Spider-eyed Lite version of Huawei flagship flies out before actual P40 launch event There are still several weeks until Huawei formally announces its upcoming P40 and P40 Pro flagship smartphones. As a taste of what's to come, the embattled Chinese tech giant has quietly revealed the first device in the lineup: the P40 Lite. As the name implies, the P40 Lite (as was the case with the P30 Lite, and so on) is a …
It's between Samsung and Apple if you're in the market for a high end phone. There are no competitors. Anyone else is just trying to fill a gap whether one exists or not.
Both Samsung and Apple have tried to do the "budget" version of a flagship model with limited success.
You'll always get someone saying they have an (insert-brand) and why buying it was the best decision they ever made. But it usually comes down to...price. More specifically a lower price than Samsung/Apple alternatives. Or for people who are clutching at straws...ooh mine has a 3.5mm jack.
There isn't really a market for mega expensive phones from companies who aren't Samsung or Apple. If we're being honest.
There's nothing particularly noteworthy or exciting about a P40 Lite, other than the fact it costs significantly less than an iPhone or Galaxy.
Speaking as the husband of a wife who bought a Samsung Galaxy S8 while I chose the Honor 9 at the same time, its not just price. The rebadged Huawei has generally lasted far better. The battery lasts way longer than the Samsung, it hardly ever crashes while the Glaaxy crashes fairly often, in fact the only thing I can really point to as having ever been better on the Samsung (noticeably anyway) is that the Sammy has a much better, more capable camera.
Can't speak for Apples though, although I'm fairly sure Huawei have never pushed an update to deliberately slow my phone down.
YMMV though.
But the market isn't responding to that. That was really my point.
If you look at Samsung and Apple market share - particularly combined - every other manufacturer is tiny in comparison. If everyone thought the same as what you've said Samsung wouldn't be able to gain the market share they have.
There are two areas - cheap phones and expensive ones. Nobody is touching either of these manufacturers in the expensive end because peoples mentality is it's too big a gamble to pick anyone other than them (proven by market share). At the cheap end it's hard to convince people to buy an Honor when they know Samsungs reputation, albeit one they've created largely off the back of their higher end devices. You can get a Galaxy S8 for under £200 at which point a ~£150 Honor 9 isn't very attractive, to the average person.
The point being, if Huawei was offering anything noteworthy at either end they would have more than a 10% market share. These phones they've brought out won't increase that to any significant degree.
I'm not sure where you are getting your figures from, but IDC say that Huawei have a much bigger market share than you imply. Perhaps it's not cut into the "high/low" classes you mention though:
https://www.idc.com/promo/smartphone-market-share/vendor
Anecdotally though, I felt that the P30 and P30 Pro (as well as the P20 equivalents) got more than enough mindshare to be considered viable high end purchases. And looking around my own bubble, I see more Huaweis than Samsungs and Apples.
I'm not sure where you are getting your figures from, but IDC say that Huawei have a much bigger market share than you imply.
Much of Huawei's sales are in their captive market of China. A captive market is not as subject to competitive market forces as other suppliers.
In the USA Apple+Samsung = 80% of the market. In Europe that equation is 60%.
According to statcounter, Huawei's European market share is currently above 18%, and has been quite stable in recent times
Totally agree especially regarding the camera.
The camera on on Huawei 9 lite is crap even when compared to an old galaxy S7. The 10 lite is much better but still not as good as the ancient by comparison Samsung.
The only other downside is that my S7 is very water resistant, not sure the Huawei would survive a drop in a puddle but I don't tend to drop things that cost £180 very often.
The camera on on Huawei 9 lite is crap even when compared to an old galaxy S7. The 10 lite is much better but still not as good as the ancient by comparison Samsung.
P9 lite - Launched April 2016, $200
S7 - Launched March 2016, $670
Why are you talking about these old phones? This is about the P40 lite.
This.
I am the proud owner of a P30 Pro. It is simply the best phone i've ever had. The camera is ridiculous and the pictures that even as a quick snap are stunning. i can use it all day, including google maps navigation to and from work without being plugged in the car - it still has over 50% battery at the end of the day.
The 2 sim slots work pretty flawlessly as well, with the exception of android auto cant cope with dual sims at the moment.
i cant fault it.
... it's a tablet! Seriously 6.4"?
I've got a P10 Lite which despite getting quite old now is absolutely hands down the best Android I've ever owned. It cost me £180 about 2 years ago and at the time it was the only phone I could find that packed the kind of storage and spec that I wanted whilst not being too enormous.
I started with a Google Nexus One years ago, any have had a variety of phones from HTC, Samsung any Sony - All of them have had annoying problems and the damn Sony very suddenly died on me and I lost data that it had been silently failing to backup for a few weeks.
So far the Huawei hasn't missed a beat, save for me having dropped it and smashed the screen twice (It's still too big).
I'd jump at a P40 Lite if it were smaller but I already find the P10 Lite a bit too large to operate single-handed so bigger is not an option.
Nice to see that the 'Lite' models seem to be dropping back to a more sensible price point.
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2025
