Hands-on review: IFA 2016: Huawei Nova+

It's always weird when a brand brings out a 'plus' variant of a phone – it feels like a direct note that it likes what Apple did with the iPhone 6 Plus. But when it's filled with a decent tech upgrade for a lower price, it's somewhat forgivable.

The Huawei Nova+ is essentially the same phone as the Huawei Nova – if you're interested in the spec list or just the overall design quality, please pop along to our hands on: Huawei Nova review to get all the details laid out splendidly for you.

But while the Nova+ shares a LOT of the same traits as that phone, it's not totally similar – so let's take a look and see where the upgrades lie for the bigger handset.

Huawei Nova+ price and release date

Like the Nova, there's annoyingly no information on this larger handset's cost or release date as yet – but a little bit of analysis tells us that it'll likely come in at around £350 / $425 unlocked, and around £28 per month on contract in the UK.

The likely Nova+ release date is October, matching that of its smaller brethren, but there's a good chance it could be pushed back to November if Huawei wants to stagger things

Design and features

The main difference, design-wise, on the Nova+ over the normal Nova is the larger screen – sticking at Full HD, but pushing the size up to 5.5-inches, with the same curved glass exterior.

On the rear there's the same fingerprint scanner but it's a little harder to reach this if you've got small hands – which makes sense given this is a phablet rather than a more pocketable phone.

The camera is the other big change on offer, and that's where a lot more technology has been packed in. It's got a 16MP sensor with optical image stabilisation, so low light is going to be a lot cleaner and clearer thanks to the tiny motors on board keeping things level.

The battery has been extended too, to make use of the larger chassis size – this is boosted to 3340mAh, which means 2.2 days usage (according to Huawei, which called the performance 'leading' in this segment of the market).

Early verdict

Available in silver, grey or gold, the Huawei Nova+ is, like the Nova, a very competent device – and if the price isn't too extravagant could be a top budget choice.

However, there are some issues with the speed of the mid-range processor in our testing, which causes a slight flicker of worry… but then again, these aren't retail-ready models, so could very well be optimised by then.

This seems to be a capable phablet – the question just remains on how well it will perform in our full review.