The HTC One impressed us with its elegant aluminum design and amazing stereo speakers when it launched nearly half a year ago, but a lot of time has passed since then and it's starting to show its age. The Nexus 5 on the other hand has just arrived fresh with the latest Android 4.4 KitKat treat and the ambition to finally bring a good camera to the Nexus series. Moreover, all of that in an irresistible price much lower than that of the HTC One.
Putting the HTC One against the Nexus 5 is a battle of old versus new, and in technology even a relatively small time frame like just half a year can make a huge difference. Is this the case this time as well and does the Nexus 5 live up to all the hype, or has its lower price taken its toll?
We will be comparing HTC's UltraPixel camera against the new optical image stabilized shooter on the Nexus 5, the brilliant 4.7” display on the One against the 5 incher on the Nexus 5, the aluminum unibody frame against the soft touch plastic of the Nexus 5, Android with HTC Sense versus pure KitKat, and of course look under the hood to find which one is more powerful.
After all of this, we should finally be able to tell which one is the device to get right now. Let's start right away.
Design
The Nexus 5 has a modest, understated design. An edgy rectangular block with soft touch plastic on the back and a giant Nexus sign on its back, it feels utilitarian rather than inspiring. The HTC One is nearly identical in size, but a complete opposite in design. A unibody aluminum frame with a curved back makes it better fit in your hand despite it being a bit thicker. The One also does not pick up fingerprints, while just after a short while with the Nexus 5 its back was a complete smudgy mess. Both devices are not excruciatingly large, but using them single-handedly is quite a stretch.
The two feature large and clicky physical buttons, but while the Nexus 5 places them in easy to reach places (volume rocker on the right and lock key on the left), on the HTC One the lock key is way out of reach at the top. That same lock key however doubles in function on the One with an infrared blaster built-in. This allows you to use your phone as a TV remote, a function the Nexus 5 does not have.
The Nexus 5 and the HTC One feature two of the best displays on the market, but we like the screen on the HTC One a bit better. The Nexus 5 has a slightly larger, 4.95-inch display, while the One features a 4.7” screen.
However, the on-screen controls of the Nexus 5 take up some of the space, while HTC uses capacitive control buttons below the screen, so in terms of actual usable screen space, we’d say the two are nearly the same.
Both are extremely sharp with resolutions of 1080 x 1920 pixels, but the One features more natural, vivid colors. We'd say the Nexus 5 has a slight yellowish tint and looks very slightly washed out.
The technology on both is LCD - the Nexus 5 uses an in-cell touch LCD display and the One boasts a Super LCD3. Viewing angles are great on both devices as colors don’t wash out even when you view them at an angle.
The numbers below represent the amount of deviation in the respective property,observed when a display is viewed from a 45-degree angle as opposed to direct viewing.
The CIE 1931 xy color gamut chart represents the set(area)of colors that a display can reproduce,with the sRGB colorspace(the highlighted triangle)serving as reference.The chart also provides a visual representation of a display's color accuracy. The small squares across the boundaries of the triangle are the reference points for the various colors, while the small dots are the actual measurements. Ideally, each dot should be positioned on top of its respective square. The 'x:CIE31' and 'y:CIE31' values in the table below the chart indicate the position of each measurement on the chart. 'Y' shows the luminance (in nits) of each measured color, while 'Target Y' is the desired luminance level for that color. Finally, 'ΔE 2000' is the Delta E value of the measured color. Delta E values of below 2 are ideal.
The Color accuracy chart gives an idea of how close a display's measured colors are to their referential values. The first line holds the measured (actual) colors, while the second line holds the reference (target) colors. The closer the actual colors are to the target ones, the better.
The Grayscale accuracy chart shows whether a display has a correct white balance(balance between red,green and blue)across different levels of grey(from dark to bright).The closer the Actual colors are to the Target ones,the better.
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HTC One 360-Degrees View
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Interface and Functionality
The Nexus 5 is the first device to showcase Android 4.4 KitKat in its pure vanilla form. It’s Android as Google wants it to be, whereas the HTC One runs on Android 4.2 Jelly Bean with HTC’s Sense 5.0 skin on top.
Android 4.4 on the Nexus 5 brings no radical changes. Instead, Google has gone towards simplicity in KitKat: larger buttons, a full-screen app launcher with no more separate app and widget tabs, voice recognition right from the home screen.
The Sense skin on the One is a bit similar to KitKat in its clean looks, flat visuals and simplistic approach. Still, there are very clear differences. HTC uses neutral charcoal colors throughout while stock Android has grown much more colorful. Gone are the Holo days of black and neon blue. The transparent app drawer and colorful wallpaper make stock Android more lively.
There are some slight niggles in both experiences. In daily use, we find ourselves wishing for a quicker way to adjust screen brightness on both devices, and setting the wallpaper and adding shortcuts on the HTC One is unnecessarily complicated.
Both devices feature large and easy to use keyboards. The Nexus 5 ships with the stock Google keyboard that supports swipe typing. The HTC One keyboard on the other hand spreads from edge to edge and features large keys that are very easy to press and we found ourselves typing even quicker on it.
Processor and Memory
There’s no going around the fact that the HTC One is more than half a year old device. While in basic use both phones feel sufficiently snappy and are definitely lag-free, there are a few places where the hardware difference can really be felt - in web browsing for instance the Nexus 5 loads pages nearly instantly whereas on the One you need to wait a few seconds.
The main reason is that HTC features the older Snapdragon 600 system chip, while the Nexus 5 boasts the latest and most powerful Snapdragon 800. Both are quad-core chips, however, the Snapdragon 800 in the Nexus 5 is clocked at 2.3GHz, whereas the Snapdragon 600 in the One maxes out at 1.9GHz.
The new Krait 400 processor core in the Nexus builds up on the Krait 300 architecture with slight improvements rather than ground-up changes in instruction width or pipeline depth. JavaScript benchmarks are the only tests we can use right now to measure CPU performance and they show a nearly 20% to 30% improvement in the new Nexus.
Gamers will be the ones who will probably appreciate the Snapdragon 800 in the Nexus 5 the most. The Adreno 330 graphical chip in it runs at up to 450MHz, and is capable of handling the most graphically intensive games like Modern Combat 4 with ease.
Both devices feature 2GB of dual-channel RAM, but the Nexus again has an advantage as it uses the faster 800MHz LPDDR3 RAM, while the One features LPDDR2 RAM.
Here is how the two compare in benchmark testing.
QuadrantHigher is better
Google Nexus 58455
HTC One12481
AnTuTuHigher is better
Google Nexus 526340
HTC One23308
GFXBench Egypt HD 2.5 onscreen(fps)Higher is better
With the Nexus 5, Google has finally stepped it up and now offers 16GB of storage in the basic model. In reality, around 12.5GB of that is available to the end user. The HTC One in comparison ships with 32GB on board (26 gigs of user-available storage), and both do not support microSD card expansion slots.
Internet and Connectivity
The Nexus 5 and the HTC One feature the full cellular connectivity package with 4G LTE on board. Well, not exactly the whole as the Nexus 5 is missing support for Verizon Wireless bands, but apart from that you have blazing fast 4G data on both devices. Needless to say, browsing is an enjoyable experience.
The Nexus 5 features mobile Chrome as the default and only web browser on board, while the HTC One ships with both Chrome and HTC’s custom Android browser, and both are fine. We already mentioned that there is a noticeable difference in browsing speeds. The Nexus loads pages much quicker to the point where it feels instant, and you can feel a slight delay with the One. Once loaded, scrolling and zooming around webpages is smooth on both.
The two devices also come with dual-channel Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0, GPS with Glonass and NFC.
Camera
Google uses an 8-megapixel optical image stabilized camera in an attempt to prove a Nexus phone can serve as a good camera, while HTC made a bold bet with a 4-megapixel camera with larger pixels.
Let's start with the camera experience. Firing up the camera app is definitely quicker on the HTC One whereas the Nexus 5 takes a bit more to start. Focusing and actually capturing an image is also a much speedier, almost instant process on the HTC One. The Nexus 5 in comparison has a particularly lazy auto-focus and the whole shooting process is slowed down by a tedious animation after the shot. All this adds up to make shot-to-shot time excruciatingly long on the Nexus 5.
The actual camera apps could not have been more different. The HTC One has large separate buttons for image still and video recording so you can start shooting right away, while the Nexus 5 only features a single button so if you’re in image still mode, you have to switch to video and only then shoot. We definitely prefer the One’s camera app in that regard as you won’t miss any opportunity to take a shot or capture a video. The HTC One also allows you to select 60fps recording (at 720p resolution) and slow motion videos, two things the Nexus 5 lacks. The HTC One also has more settings like ISO, face detection, a grid and others to manually adjust or enable, while the Nexus 5 lacks a lot of these finer settings in the stock camera app.
When it comes to the actual still image quality, we like the Nexus 5 much better. It’s not a perfect camera, but it does very well all around. The HTC One suffers from constant and thorough blue-ishness in images whereas the Nexus 5 has generally more natural colors and images on it look sharper, with lots of detail compared to the mediocre one on the One.
Indoors, the Nexus 5 handles itself better keeping noise in check and managing to get sharper images, while the HTC One struggles. The built in LED flash on the Nexus 5 lights up the scene much better, while the One's flash feels underpowered and cannot lighten even relatively close objects.
Both devices are also capable of shooting panoramas (the Nexus 5 can also shoot 360-degree shots) and the experience is relatively quick and hassle free. The panoramic images actually turn out better on the HTC One – although both are mediocre, the Nexus 5 has very low resolution and pale, washed out look.
There is a hugely important new setting in the Nexus 5 that improves the dynamic range. It’s HDR+. When you select it, the phone fires multiple shots and combines them into one. Usually HDR shooting is slow and often results in blurry/ghost images, but the Nexus 5 is a huge improvement as its HDR+ mode works quickly and shots are very good. Try it out - it’s so good you might leave HDR+ as the default shooting mode.
Both devices record video at up to 1080p at 30 frames per second. Since the two handsets feature optical image stabilization the recordings turn out very stable. Both devices seem to fare a bit better in capturing video rather than stills. Still, both have trouble locking focus, even in well lit conditions. The Nexus 5 has the upper hand with warmer and more pleasing colors, as well as more details in video, but the HTC One stands out with very clean sound recording whereas the Nexus picks up wind noise and is not all that clean. At night, when light gets extremely low, the HTC One captures more light and records actually usable footage, while the Nexus 5 recordings are too dark.
The HTC One features a 2-megapixel front facing whereas the Nexus 5 has a 1.3-megapixel front shooter. The HTC One is the more practical front shooter with a much wider field of view meaning that a lot more content ends up in the shot. At an arm’s length, the Nexus 5 will only capture your face and shoulders while the HTC One can easily fit more of you and your surroundings. The pure quality of the image is not great (it’s a low-res front camera after all) on both, but still better on the Nexus 5 that manages to keep noise in check and colors more or less accurate. The HTC One this time has the advantage of more fine detail, but images on it often turn a bit washed out.
Multimedia
HTC One
Both devices have large and vivid screens - one of the best out there - and that’s a huge plus for media. Watching movies or browsing through your image collection is a rewarding experience.
Both come with a basic built-in media players that chew through most popular video formats with ease, except for Dis hardly any big downside - a quick trip to the Play Store and you can get a third-party app like the free MX Player that enables 1080p video playback for all common formats with no slowdown.
The Google Play Music app on the Nexus 5 now takes up your whole lockscreen with album art and is a pretty experience, but apart from that it is the same as on the One. We prefer listening to music on the HTC One, though. Its dual stereo speakers are powerful and very clean adding even some depth to sound and generally a notch above any other competing smartphone. There is a big difference between the tinny and quiet audio from the single speaker on the Nexus 5 and the loud and clear One. The HTC One also comes bundled with decent in-ear headphones, while the Nexus 5 does not include any headset in the box.
Call quality is pleasing on both the HTC One and the Nexus 5. We had no glaring issues except for a slight rumble in the HTC One earpiece (turning the volume down a bit from the maximum clears it out). Otherwise, voices in the earpiece are easy to distinguish and sound natural. On the other end of the line our callers also reported hearing us loud and clear. Both handsets also feature a second microphone for noise cancellation and on both side-noises are well filtered out.
Battery
Both devices feature a 2300mAh battery, but in reality the HTC One lasts much longer. We have no problems getting even two days out of the One on moderate use, while the Nexus 5 barely makes it through the day in most cases.
We measure battery life by running a custom web-script,designed to replicate the power consumption of typical real-life usage.All devices that go through the test have their displays set at 200-nit brightness.
It's amazing to see the progress of the Nexus series. With the new Nexus 5, Google finally ticks all the boxes – performance is top notch, the screen is good, and the camera is hugely improved. The HTC One on the other hand starts to show its age. We are still in love with its sturdy aluminum unibody and there's no denying the device is a looker, however the UltraPixel camera underperforms and actually fares way worse than the Nexus 5 shooter, and the Snapdragon 600 chip pales in comparison to the newer and faster 800. Not least, the Nexus features the latest Android version and is future proof – getting it you can be sure you'll be first in line for future Android updates while the HTC One runs on Android 4.2 and it will probably take months for it to go 4.4 KitKat, and it's unclear whether it will ever get updated further.
With all this, you'd expect the lower-specced HTC One to cost less, but the reality of the situation is a bit more complicated. The Nexus 5 has a bargain low off-contract price of $350 for the 16GB version and $400 for the 32 gig model, whereas an unlocked One (32 GB) will set you back a whopping $580. For those of you who plan on getting it on-contract, though, the price varies. On Sprint, the HTC One can be had for as low as $20 with a new 2-year contract whereas the Nexus 5 costs $150. On T-Mobile, the down payment for the HTC One and Nexus 5 is almost the same, but total payments over two months work out to a higher price for the One.
To sum up, the Nexus 5 is generally more affordable with some exceptions for U.S. carriers. Even if your operator offers the Nexus 5 at a higher price, though, we definitely feel it's justified to pay a bit more to get the Nexus, a device that is superior in almost every way.
Victor, a seasoned mobile technology expert, has spent over a decade at PhoneArena, exploring the depths of mobile photography and reviewing hundreds of smartphones across Android and iOS ecosystems. His passion for technology, coupled with his extensive knowledge of smartphone cameras and battery life, has positioned him as a leading voice in the mobile tech industry.
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