Sony Xperia Z2 vs HTC One (M8): preliminary comparison

At this year's MWC in Barcelona, Sony introduced us to its greatest smartphone yet – the Xperia Z2. As strikingly similar to the Xperia Z1 as it may seem, the new model brings along a number of noteworthy (and welcome) improvements, including a better screen, an even faster processor, a higher RAM capacity, and a greater set of camera features. But the phone looks great not only on paper. We had the chance to take it for a spin at the show, and to tell you the truth, we were quite pleased. And with so much to offer, the Sony Xperia Z2 surely ranks among the most highly anticipated phones in existence.

A phone that fits into the very same category is the new HTC One (M8). Like the Sony Xperia Z2, it is sleek, powerful, and packed to the brim with goodies of all kinds. From the external design, through the goodies under the hood, to all the fancy software features, the HTC One (M8) seems like a phone that can easily give the Xperia Z2 a run for its money.

Design

Last year's Xperia Z1 was a gorgeous smartphone, and the same can be said about the upcoming Sony Xperia Z2. Just like its predecessor, the latest Sony flagship is built to impress with its solid feel and premium design. Flat glass plates grace the phone's front and back, while a smooth aluminum frame embraces its sides, with flaps protecting its ports. Plus, the Sony Xperia Z2 is waterproof, which is a trait that only a few high-end phones can brag with.

Visually, the new HTC One (M8) is expected to be very similar to its critically-acclaimed predecessor, adopting an enhanced version of its outstanding, all-metal construction. This is why we consider both HTC's and Sony's flagships to be in the same league when it comes to design. The new HTC One isn't water-resistant, but unlike the Z2, it features a built-in IR blaster for controlling TVs, stereos, and set-top boxes.

The Sony Xperia Z2 can't be regarded as a compact smartphone, as it is 5.78 inches (146.8 mm) tall and 2.89 inches (73.3 mm) wide. It is also far from the lightest among today's high-ends with a weight of 5.75 ounces (163 grams). Looking at the new HTC One, though, the situation seems pretty similar, as HTC's new offering has dimensions of 5.76 x 2.78 x 0.37 inches, and a weight of 5.64 oz (160 g). So, we can officially say that we're dealing with two 'grand' smartphones, in every sense of the word.

HTC outfitted the 2013 One with a pair of high-quality speakers in the front, which made the phone ideal for music listening and for watching movies. The good news is that these are still present on the new HTC One. Sony, however, has also added front-facing stereo speakers to its flagship. Which phone will produce better sound remains to be seen, or rather... heard.

Display

Sony's last few flagships had one flaw in common – their displays weren't quite as good as the ones used on the high-ends by Sony's competitors. The Xperia Z2, however, is different. In fact, according to its maker, the Z2 sports the best display that has ever graced the front of a Sony smartphone. Indeed, colors on the Xperia Z2's display are vibrant, viewing angles are excellent, and the X-Reality feature aims to improve representation of videos and photos. (More on Sony's display tech here.) As for its technical characteristics, the Sony Xperia Z2 has a 5.2-inch IPS LCD display with a resolution of 1080 by 1920 pixels for a pixel density of 424 ppi.

Even though the new HTC One will be about as large as the Xperia Z2, it will use a slightly smaller, 5-inch display. Sure, a size difference of 0.2 inches is not that big of a deal, but it still counts as an advantage for Sony's flagship. Size aside, last year's HTC One had a wonderful S-LCD 3 display with accurate color reproduction and great viewing angles, and the One (M8) is taking things even further. However, which screen will prove to be the better one remains to be seen.

Interface

Sony is launching the Xperia Z2 with Android 4.4 KitKat running on it. The OS, of course, has been treated to a fair dose of customization, although it doesn't deviate radically from the Android experience in its vanilla form. All menus and native apps have been tweaked to some extent, and the result is a very smooth, very consistent Android UI. In addition to the usual set of personalization features, you get themes that change the color accents throughout the interface. The phone's multitasking abilities have been augmented with a set of mini apps – a calculator, a voice recorder, a notepad, and so on – which are accessed from the multitasking menu and hover above other opened apps.

HTC's approach to UI design is slightly different. On the new HTC One, we're seeing the all new Sense 6.0 user interface running on top of Android 4.4 KitKat. BlinkFeed – the news and social network feed aggregator that debuted in Sense's previous major release – is going to be present as well. In fact, the feature is going to be upgraded and will allow for content to be sorted in groups. Standard Android home screens, with icons and widgets, will be available at a swipe's distance. Furthermore, a number of gestures will be augmented into the UI, including a double-tap-to-wake one. It is also worth noting that the new HTC One will feature on-screen navigation buttons, as opposed to last year's model, which had capacitive ones.

Processor and memory

Qualcomm is known for its top-notch mobile SoC solutions, and one of its finest specimens is powering the Sony Xperia Z2. The chip of choice is the Snapdragon 801, or the MSM8974-AB, to be more specific. In the Z2's case, the SoC has a quad-core Krait 400 CPU with a maximum clock speed of 2.3GHz and Adreno 330 graphics running at 550MHz. Unsurprisingly, the HTC One (M8) is also going to be powered by the very same Snapdragon 801 SoC, so, what can we say - we expect these babies to have almost identical, top-notch performance!

The Xperia Z2, however, might have just a slight edge, due to it sporting the whopping 3GB of DDR3 RAM, while the new HTC One features “only” 2GB of DDR2 RAM. Yet nevertheless, we're assuming that the real-world performance of both phones should be equally flawless, with the Z2's advantage of having extra RAM making a difference only in cases of very heavy multitasking.

16GB of storage is what you get with an Xperia Z2, along with the option to augment that by throwing in a microSD card. The new HTC One will be available in 16GB and 32GB flavors, and thankfully, it will also sport a slot for microSD cards.

Camera

The Sony Xperia Z2 uses a camera that is very similar to the one found on its predecessor, the Sony Xperia Z1. Not that we have anything against that – the snapper on the latter is well capable of taking good photos, as we know from our experience with it. Besides, leaked photo samples suggest that the Sony Xperia Z2 will perform well in the camera department. For those who are into technical details, the Z2's 20.7MP camera has a 1/2.3” CMOS sensor with 1.1-micron pixels and Sony G Lens optics. Feature-wise, you get a ton of bells and whistles, including 4K and 120fps slow-motion video recording, augmented reality effects, Background Defocus for still images, and much more.

As for the HTC One (M8), leaks have revealed that the phone will use a rather unusual Duo Camera setup, which will consist of two different cameras. An upgraded 4MP UltraPixel camera with a 1/3.0 sensor size, f/2.0 aperture, and pixel size of 2 micrometers will be paired with a secondary cam, which will serve to capture depth information, allowing you to apply some fancy image effects, like shallow depth of field. What this enables you is to alter the focus point of an image after it has been captured. Stay tuned for our camera comparison featuring the new HTC One (M8)!

A peculiar detail that we also have to mention is that the new HTC One sports a 5MP front-facing camera with a wide-angle lens and HDR capabilities. Imagine the selfies! Of course, the 2.2MP front-facing camera on the Sony Xperia Z2 is probably going to be almost as suitable for the purpose.

Expectations

Sony is definitely not fooling around. Its Xperia Z2 is shaping up as a serious contender for the top spot in the Android hierarchy, adopting all there was to like about its predecessor and improving in many key areas where room for improvement was present. As far as we can tell, HTC is taking a similar approach. The new HTC One (M8) is not radically different from the 2013 flagship Android model, but it will introduce a number of welcome upgrades over its predecessor, including the addition of a bigger screen, a much faster processor, and, hopefully, a more capable main camera.

Of course, at this point in time, it is not possible to say whether the Sony Xperia Z2 or the new HTC One is the ultimately better smartphone. After all, we're yet to hold both handsets side by side in the flesh. What we can say, on the other hand, based on all the info that has been announced, is that the HTC flagship might have a hard time outperforming Sony's finest. Sure, the HTC One is an awesome phone, but the Z2 might be able to give buyers slightly more bang for their buck, in case they dig its glass design.