Honor 7X goes official: $200 mid-ranger with all-screen design, dual camera, and decent specs

The Huawei Honor 7X just had its global premiere. If you've been following our news reports, you'll probably know quite a bit about Honor's latest mid-ranger since it was announced in China back in October. Still, several important details about the US and European variants of the device were revealed today, so let's give it a quick look.

As expected, the handset features the in vogue all-screen design. Its bezels aren't the slimmest we've seen on a smartphone, but Honor claims that the 82.9% screen-to-body ratio on the 7X is the highest in this price segment. On the front, there's a Full HD 5.93-inch display with an aspect ratio of 18:9 and a pixel density of 407ppi. That's a big difference compared to the standard 5.5-inch 16:9 panel on its predecessor, the Honor 6x. The aluminum back plate of the phone hosts the fingerprint scanner and dual main camera. They are quite far apart, meaning that there's little risk of smudging the camera lens with your finger.

In terms of performance, the 7X is powered by the mid-range Kirin 659. It's an octa-core SoC that features eight ARM Cortex-A53 cores. RAM and internal storage differ by region - a 3GB RAM/32GB ROM variant will be sold in the US, while European units will boast 4GB RAM and 64GB of internal storage. MicroSD support is present on all Honor 7X variants. A 3,340mAh battery is tasked with keeping the lights on. The Honor 6x featured a power cell with the same capacity and offered ample time between charges, so we're hoping to see the 7X boasting a similar battery life. 

The phone will come with Huawei's EMUI 5.1 (based on Android Nougat) skin out of the box. It still looks a lot like iOS, but it's quite feature-rich and customizable. We wouldn't be surprised to see an upgrade to the Oreo-based EMUI 8 soon after release.

The Honor 7X sports a rather interesting dual camera composition. A 16MP main sensor is responsible for taking all the photos, while an assistive 2MP sensor is employed for depth perception. This combination allows for shallow depth-of-field/bokeh effects. Honor states that the Improved Phase Detection Autofocus (PDAF) will increase shutter speeds by 40%. On the front, there's an 8MP camera for your selfies. Both shooters are capable of capturing video in 1080p.

Finally, let's talk about price and availability. Pre-orders for the Honor 7X begin today (December 5th) and end on December 14th. In the US, the device will be available in Aurora Blue and Midnight Black for the very unpretentious price of $199. In Europe, the handset will go for €299 due to the higher RAM and storage and will be available in one additional color option - Platinum Gold.