wasn’t as high as I was expecting. The A9’s AMOLED panel, however, rectifies this instantly, as it covers a full 100% of the sRGB colour gamut and produces perfect 0.00cd/m2 blacks, allowing colours and text to really jump out of the screen without appearing too oversaturated. Its contrast ratio of infinity:1 also ensures there’s plenty of detail on show in dark photos and images.

The only downside is that the colours are a little warm, so whites look a little yellow, at least when compared to the Super AMOLED display on the Samsung Galaxy S6, for example. This can be quite a common problem with AMOLED panels, but it’s not something I find particularly bothersome on this particular handset. The screen’s peak brightness is also a little low at 347.19cd/m2 when you put it up against its LCD-based rivals, but again this isn’t out of the ordinary for AMOLED display.

HTC One A9 review: Performance and Battery Life

As for the rest of the phone’s specs, the One A9 is powered by an octa-core 1.5GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 617 processor and 2GB of RAM. It’s a shame it doesn’t use a Snapdragon 810 like the One M9, but it’s still very quick. In the Expert Reviews benchmark suite, it showed a significant increase in speed over older Snapdragon 615 handsets (including HTC’s own Desire 820), as its Geekbench 3 scores of 732 in the single core test and 3,050 in the multicore test were roughly 100 and 800 points faster respectively. As a result, Android felt silky smooth and apps were very quick to load.

However, when you consider the phone costs £470 SIM-free or around £32-per-month on contract, this starts to seem a little sluggish compared to other handsets in this kind of price range. The Galaxy S6, for example, which now costs just £400 SIM-free or £28.50-per-month on contract, is streets ahead of the One A9, and the difference is plain to see in day-to-day use. Apps open much quicker and the whole operating system feels that much slicker, leaving the One A9 feeling a little behind the curve.

HTC One A9 review: Gaming performance

Gaming performance is also a little lacklustre for a handset of this price, as it only managed an offscreen Manhattan test score of 411 frames in GFX Bench GL, which equates to roughly 6.6fps. Again, this is by no means bad, but compared to the S6’s 923 frames (or 15fps), complex 3D games like Hearthstone aren’t quite as smooth as they could be. It’s only minor, but I did notice a few stuttering animations when new cards were being played on the One A9, which is a bit disappointing considering how expensive it is. Simpler games such as Threes! and Alphabear worked perfectly fine though, so it’s unlikely you’ll notice any difference to other flagships here unless you’re playing lots of 3D games.

I wasn’t too impressed by its Peacekeeper web browsing score of 793 either, as this falls quite a way behind other handsets in this kind of price range. Even the 3rd Gen Moto G, for example, can manage 731, while the Galaxy S6 is way out in front with 1,257. As a result, web pages can be a little jerky at times, particularly if there are lots of images or embedded videos present. It stumbled a few times while scrolling down the Guardian, for instance, but on the whole it’s not too much of a nuisance.

Battery life is also a little underwhelming, but at least the One A9 manages to scrape into double figures this time, as its 2,150mAh battery lasted 10h 02m in our continuous video playback test with the screen set to 170cd/m2. This beats the One M9 by 45 minutes, but it’s still some way behind other flagships such as the LG G4, which lasts just under 12 hours, and the Galaxy S6 which stretches just past 13 and a half hours. It certainly doesn’t match the 12 hours of video playback HTC promised, but it should still be enough to get you through the day.

HTC One A9 review: Camera

Thankfully, HTC’s claims about the A9’s improved rear camera hold a lot more truth, as the effort it’s put in to improving both the sensor and the interface this time round pay huge dividends. Despite only having a 13-megapixel sensor (down from the M9‘s 20-megapixel snapper), its overall photo quality is much higher. Colours are rich and accurate and the exposure levels are vastly superior to those on the M9. Photos are still perhaps a fraction dark in places, but switching on HDR quickly sorts this out.

Indoor photos looked great, too. Object edges could be a tad grainy and over-processed at times, but colours looked nice and punchy there was plenty of contrast on show. Low lighting conditions were noticeably noisier, but colours still looked bright and vibrant. The only major disappointment was the flash, as this had a tendency to turn images rather green.

HTC’s redesigned interface makes the camera much easier to use, too, as HDR is now included as an onscreen shortcut on the main screen and switching between the rear and front-facing 4-megapixel Ultrapixel sensor (the same as on the One M9) camera is quick and simple. HTC has also included several other features such as hyper-lapse and slow-mo videos, RAW capture and auto RAW processing, optical image stabilisation and Zoe highlights, the latter of which captures three second clips – think Apple’s Live Photos – or a burst of three stills. There’s also a Pro camera mode which gives you full control over the white balance, exposure, ISO, aperture and focus level.

I’ll be testing these modes more thoroughly in the coming weeks, but the RAW processing feature is something of a disappointment. It’s great to have the opportunity to do this on the device itself, but you don’t actually have any control over how it’s processed, so those who really want to fine-tune their pictures will probably still want to tinker about with them on their PC. Still, it’s a nice extra, and the Zoe highlights feature also does a much better job of capturing short video moments than Live Photos on the iPhone 6S. For a start, you actually get some visual feedback on when the video is being captured, but it’s a shame you can’t select your own stills when you switch to Zoe’s burst mode.

HTC One A9 review: Fingerprint sensor

HTC has also included a fingerprint sensor on the One A9 for use with Android Pay. This is located at the bottom of the handset underneath the display. While it can be configured to act as a physical home button, the back and recent apps buttons are still relegated to onscreen controls, as HTC believes this offers the best user experience. While it would be nice to have to the option of using dedicated buttons, there’s no denying that the fingerprint sensor works beautifully.

You don’t even have to tap the sensor in order to wake the phone either, as it will unlock the phone from sleep mode as soon as you touch it with your thumb, making it much more convenient than the fingerprint sensors on the Galaxy S6 and Xperia Z5 and Z5 Compact. I also didn’t have to deliberately place my thumb over it vertically either, as it worked just as well when I positioned it across the sensor horizontally as well, giving it a serious advantage over Samsung’s Galaxy S6 sensor in particular.

If you’d rather not use the fingerprint sensor to turn on and unlock the One A9, the grooved power button is another great touch in the One A9’s design. It sits at just the right height for your thumb and its machined finish makes it very easy to find by touch alone. On the other side of the phone, you’ll find a microSD card slot to expand the phone’s default 16GB of internal storage.

HTC One A9 review: Android Marshmallow & Sense 7

One thing you don’t have to worry about is waiting to upgrade to Android 6.0 Marshmallow, as the One A9 is one of the first smartphones outside of Google’s own Nexus 5X and Nexus 6P devices to come with Marshmallow straight out of the box. It still uses HTC’s excellent Sense 7 interface for the main homepage and Settings menu, but you’ll still find glimpses of stock Marshmallow in the drop-down notification menu and the volume settings.

I’m a big fan of HTC’s Sense 7 UI, as it’s by far one of the most personal versions of Android I’ve seen yet. The Theme Generator, for instance, will let you revamp the entire handset right down to your app icons, sounds, fonts and caller ID logo if you so wish. A handful of themes come pre-installed, but you can download more or even make your own using images in your gallery to define the look of the phone. It works by analysing the colours present in your chosen wallpaper and then suggests different tones and colour combinations for your home screen, Blinkfeed hub and settings menu, which you can then tweak to your liking. It works exceedingly well, and even photos I took that had only a few main colours present still gave me plenty of options to choose from.

Sense Home is another useful feature, as this learns which apps you use most in certain locations, such as home, work or on the move, and automatically promotes them to your main homescreen when you need them. For instance, it will show Mail, Google Drive, Calendar and HTC’s note-taking Scribble apps when I’m in the office, but swap those for Google Maps and HTC’s Music and Car apps when I’m on my way home. Similarly, if you’re near certain landmarks, such as a station, Sense Home can also suggest relevant apps such as train timetables or route planners in its Suggestion folder.

You can still pin apps to the home screen so they don’t get lost, but it should help reduce the amount of app clutter on your various home screens. Taken together, it’s a great improvement on Sense 6, and is a real asset to the handset as a whole.

HTC One A9 review: Verdict

Taken together, the HTC One A9 is the phone the One M9 should have been from the start, and it’s easily my favourite HTC handset to date. Sense 7 is a fantastic interface and the A9’s beautiful design makes it by far one of the most pleasing and attractive smartphones I’ve reviewed in some time.

The only real sticking point is the price. At £470-420 SIM-free it’s up against the now hugely competitive Samsung Galaxy S6, LG G4 and Sony Xperia Z5 Compact, all of which are faster and have better battery lives. In this light, it’s not particularly good value, but that doesn’t stop me liking it any less. It’s definitely a better buy than the One M9, but it doesn’t do quite enough to make the big leagues.