Kirin 990-powered Honor Play 4 Pro on the cards, but the original Honor Play remains without EMUI 10

Two years ago, Huawei debuted the Honor Play as a Kirin 970-powered alternative to the vaunted Poco F1. The Honor Play was considered a success by most, and Huawei is now set to release a spiritual successor to the phone—the Honor Play 4 Pro.

Reports from a few days claimed the Honor Play 4 Pro would be powered by a Kirin 820. New information, however, has surfaced touting the phone to be powered by the flagship Kirin 990 5G, similar to how the original Honor Play featured a Kirin 970 back then. While the Kirin 820 is an extremely capable chipset that trumps competitors like the Exynos 980 and Snapdragon 765G, it's still not as good as the Kirin 990. 

The Honor Play 4 Pro is expected to sport a pill-shaped hole punch, like the Honor V30 Pro. At the phone's rear will be a dual-camera setup, with the main camera being a 40 MP IMX600y. The phone will feature a side-mounted fingerprint reader, which probably means the display is an LCD. There's no mention of the battery capacity but the phone does offer 40 W SuperCharging. It's expected to go on sale towards the end of June, with a starting price tag in the region of CNY 3,000 (US$420).

Meanwhile, the Honor Play remains stuck on EMUI 9.1. The phone has received just one major OS update so far, going from Android Oreo to Android Pie. Huawei has no plans of providing the phone with an EMUI 10 update either, and that's a shame.