Software

The Huawei Mate 9 comes with Android seven.0 out of the box, but unfortunately Huawei has paired information technology with their EMUI v.0 skin. Compared to the version of EMUI I used on the P9, there are some improvements here that brand the Mate 9 easier to use, but I'm still not a massive fan of Huawei'due south heavy skin.

EMUI still comes with heaps of annoying and pointless duplicate apps. There is no need for ii email clients, 2 gallery apps, and ii music apps on this phone. It just bogs downwardly the phone with crap and forces you to cull an app through irritating popular-ups. Duplicate apps nonetheless aren't a skillful experience on Android and information technology's something OEMs need to address.

There are also a number of spam apps included here. Weather, wellness, notepad and fill-in apps are unnecessary as most people already have a preferred third-party app and would rather download ane through the Play Store. HiGame is also completely useless when there'south the Play Store and Play Games already included. On superlative of this, there'due south an entire 'flashlight' app when there'south a flashlight shortcut in the notification pane.

Huawei has addressed 1 of my main complaints with EMUI: the notification pane. Quick setting toggles are at present given their ain, easy-to-access pane, rather than an unabridged tab in previous editions. The notification timeline has also been replaced with a more than traditional Android notification system, which is far better as it includes more information and wastes less space.

The settings screen is nonetheless a chip of a mess. I'm not sure why the date and fourth dimension settings are hidden under the "advanced settings" page as it isn't really an avant-garde feature. At that place are a lot of separate pages hither that I experience could be condensed, which would brand the entire settings screen easier to navigate.

At that place are some adept features available in the settings, though. The power to modify the lodge of the navigation bar is e'er welcome, equally is the highly customizable condition bar. If you don't want to display the carrier name and would similar to see network speed, you lot can through customization. The battery page includes lots of data and tools to help optimize battery life, which could come in handy for the times when yous're feeling battery feet.

The visual style of EMUI is okay, but it differs significantly from the style of vanilla Android, which can create a disjointed experience between first-party apps and everything else available for Android. Huawei seems to straddle the boundary between Android and iOS with their pattern, and some choices have clearly been made to make the software more like iOS: the lack of an app drawer, and a familiar settings screen design come to mind.

EMUI v.0 with Android 7.0 isn't the worst software pare I've used, however fans of stock Android will be disappointed with the number of things it changes just for the sake of being different.

I don't hold much faith that the Mate 9 volition receive prompt updates to new versions of Android, or when security patches are bachelor. Huawei has promised the P9 will be upgraded to Android 7.0 in March, but that'south vi months after Noguat devices striking the market. The Mate 9 is even so on November 2022 security updates every bit well, which is very outdated. The good news is this phone will receive Google Banana soon, simply that's entirely thanks to Google.