HTC U Play vs Honor 8 vs Samsung Galaxy A5: specs comparison

by Preslav Kateliev

Jan 12, 2017, 8:27 AM

HTC U Play vs Honor 8 vs Samsung Galaxy A5: specs comparison

So, the U for U teaser was all about two new smartphones by HTC — the flagship-grade U Ultra and the midrange U Play. Now, while the “big brother” here looks awesome and has a high-powered hardware to keep it competitive among other top-shelf devices, we're a bit curious if the U Play will have enough going for it to make an impact.

See the U Play is powered by a Mediatek Helio P10 SoC — the lowest of the Helio series — and its 2,500 mAh battery doesn't inspire confidence either. Still, it's expected to cost around $400 at launch, probably because that shiny liquid-like finish makes it look like the price is justified.

So, let's compare internals — let's pit the HTC U Play against similar midrangers like the Samsung Galaxy A5 (2016) and Honor 8. Both of these cost around the $400 mark and have metal-and-glass builds. The Honor 8 even has that fancy dual camera!

HTC U Play vs Samsung Galaxy A5 (2016) vs Honor 8

Display

Size

5.2 inches

Technology

S-LCD

Super AMOLED

IPS LCD

Screen-to-body

70.01 %

72.39 %

72.02 %

Features

Scratch-resistant glass, Ambient light sensor, Proximity sensor

Hardware & Performance

System chip

MediaTek Helio P10 MT6755

Qualcomm Snapdragon 615 8939

HiSilicon Kirin 950

Processor

Octa-core, 2000 MHz, ARM Cortex-A53, 64-bit

Octa-core, 1600 MHz, ARM Cortex-A53, 64-bit, 28 nm

Octa-core, 2300 MHz, ARM Cortex-A72 and ARM Cortex-A53, 64-bit, 16 nm

GPU

Mali-T860 MP2

Adreno 405

Mali-T880 MP4

RAM

3GB LPDDR3

2GB

4GB LPDDR4

Internal storage

32GB

16GB

64GB

OS

Android (7.0 Nougat), HTC Sense UI

Android (5.1 Lollipop)

Android (8.0 Oreo, 7.0 Nougat, 6.0 Marshmallow), Huawei Emotion UI

Battery

Capacity

2500 mAh

2900 mAh

3000 mAh

Charging

Fast charging

Talk time

28.00 hours

Stand-by time

15.0 days (360 hours)

Talk time (3G)

15.21 hours

16.00 hours

15.00 hours

Stand-by time (3G)

17.8 days (428 hours)

Talk time (4G)

15 hours

11 hours

Stand-by time (4G)

17.8 days (428 hours)

Music playback

75.00 hours

24.00 hours

Video playback

14.00 hours

10.00 hours

Camera

Rear

Single camera

Dual camera

Main camera

16 MP

13 MP

12 MP

Features

OIS, PDAF, BSI sensor

OIS, Autofocus, CMOS image sensor

Laser and PDAF, CMOS image sensor, BSI sensor

Specifications

Aperture size: F2.0; Focal length: 28 mm; Pixel size: 1 μm

Aperture size: F1.9; Focal length: 28 mm

Aperture size: F2.2; Focal length: 35 mm; Sensor size: 1/2.9"; Pixel size: 1.25 μm

Second camera

12 MP

Features

Black and White, Laser and PDAF

Specifications

Aperture size: F2.2; Focal Length: 35 mm; Sensor size: 1/2.9"; Pixel size: 1.25 μm

Video recording

1920x1080 (Full HD) (30 fps)

1920x1080 (Full HD) (60 fps), 1280x720 (HD) (120 fps)

Features

Hyperlapse, Picture-taking during video recording, Video calling, Video sharing

Video calling

Time-lapse video, Video calling, Video sharing

Front

16 MP

5 MP

8 MP

Video capture

1920x1080 (Full HD) (30 fps)

Design

Dimensions

5.75 x 2.87 x 0.31 inches (145.99 x 72.9 x 7.99 mm)

5.70 x 2.80 x 0.29 inches (144.8 x 71 x 7.3 mm)

5.73 x 2.80 x 0.29 inches (145.5 x 71 x 7.45 mm)

Weight

5.11 oz (145 g)

5.47 oz (155 g)

5.40 oz (153 g)

Materials

Back: Glass; Frame: Aluminum

Back: Glass; Frame: Metal

Biometrics

Fingerprint (touch)

Features

Touch sensitive control keys

Shopping information

MSRP

$ 440

$ 499

Options

7 Comments

5. raky_b

Posts: 467; Member since: Jul 02, 2014

better than Samsung, but still far from a good offer

posted on Jan 12, 2017, 5:16 PM 0

6. yalokiy

Posts: 1156; Member since: Aug 01, 2016

It's better than Samsung Galaxy A5 (2016), but not (2017) which is going on sale now. They did a wrong comparison here above with outdated model.

posted on Jan 13, 2017, 2:00 AM 0

2. yalokiy

Who would buy HTC U Play for $440, when you can get for the same price or even much cheaper (depends from country) a honor 8 or samsung galaxy A5 (2017) ?