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Honor 6 Plus Smartphone Review

Are two better than one? The key feature of the Honor 6+ is the dual-camera of the smartphone. HTC tried this in the past as well and failed miserably, but the Chinese do a better job. The 6+ also convinces with a good set of features as well as great battery runtimes.

For the original German review, see here.

The Honor 6 Plus is a 5.5-inch smartphone for 400 Euros (~$437) that scares off the competition with its features, at least on paper. The technical equipment does not really leave anything to be desired, but you should not expect new records in terms of performance. As expected, the smartphone is equipped with a Kirin processor from the parent group Huawei. Still, the P8 already showed that the performance is completely sufficient and provides a smooth user experience. One key feature is the dual-camera of the Honor 6+, which is also supposed to take good pictures in difficult lighting situations.

In the same price range are rivals like the HTC Desire Eye and Samsung Galaxy A5, and also the Huawei P8 which is just slightly more expensive. The majority of high-end smartphones from 2014 is now in this price range as well.

Honor 6 Plus (6 Series)
Processor
HiSilicon Kirin 925 8 x 1.8 GHz, Cortex-A15 / Cortex-A7
Graphics adapter
Memory
3 GB 
Display
5.50 inch 16:9, 1920 x 1080 pixel, capacitive touchscreen, NEO-IPS, LTPS, glossy: yes
Storage
32 GB eMMC Flash, 32 GB 
, 25.5 GB free
Connections
1 USB 2.0, Audio Connections: combined headphones and microphone jack, Card Reader: MicroSD up to 128 GB (SD, SDHC, SDXC), Sensors: Position sensor, Accelerometer, Ambient light sensor, Proximity and G-sensor, Digital compass, GPS, Glonass, DLNA, Wifi Direct, MHL 2.0, OTG
Networking
802.11 b/g/n (b/g/n = Wi-Fi 4/), Bluetooth 4.0, GSM/GPRS/Edge (850, 900, 1800 and 1900 MHz), UMTS/HSPA+ (850, 900, 1900 and 2100 MHz), LTE Cat. 4 (FDD: 1800, 2100 and 2600 MHz; TDD: 1900, 2300, 2500 and 2600 MHz), Head-SAR: 0.284 W/kg, Body-SAR: 0.464 W/kg
Size
height x width x depth (in mm): 7.5 x 150.4 x 75.7 ( = 0.3 x 5.92 x 2.98 in)
Battery
Lithium-Ion, 3600 mAh, Talk time 2G (according to manufacturer): 30 h, Talk time 3G (according to manufacturer): 23 h, Standby 2G (according to manufacturer): 636 h, Standby 3G (according to manufacturer): 690 h
Operating System
Android 4.4 KitKat
Camera
Webcam: 8 MP, Main camera: 2x 8 MP Dual-camera
Additional features
Speakers: Mono speaker, Keyboard: virtual, modular power adaptor, USB cable, protective display cover, quick-start guide, SIM tool, EMUI 3.0, Kingsoft Office, Smartphone Manager, 24 Months Warranty, Dual-SIM
Weight
164 g ( = 5.78 oz / 0.36 pounds), Power Supply: 70 g ( = 2.47 oz / 0.15 pounds)
Price
400 Euro
Note: The manufacturer may use components from different suppliers including display panels, drives or memory sticks with similar specifications.

 

Case

The chassis of the Honor 6+ is made of durable fiber-glass. The alleged aluminum frame is made of plastic as well but looks quite appealing. This impression is also supported by the comparatively high weight of 164 grams. Honor specifies the height with 7.5 millimeters, but the smallest height we could measure was 7.65 millimeters, while the frame is almost 8 millimeters high.

The smartphone is very sturdy and there is just slight creaking when we try to twist it. Pressure is no problem for the Honor 6+, either, only heavy pressure directly on the display can create some ripples on the screen.

The battery of the smartphone is integrated. The two slots on the right side of the Honor 6+ are, unfortunately, not flush with the rest of the case but sit slightly deeper. The first slot can be equipped with a Micro-SIM card, the other one either with a Nano-SIM or a microSD card.

158.1 mm / 6.22 inch 77.8 mm / 3.06 inch 7.1 mm / 0.2795 inch 172 g0.3792 lbs152.9 mm / 6.02 inch 75.9 mm / 2.99 inch 8.9 mm / 0.3504 inch 164 g0.3616 lbs151.7 mm / 5.97 inch 73.8 mm / 2.91 inch 8.5 mm / 0.3346 inch 152 g0.3351 lbs148.9 mm / 5.86 inch 76.1 mm / 3 inch 9.8 mm / 0.3858 inch 155 g0.3417 lbs150.4 mm / 5.92 inch 75.7 mm / 2.98 inch 7.5 mm / 0.2953 inch 164 g0.3616 lbs139.8 mm / 5.5 inch 68.8 mm / 2.71 inch 7.5 mm / 0.2953 inch 130 g0.2866 lbs139.3 mm / 5.48 inch 69.7 mm / 2.74 inch 6.7 mm / 0.2638 inch 123 g0.2712 lbs148 mm / 5.83 inch 105 mm / 4.13 inch 1 mm / 0.03937 inch 1.5 g0.00331 lbs

Connectivity

The Micro-USB 2.0 port of the Honor 6+ can be used to charge the smartphone and transfer files to a PC. It also supports OTG, so it is possible to attach external drives or input devices. MHL 2.0 is available as well, so you can transfer the display content to a TV with an optional cable. DLNA and Wi-Fi Direct are also integrated.

The microSD slot supports memory cards with a capacity of up to 128 GB. It is no problem to transfer apps to the additional storage (App2SD), but it is, unfortunately, not possible to install them there directly.

Thanks to the infrared sensor and the app Smart Controller, you can control your own home cinema and the climate control.

Top: audio, infrared, microphone
Top: audio, infrared, microphone
No ports on the left side.
No ports on the left side.
Right: volume, power, hybrid slot, SIM
Right: volume, power, hybrid slot, SIM
Bottom: USB, microphone
Bottom: USB, microphone

Software

The Honor 6+ is shipped with Google Android 4.4.2 and Huawei’s user interface EMUI 3.0. Similar to the Honor 6 or the Huawei P8, you don’t get an app drawer. We already know the Smartphone Manager from other models and it can be used to optimize the smartphone. You also get some handy little tools like a magnifier, a radio and a flashlight. Besides the Google apps, there is only one preloaded third-party app, the Office Suite from Kingsoft.

An update to Google Android 5.0.1 Lollipop and EMUI 3.1 is currently in the works and is supposed to be released this year.

Communication & GPS 

The Honor 6+ was announced with dual-band Wi-Fi at the Mobile World Congress 2015 in Barcelona, but the actual production unit only supports the IEEE 802.11 standards b/g/n, which means you can only use 2.4 GHz networks. But the signal quality and the range are pretty good in return. The Honor 6+ can still recognize 5 GHz networks, but the signal quality is not very good in this case.

Mobile Internet connections can be established via HSPA+ (up to 42 Mbps) and LTE (up to 150 Mbps), but we miss the 800 MHz band for the latter. It should, however, work well in Asia thanks to the support of many TDD LTE frequencies. The signal quality was really good. It just seems that the Honor 6+ prefers the HSPA connection instead of the faster but also power-hungry LTE. While the Lumia 930 immediately connected to the LTE network of O2, the review unit only used HSPA+ but with a better signal quality.

Bluetooth is only available in version 4.0 but worked really well in our review.

GPS-Test: indoors
GPS-Test: indoors
GPS-Test: outdoors
GPS-Test: outdoors

The position of the smartphone can be located via GPS, Glonass and BeiDou. The satellite fix is also very fast and precise indoors. Outdoors, the accuracy is down to six meters, so we cannot criticize the performance.

We compared the accuracy of the Honor 6+ with the outdoor navigation device Garmin GPSMAP 64s. The smartphone does a pretty good job and the overall track length differs by around 500 meters from the professional device, which is slightly more than 2%. The reason is that the smartphone does not locate the position as often and therefore takes some shortcuts, which is easy to see in the bridge section.

Garmin GPSMAP 64s
Garmin GPSMAP 64s
Garmin GPSMAP 64s
Garmin GPSMAP 64s
Garmin GPSMAP 64s
Garmin GPSMAP 64s
Honor 6 Plus
Honor 6 Plus
Honor 6 Plus
Honor 6 Plus
Honor 6 Plus
Honor 6 Plus

Telephone & Voice Quality

The voice quality of the Honor 6+ is pretty decent and is sufficient for phone calls. Voices are slightly distorted on both sides, which does not create a natural sound, but it is otherwise free of distortions and allows convenient conversations. The speaker of the device leaves a good impression in quiet environments. It echoes just a bit, and it does not make an audible difference whether we hold the smartphone in our hand or if it is lying next to us on the table.

Cameras

Smartphones are continuing to get better cameras. The Honor 6+ has an 8 MP sensor at the front (3264x2448 pixels, 4:3, f/2.4), which is great news for selfie fans. You should only be careful with the automatic picture retouching because it uses a very strong soft focus, which can create a very artificial look at the highest setting. Both cameras offer many options and can also be triggered with a smile or via voice command, for example.

At the back is a dual-camera consisting of two 8 MP sensors that create one image with around 13 MP (4160x3120 pixels, 4:3, f/2.0). This is supposed to create good pictures, especially in difficult lighting conditions. HTC tried a similar thing with the One M8 and failed miserably, but Honor does a better job. The pictures are actually pretty sharp and the environment is bright when the lighting is bad, but you have to live with small fragments in return. Neither the Samsung Galaxy S6 nor the LG G4 have this problem, but the pictures are not quite as sharp. The edges of the Samsung device in particular appear a bit soft. The Lumia 930 is still undefeated in respect of the sharpness. The results of the LG G4 appear a bit more balanced, but the Honor 6+ still works very well.

The dual-camera also works well under daylight, but the pictures are not as sharp and detailed compared to the high-end competition. The peripheral areas in particular lack sharpness. We like the color reproduction, which leaves a comparatively natural impression. The dynamic range should be higher without HDR, which has to be activated manually. The short trigger time is great and reminds us of the Huawei P8, especially since the ultra-snapshot mode is also available and can be used to take a snapshot within one second with a double tap on the volume-down button.

The super-night mode implements a simplified long-term exposure, but it requires a solid underground or even better, a tripod. The function Wide Aperture simulates aperture ratios of f/0.95 up to f/16, but it does not improve the light sensitivity and just simulates an objective vignetting.

Videos on the Honor 6+ can be recorded in Full HD (1920x1080 pixels, 16:9, 30 fps). Sound is recorded in stereo and is a bit dull, but the picture quality is decent in return. There are also some features for videos like object tracking, but there is, unfortunately, no time-lapse or slow-motion feature.

All in all, Honor equips its flagship device with a good camera, but it cannot quite keep up with the high-end competition. It is well-suited for snapshots and medium-sized copies.

Image Comparison

Choose a scene and navigate within the first image. One click changes the position on touchscreens. One click on the zoomed-in image opens the original in a new window. The first image shows the scaled photograph of the test device.

Scene 1Scene 2Scene 3
click to load images

Accessories

The Honor 6+ is shipped with a modular power adaptor, a USB cable, a quick-start guide as well as a small SIM tool. Optional accessories are currently not available, but there are some in the pipeline.

Warranty

Honor grants a warranty of 24 months for its product.

Input Devices & Handling

The capacitive touchscreen of the Honor 6+ recognizes up to ten inputs simultaneously, and it has very good gliding capabilities. Even two fingers close to each other are recognized without problems, and there are no problems in the peripheral areas, either. Inputs are executed quickly and precisely. 

The Android buttons of the Honor 6+ are on-screen buttons. This does reduce the visible screen area in some situations, but the majority of apps can fade them out. It is also possible to adjust the navigation bar to your own preferences. You can, for example, add another input field that gives direct access to the notification center.

The keyboard layout is identical to the Huawei P8 and offers language-specific adjustments. The keyboard layout is simple and allows a smooth typing experience. Swype inputs are supported just like automatic word predictions above the keyboard. You only have to live without a one-hand mode.

Display

The display of the Honor 6+ can convince us for the most part.
The display of the Honor 6+ can convince us for the most part.

The Full HD display (1920x1080 pixels) of the Honor 6+ measures 5.5-inches. This corresponds with an aspect ratio of 16:9 and a pixel density of around 401 PPI, which means content is razor sharp. The subjective impression of the display is very good with rich colors and a very even brightness distribution.

The luminance of the review unit is convincing as well at up to 488 cd/m², even though it is still clearly beaten by the HTC Desire Eye, which manages an impressive value of 635 cd/m².

484
cd/m²
479
cd/m²
454
cd/m²
488
cd/m²
472
cd/m²
454
cd/m²
477
cd/m²
477
cd/m²
454
cd/m²
Distribution of brightness
tested with X-Rite i1Pro 2
Maximum: 488 cd/m² (Nits) Average: 471 cd/m²
Brightness Distribution: 93 %
Center on Battery: 472 cd/m²
Contrast: 1686:1 (Black: 0.28 cd/m²)
ΔE Color 6.33 | 0.5-29.43 Ø5
ΔE Greyscale 7.39 | 0.57-98 Ø5.3
Gamma: 2.34
Honor 6 Plus
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 925, 32 GB eMMC Flash
Honor 6
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 920, 16 GB eMMC Flash
Huawei P8
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 930, 16 GB eMMC Flash
HTC Desire EYE
Adreno 330, 801 MSM8974AB, 16 GB eMMC Flash
Samsung Galaxy A5
Adreno 306, 410 MSM8916, 16 GB eMMC Flash
Sony Xperia Z3 Compact
Adreno 330, 801 MSM8974AC, 16 GB eMMC Flash
LG G4
Adreno 418, 808 MSM8992, 32 GB eMMC Flash
Apple iPhone 6 Plus
PowerVR GX6450, A8, 64 GB eMMC Flash
Screen
-41%
6%
3%
25%
-18%
-7%
-10%
Brightness middle
472
439
-7%
453
-4%
635
35%
482
2%
513
9%
566
20%
519
10%
Brightness
471
439
-7%
439
-7%
631
34%
432
-8%
500
6%
536
14%
496
5%
Brightness Distribution
93
93
0%
91
-2%
92
-1%
85
-9%
94
1%
90
-3%
90
-3%
Black Level *
0.28
0.8
-186%
0.28
-0%
0.54
-93%
0.41
-46%
0.47
-68%
0.62
-121%
Contrast
1686
549
-67%
1618
-4%
1176
-30%
1251
-26%
1204
-29%
837
-50%
Colorchecker dE 2000 *
6.33
7.06
-12%
4.7
26%
4.11
35%
2.15
66%
8.54
-35%
6.17
3%
3.67
42%
Greyscale dE 2000 *
7.39
8.08
-9%
5.03
32%
4.29
42%
1.81
76%
9.88
-34%
6.26
15%
3.78
49%
Gamma
2.34 94%
2.16 102%
2.27 97%
2.59 85%
2.42 91%
3.03 73%
2.48 89%
2.42 91%
CCT
8227 79%
8134 80%
7439 87%
6956 93%
6626 98%
8659 75%
8171 80%
7327 89%
Color Space (Percent of AdobeRGB 1998)
72.04
65.48
Color Space (Percent of sRGB)
98.63

* ... smaller is better

The black value of the Honor 6 Plus is identical to the Huawei P8 (0.28 cd/m², 1,618:1) and is really good. Thanks to the slightly higher brightness, you even get a better contrast ratio. The smartphone manages the highest value in our comparison group and can only be beaten by a rival with an OLED display.

We checked the color accuracy with a photo spectrometer and the software CalMAN. The grayscale quickly shows a slight blue cast, and the deviations from the ideal value are pretty high with a DeltaE over 7. It is basically the same situation for the ColorChecker, where the average deviation of the Honor 6+ is a bit better, but there are pretty big outliers in the blue spectrum. This was, however, no problem in practice. It is even possible to adjust the panel according to your own preferences thanks to a manual white balance.

Grayscale (target color space sRGB)
Grayscale (target color space sRGB)
ColorChecker (target color space sRGB)
ColorChecker (target color space sRGB)
Colorspace (target color space AdobeRGB)
Colorspace (target color space AdobeRGB)
Saturation Sweeps (target color space sRGB)
Saturation Sweeps (target color space sRGB)

The outdoor capabilities of the Honor 6+ are decent. Reflections are reduced by the LTPS technology, and the high contrast ensures a good visibility of the screen even in bright environments. It is still not possible to watch a movie under direct sunlight, but this is a problem for pretty much every mobile device.

Good visibility in the shade.
Good visibility in the shade.
It is trickier under the sun, but the 6+ does a good job.
It is trickier under the sun, but the 6+ does a good job.

The viewing-angle stability of the LTPS panel inside the Honor 6+ is excellent. The colors are stable from every position and there are no ghost effects. You can only see a slight glow effect when you look at the display from extreme positions from an angle above or below.

Viewing angles Honor 6 Plus
Viewing angles Honor 6 Plus

Performance

The Honor 6 Plus uses the 32-bit SoC HiSilicon Kirin 925 with eight cores. It still consists of an older big.LITTLE configuration with four Cortex A7 and Cortex A15 cores each, which are clocked at 1.3 and 1.8 GHz, respectively. You also get 3 GB RAM and the integrated graphics card ARM Mali-T628 MP4, a powerful chip that we already know from the older Huawei Ascend Mate 7.

Our benchmarks show that the review unit is even a bit faster than the older sibling and is only beaten by the HTC Desire Eye (Snapdragon 801) and sometimes by the Huawei P8 (Kirin 930). The system performance is also very good. Micro stutters are hardly perceptible at all. It is, however, unfortunate that Honor did not use a 64-bit SoC, which would have resulted in a small performance gain with the upcoming update to Lollipop 5.1.

Smartbench 2012
Productivity Index (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
6469 points
Honor 6
7002 points +8%
Huawei P8
5433 points -16%
HTC Desire EYE
9650 points +49%
Samsung Galaxy A5
5826 points -10%
Gaming Index (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
4363 points
Honor 6
4327 points -1%
Huawei P8
4340 points -1%
HTC Desire EYE
4515 points +3%
Samsung Galaxy A5
3262 points -25%
Linpack Android / IOS
Single Thread (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
191.4 MFLOPS
Honor 6
174 MFLOPS -9%
Huawei P8
122 MFLOPS -36%
HTC Desire EYE
389.9 MFLOPS +104%
Samsung Galaxy A5
0 MFLOPS -100%
Multi Thread (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
420.6 MFLOPS
Honor 6
231 MFLOPS -45%
Huawei P8
272.5 MFLOPS -35%
HTC Desire EYE
839 MFLOPS +99%
Samsung Galaxy A5
0 MFLOPS -100%
AnTuTu v5 - Total Score (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
44523 Points
Honor 6
41860 Points -6%
Huawei P8
45927 Points +3%
HTC Desire EYE
38920 Points -13%
Samsung Galaxy A5
21589 Points -52%
Huawei Ascend Mate 7
42181 Points -5%
3DMark
1280x720 offscreen Ice Storm Unlimited Score (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
14201 Points
Honor 6
14104 Points -1%
Huawei P8
9080 Points -36%
HTC Desire EYE
16238 Points +14%
Samsung Galaxy A5
2627 Points -82%
Huawei Ascend Mate 7
13766 Points -3%
1280x720 offscreen Ice Storm Unlimited Graphics Score (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
14441 Points
Honor 6
14522 Points +1%
Huawei P8
8743 Points -39%
HTC Desire EYE
16346 Points +13%
Samsung Galaxy A5
2190 Points -85%
Huawei Ascend Mate 7
14432 Points 0%
1280x720 offscreen Ice Storm Unlimited Physics (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
13420 Points
Honor 6
12813 Points -5%
Huawei P8
10494 Points -22%
HTC Desire EYE
15872 Points +18%
Samsung Galaxy A5
8690 Points -35%
Huawei Ascend Mate 7
11851 Points -12%
GFXBench (DX / GLBenchmark) 2.7
T-Rex Onscreen (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
13 fps
Honor 6
17 fps +31%
Huawei P8
11 fps -15%
HTC Desire EYE
22.9 fps +76%
Samsung Galaxy A5
9.5 fps -27%
1920x1080 T-Rex Offscreen (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
12 fps
Honor 6
17 fps +42%
Huawei P8
10 fps -17%
HTC Desire EYE
21.9 fps +83%
Samsung Galaxy A5
5.3 fps -56%
GFXBench 3.0
on screen Manhattan Onscreen OGL (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
7.5 fps
Honor 6
8.7 fps +16%
Huawei P8
5.8 fps -23%
HTC Desire EYE
10 fps +33%
Samsung Galaxy A5
3.9 fps -48%
Huawei Ascend Mate 7
8.5 fps +13%
1920x1080 1080p Manhattan Offscreen (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
6.6 fps
Honor 6
8.1 fps +23%
Huawei P8
5.5 fps -17%
HTC Desire EYE
9.3 fps +41%
Samsung Galaxy A5
1.8 fps -73%
Huawei Ascend Mate 7
8 fps +21%
Geekbench 3
32 Bit Single-Core Score (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
900 Points
Honor 6
858 Points -5%
Huawei P8
698 Points -22%
HTC Desire EYE
952 Points +6%
Samsung Galaxy A5
479 Points -47%
Huawei Ascend Mate 7
893 Points -1%
32 Bit Multi-Core Score (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
3250 Points
Honor 6
3102 Points -5%
Huawei P8
2955 Points -9%
HTC Desire EYE
2785 Points -14%
Samsung Galaxy A5
1437 Points -56%
Huawei Ascend Mate 7
3178 Points -2%

Legend

 
Honor 6 Plus HiSilicon Kirin 925, ARM Mali-T628 MP4, 32 GB eMMC Flash
 
Honor 6 HiSilicon Kirin 920, ARM Mali-T628 MP4, 16 GB eMMC Flash
 
Huawei P8 HiSilicon Kirin 930, ARM Mali-T628 MP4, 16 GB eMMC Flash
 
HTC Desire EYE Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 MSM8974AB, Qualcomm Adreno 330, 16 GB eMMC Flash
 
Samsung Galaxy A5 Qualcomm Snapdragon 410 MSM8916, Qualcomm Adreno 306, 16 GB eMMC Flash
 
Huawei Ascend Mate 7 HiSilicon Kirin 925, ARM Mali-T628 MP6, 16 GB eMMC Flash

We checked the browser performance with the preloaded Google Chrome 43. Subjectively, websites opened quickly and the benchmarks confirm this impression as well.

Octane V2 - Total Score (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 925, 32 GB eMMC Flash
6370 Points
Honor 6
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 920, 16 GB eMMC Flash
6363 Points 0%
Huawei P8
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 930, 16 GB eMMC Flash
4084 Points -36%
HTC Desire EYE
Adreno 330, 801 MSM8974AB, 16 GB eMMC Flash
3028 Points -52%
Samsung Galaxy A5
Adreno 306, 410 MSM8916, 16 GB eMMC Flash
2796 Points -56%
Huawei Ascend Mate 7
Mali-T628 MP6, Kirin 925, 16 GB eMMC Flash
6552 Points +3%
Sunspider - 1.0 Total Score (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 925, 32 GB eMMC Flash
743 ms *
Honor 6
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 920, 16 GB eMMC Flash
725 ms * +2%
Huawei P8
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 930, 16 GB eMMC Flash
1164 ms * -57%
HTC Desire EYE
Adreno 330, 801 MSM8974AB, 16 GB eMMC Flash
594 ms * +20%
Samsung Galaxy A5
Adreno 306, 410 MSM8916, 16 GB eMMC Flash
1360 ms * -83%
Huawei Ascend Mate 7
Mali-T628 MP6, Kirin 925, 16 GB eMMC Flash
666 ms * +10%
BaseMark OS II - Web (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 925, 32 GB eMMC Flash
797 Points
Honor 6
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 920, 16 GB eMMC Flash
790 Points -1%
Huawei P8
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 930, 16 GB eMMC Flash
694 Points -13%
HTC Desire EYE
Adreno 330, 801 MSM8974AB, 16 GB eMMC Flash
1062 Points +33%
Mozilla Kraken 1.1 - Total (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 925, 32 GB eMMC Flash
5501 ms *
Honor 6
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 920, 16 GB eMMC Flash
5450 ms * +1%
Huawei P8
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 930, 16 GB eMMC Flash
11808 ms * -115%
HTC Desire EYE
Adreno 330, 801 MSM8974AB, 16 GB eMMC Flash
10424 ms * -89%
Samsung Galaxy A5
Adreno 306, 410 MSM8916, 16 GB eMMC Flash
13938 ms * -153%
Huawei Ascend Mate 7
Mali-T628 MP6, Kirin 925, 16 GB eMMC Flash
5414 ms * +2%
WebXPRT 2015 - Overall (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 925, 32 GB eMMC Flash
94 Points
Huawei P8
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 930, 16 GB eMMC Flash
70 Points -26%

* ... smaller is better

The Honor 6+ is equipped with 32 GB eMMC storage, and almost 26 GB can be used for your own files. The is quite a lot in this price range, but the storage is not very fast in return, even though the competition is not that fast in general. The performance is at least much better compared to the Honor 6.

The storage can be expanded by up to 128 GB via microSD card. We checked the performance with the fast memory card Toshiba Exceria (CX32UHS1, UHS-I Class 3, read: 85 MB/s, write: 55 MB/s). The result was sobering. We only measured 10.32 MB/s during writing, but it was at least twice as fast during reading. The performance is still sufficient to store videos directly onto the memory card. You only have to expect longer waiting times when you copy large files.

AndroBench 3-5
Sequential Read 256KB (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 925, 32 GB eMMC Flash
109.8 MB/s
Honor 6
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 920, 16 GB eMMC Flash
80 MB/s -27%
Huawei P8
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 930, 16 GB eMMC Flash
139.9 MB/s +27%
HTC Desire EYE
Adreno 330, 801 MSM8974AB, 16 GB eMMC Flash
116.1 MB/s +6%
Samsung Galaxy A5
Adreno 306, 410 MSM8916, 16 GB eMMC Flash
130 MB/s +18%
Huawei Ascend Mate 7
Mali-T628 MP6, Kirin 925, 16 GB eMMC Flash
51.2 MB/s -53%
Sequential Write 256KB (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 925, 32 GB eMMC Flash
54.3 MB/s
Honor 6
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 920, 16 GB eMMC Flash
29.6 MB/s -45%
Huawei P8
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 930, 16 GB eMMC Flash
39.58 MB/s -27%
HTC Desire EYE
Adreno 330, 801 MSM8974AB, 16 GB eMMC Flash
22.67 MB/s -58%
Samsung Galaxy A5
Adreno 306, 410 MSM8916, 16 GB eMMC Flash
71 MB/s +31%
Huawei Ascend Mate 7
Mali-T628 MP6, Kirin 925, 16 GB eMMC Flash
10.43 MB/s -81%
Random Read 4KB (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 925, 32 GB eMMC Flash
20.8 MB/s
Honor 6
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 920, 16 GB eMMC Flash
17 MB/s -18%
Huawei P8
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 930, 16 GB eMMC Flash
22.46 MB/s +8%
HTC Desire EYE
Adreno 330, 801 MSM8974AB, 16 GB eMMC Flash
15.75 MB/s -24%
Samsung Galaxy A5
Adreno 306, 410 MSM8916, 16 GB eMMC Flash
12 MB/s -42%
Huawei Ascend Mate 7
Mali-T628 MP6, Kirin 925, 16 GB eMMC Flash
7.32 MB/s -65%
Random Write 4KB (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 925, 32 GB eMMC Flash
6.12 MB/s
Honor 6
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 920, 16 GB eMMC Flash
5.3 MB/s -13%
Huawei P8
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 930, 16 GB eMMC Flash
10.04 MB/s +64%
HTC Desire EYE
Adreno 330, 801 MSM8974AB, 16 GB eMMC Flash
1.77 MB/s -71%
Samsung Galaxy A5
Adreno 306, 410 MSM8916, 16 GB eMMC Flash
6 MB/s -2%
Huawei Ascend Mate 7
Mali-T628 MP6, Kirin 925, 16 GB eMMC Flash
1.05 MB/s -83%
BaseMark OS II - Memory (sort by value)
Honor 6 Plus
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 925, 32 GB eMMC Flash
532 Points
Honor 6
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 920, 16 GB eMMC Flash
508 Points -5%
Huawei P8
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 930, 16 GB eMMC Flash
1216 Points +129%
HTC Desire EYE
Adreno 330, 801 MSM8974AB, 16 GB eMMC Flash
422 Points -21%

Games

Games are no problem for the Honor 6+. The ARM Mali-T628 MP4 is powerful enough and supports modern graphics interfaces like OpenGL ES 3.0. More demanding titles like Asphalt 8 run just as smoothly as Angry Birds Transformers (see video).

The well working sensors, the good touchscreen and the great display complete the good gaming experience, only the speaker can be quickly covered by the finger when you hold the smartphone in landscape mode.

Angry Birds Transformers
Angry Birds Transformers
Asphalt 8
Asphalt 8

Emissions

Temperature

The Honor 6+ already gets lukewarm while idling and the surface temperatures can reach up to 44.4 °C under load. The two competitors stay much cooler and the Desire Eye stays below 36 °C despite the faster SoC. Still, the results are not critical by any means.

We performed a stress test with the GFXBench 3.1 Battery test. It runs the OpenGL ES 2.0 test T-Rex thirty times in a row while the battery capacity, the frame rate as well as the temperature of the SoC are logged. The performance of the Honor 6+ actually dropped to two-thirds of the original performance over the course of the test.

Max. Load
 41.3 °C
106 F
41.4 °C
107 F
44.4 °C
112 F
 
 40.2 °C
104 F
39.5 °C
103 F
41.5 °C
107 F
 
 39 °C
102 F
39 °C
102 F
40.2 °C
104 F
 
Maximum: 44.4 °C = 112 F
Average: 40.7 °C = 105 F
39.4 °C
103 F
40.7 °C
105 F
40.5 °C
105 F
38.2 °C
101 F
38.9 °C
102 F
38.9 °C
102 F
37.5 °C
100 F
38.7 °C
102 F
38.7 °C
102 F
Maximum: 40.7 °C = 105 F
Average: 39.1 °C = 102 F
Power Supply (max.)  36.4 °C = 98 F | Room Temperature 24.3 °C = 76 F | Voltcraft IR-260
(-) The average temperature for the upper side under maximal load is 40.7 °C / 105 F, compared to the average of 32.7 °C / 91 F for the devices in the class Smartphone.
(±) The maximum temperature on the upper side is 44.4 °C / 112 F, compared to the average of 35 °C / 95 F, ranging from 21.9 to 56 °C for the class Smartphone.
(±) The bottom heats up to a maximum of 40.7 °C / 105 F, compared to the average of 33.8 °C / 93 F
(±) In idle usage, the average temperature for the upper side is 33.1 °C / 92 F, compared to the device average of 32.7 °C / 91 F.

Speakers

The speaker of the Honor 6+ is located at the back. The position is not perfect, because you can easily cover it with a finger when you use the smartphone in landscape mode. The sound is also muffled on flat surface like a table due to the flat rear.

The sound itself is pretty balanced and clean up to a maximum volume of 50%, but there will be distortions after that. This is particularly noticeable when you listen to music. Rock music sometimes becomes a distorted screaming at the maximum setting. We therefore recommend headphones or external speakers, but the quality will be sufficient for occasional playback in quiet environments.

The stereo jack subjectively works without problems and there was hardly any signal noise.

Energy Management

Power Consumption

The Honor 6+ is not a particularly frugal device and consumes quite a lot power. Only the smaller sibling Honor 6 has similar power consumption but benefits from the smaller display. LG's G4 consumes more power under load.

The battery capacity is quite generous in return with 3,600 mAh and should be able to compensate for the higher consumption. The power adaptor has a nominal output of 10 Watts (2 Amps, 5 Volts) and is therefore powerful enough.

Power Consumption
Off / Standbydarklight 0 / 0.4 Watt
Idledarkmidlight 1.6 / 3 / 3.2 Watt
Load midlight 5.6 / 7.6 Watt
 color bar
Key: min: dark, med: mid, max: light        Voltcraft VC 870
Currently we use the Metrahit Energy, a professional single phase power quality and energy measurement digital multimeter, for our measurements. Find out more about it here. All of our test methods can be found here.
Honor 6 Plus
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 925, 32 GB eMMC Flash
Honor 6
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 920, 16 GB eMMC Flash
Huawei P8
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 930, 16 GB eMMC Flash
Samsung Galaxy A5
Adreno 306, 410 MSM8916, 16 GB eMMC Flash
HTC Desire EYE
Adreno 330, 801 MSM8974AB, 16 GB eMMC Flash
LG G4
Adreno 418, 808 MSM8992, 32 GB eMMC Flash
Apple iPhone 6 Plus
PowerVR GX6450, A8, 64 GB eMMC Flash
Power Consumption
8%
28%
56%
49%
18%
36%
Idle Minimum *
1.6
1.7
-6%
0.7
56%
0.8
50%
0.3
81%
1.1
31%
0.5
69%
Idle Average *
3
2.4
20%
2
33%
1.2
60%
1.2
60%
1.5
50%
2.1
30%
Idle Maximum *
3.2
2.8
12%
2.1
34%
1.4
56%
1.5
53%
1.9
41%
2.5
22%
Load Average *
5.6
5.3
5%
4.9
12%
1.9
66%
3.8
32%
6.6
-18%
3.5
37%
Load Maximum *
7.6
6.8
11%
7.4
3%
4
47%
6.2
18%
8.8
-16%
5.8
24%

* ... smaller is better

Battery Runtime

The Honor 6+ can benefit from its powerful 3,600 mAh battery in the runtime tests and dominates the comparison group with good results in all scenarios. Our review unit lasts more than a day in the Reader’s Test and almost four hours under sustained maximum load.

Our tests with an adjusted display brightness (150 cd/m²) offer the best comparability. Both the video runtime test as well as the Wi-Fi test determine great results for the Honor 6+. Our new Wi-Fi test is more demanding, so the results cannot be directly compared to the old test. Those results are usually higher, but the Desire Eye could be one candidate that could have managed an even better result.

If you want to increase the runtimes even further, you can also find an ultra-energy-saving mode in the settings, but it does limit the functionality of the smartphone noticeably.

Battery Runtime
Idle (without WLAN, min brightness)
27h 25min
WiFi Websurfing
8h 55min
Big Buck Bunny H.264 1080p
11h 50min
Load (maximum brightness)
3h 58min
Honor 6 Plus
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 925, 32 GB eMMC Flash
Honor 6
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 920, 16 GB eMMC Flash
HTC Desire EYE
Adreno 330, 801 MSM8974AB, 16 GB eMMC Flash
Samsung Galaxy A5
Adreno 306, 410 MSM8916, 16 GB eMMC Flash
Huawei P8
Mali-T628 MP4, Kirin 930, 16 GB eMMC Flash
LG G4
Adreno 418, 808 MSM8992, 32 GB eMMC Flash
Apple iPhone 6 Plus
PowerVR GX6450, A8, 64 GB eMMC Flash
Battery Runtime
-44%
-19%
-15%
-24%
-30%
-11%
Reader / Idle
1645
1433
-13%
1152
-30%
826
-50%
1654
1%
1436
-13%
H.264
710
503
-29%
597
-16%
581
-18%
501
-29%
675
-5%
WiFi v1.3
535
434
-19%
326
-39%
Load
238
134
-44%
200
-16%
242
2%
215
-10%
114
-52%
199
-16%
WiFi
454
914
533
777

Pros

+ Good list of features
+ Good display
+ Expandable storage
+ Radiation levels
+ Fast system performance
+ Good cameras
+ Great runtimes

Cons

- Limited WiFi range
- No 800 MHz LTE
- Slow microSD slot
- Weak speaker
- SoC throttling under load

Verdict

In review: Honor 6 Plus. Test model courtesy of Honor Germany.
In review: Honor 6 Plus. Test model courtesy of Honor Germany.

The Honor 6+ from Huawei’s subsidiary is a successful smartphone, which does have a good camera, but the high-contrast display and the great battery runtimes are even more convincing. The list of features is pretty comprehensive and lacks just a few options. The hybrid slot means users have the choice between a storage expansion via microSD card or dual-SIM LTE.

The Honor 6+ can compensate for its small flaws with great battery runtimes, good cameras as well as good features and offers everything you expect from a good smartphone. 

The small issues primarily concern details. The colors of the panel are not very accurate, LTE lacks the 800 MHz band, the microSD slot is very slow, and the speaker could be better as well. However, all these small issues will hardly be noticeable in practice, which is why the Honor 6 Plus is still a really good smartphone.

Honor 6 Plus - 07/29/2015 v4(old)
Daniel Schmidt

Chassis
80%
Keyboard
69 / 75 → 92%
Pointing Device
93%
Connectivity
48 / 60 → 80%
Weight
91%
Battery
94%
Display
85%
Games Performance
60 / 63 → 95%
Application Performance
49 / 70 → 70%
Temperature
80%
Noise
100%
Audio
53 / 91 → 58%
Camera
85%
Average
76%
86%
Smartphone - Weighted Average

Pricecompare

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Daniel Schmidt, 2015-08- 5 (Update: 2018-05-15)