HTC U12+ Review

• HTC U12+
• USB-C cable
• Wall charger
• USB-C USonic earbuds with small and large replacement buds

Design

The HTC U12+ is offered in a variety of liquescent colors which include Ceramic Black, Flame Red, and Translucent Blue. Like we saw in the HTC U11+, the Translucent Blue gives users a small, clear window emanating from the rear fingerprint scanner, which gives way to a color-gradient effect into the opaque blue glass. This is certainly a unique look for a phone, which will have its detractors and its advocates; it can come off looking like a cheap case, while others may find its originality attractive.

Squeezable side input was first introduced in the HTC U11, and the U12+ expands on this with fully-haptic volume and power buttons – you won’t find a volume rocker here. Instead, these three “buttons” are built into the metal frame and create haptic vibrations when squeezed to simulate a button click. While this does assist in stepping up the water-resistance from IP67 to IP68, it was hardly a necessary move for this or any other reason we can conceive of, other than “it’s cool.”

Unfortunately, that just doesn’t cut it for us. Two models we’ve tested now have had the same issue of having three very different experiences when pressing these “buttons.” While the power button was easiest and most natural to press, that also lead to some errant button depresses. The volume down button was usable, but noticeably harder to trigger than the power button. The volume up button, on the other hand, was often impossible to use, requiring us to hold down or press extremely hard to trigger a reaction. Adjusting our grip and changing Edge Sense sensitivity settings didn't have any effect. We hope this isn’t the case with all U12+ devices, but even attempting to put this volume up debacle out of our heads, the experience still left us wishing we had regular, good old-fashioned buttons. After contacting HTC about this, we were told that a software update that addresses button sensitivity is planned for this summer.

Questionable design elements aside, the phone looks and feels pretty good, albeit a bit plain-looking from the front. Bezels on the sides of the display are next to non-existent, but the façade does have prominent forehead and chin. Housed within the forehead is the dual front-facing camera setup, earpiece, and noise-cancelling microphone – no notch here. Although we’d love to see the top and bottom bezels shrink, the vibrant screen thankfully helps to take our minds off of it.

Display

Turning on the device is a pleasing experience when you're greeted with this 6-inch QHD+ (1440 x 2880) Super LCD 6 display. Unlike the oversaturated tones of AMOLED displays, this LCD panel likes to keep things more realistic. Still, colors are bright and vibrant, and clarity is top-notch, delivering an excellent 537 ppi. Viewing angles don’t disappoint either, and with the loud and crisp sound coming from these speakers, you'll have no trouble entertaining a small audience on this 6-incher.
 
You can also tweak your viewing experience by adjusting things like icon size, font size, and color profiles. These profiles include DCI-P3, which gives an optimized color experience for the U12+, and sRGB if you find the colors too vibrant – both of which can be adjusted with warmer and colder color temperatures.

Unfortunately, the screen isn’t much improved over the U11+ when it comes to outdoor visibility. Measuring in at 406 nits maximum, the U12+ is only about 50 nits brighter than the U11+ – which was hard to read outside – and almost 130 nits duller than the U11.

Interface and Functionality

Like most manufacturer-concocted Android flavors, HTC’s Sense UI has undergone some changes over the years, albeit to a lesser extent than many. This has left Sense looking a lot like it used to circa Android 5.0 Lollipop. Then, it displayed a fairly polished and uniform design language which still holds true today, doing so without looking dated. Tweaks like rounding icons and adding Android's revamped quick settings menu are really the only major differences you’ll notice, and though it may be boring to close market watchers, HTC Sense still pulls off a refined, uncluttered experience.

You won’t find tons of fancy animations here, just fluid, quick transitions, but there is a theme store you can browse through to tszuj things up a bit. Grid, icon, and font sizes can also be tweaked, which should help satisfy those who like to customize. Nevertheless, HTC’s Sense UI is sensible and straightforward – something the company doesn’t seem keen on changing.

Blinkfeed is also back for another round. As always, this aggregated newsfeed of your social media accounts is a neat way to peruse social media content, but the in-built plug-in for an app called “News Republic” needs to be excised from this immediately. In an apparent attempt to add news to Blinkfeed, HTC has bundled News Republic as an installed app with the ability to integrate stories within Blinkfeed. Don’t get us wrong, we would love to be able to browse popular news topics and posts from our social media in one easy-to-read news feed, but unfortunately, News Republic doesn’t provide news, but rather a spattering of low-brow, sensationalized clickbait.

Edge Sense

HTC does package a few proprietary experiences, though. Most prominent among these is Edge Sense 2. When we first saw Edge Sense implemented in the HTC U11, we found it to be cool but not exceedingly necessary. HTC has expanded functionality a bit on this second generation, and while still not a deeply compelling feature, we quite like using it.

In addition to launching the camera, flashlight, app of your choice, or taking a screenshot, squeezing can now trigger specific functions within apps. This is still a beta feature for now, but it seems to work pretty much as intended. Simply enter the setup, open the app you’d like to enhance with squeezable functionality, and tap a function within the app, as you normally would, to map it to Edge Sense. For instance, you can open the Calendar and tap the “plus” sign for a new event to map this function with a squeezable shortcut. Then, when the calendar app is open, from now on, all that’s required is a simple squeeze to begin creating a new event. This may not exactly seem essential at first, but just as we grew fond of squeezing to snap pics in awkward angles, so too may be the case for other apps and situations you find yourself in daily. While in-app functions like this can be set for any app, curiously, you can’t simply set just any app to launch from a squeeze.

Also new to the experience is a tapping gesture. Now you can tap on the edges of the phone to execute any of the same actions as squeezing. This simply adds yet another form of input and, in effect, another shortcut button to your device. Whether you need it or not depends on your usage, of course. Accidental triggers can happen, though HTC allows you to adjust the sensitivity of the squeeze gesture to help prevent such occurrences.

In essence, Edge Sense is a mappable function key with multiple inputs (quick squeeze, long squeeze, and tap on either side) able to be modified for a variety of apps, which adds functionality and enhances ease of use, while altogether just being cool.

Processor, Memory, and Performance

The HTC U12+ comes in two configurations – 6 GB RAM with either 64 or 128 GB storage. Equipped with the top-of-the-line Snapdragon 845 processor, the U12+ delivers nothing but swift performance in day-to-day use. With animations kept to a minimum, there’s very little that gets in the way of observing this device’s prompt actions with every tap or swipe. Apps launch smoothly, and hangs were never an issue, as should be expected from such hardware.

Despite some lackluster benchmarks, the phone delivers a solid gaming performance. There were some dropped frames here and there, but otherwise, the experience is enjoyable. We are pleased, as consumers will be too, to find expandable storage capability.

Connectivity

Being a U.S. release for HTC, the company ensured to pack all the proper antennas in the U12+ to let it work on the four major U.S. carriers. That means Verizon, AT&T, Sprint, and T-Mobile subscribers can all pop SIM cards in the U12+ and have it working without exception.

Other than that, you’ll find dual-band Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 5.0 and NFC, as well as HTC Connect, which imbue the phone with super powers like Chromecast, DLNA, and AirPlay streaming capability. We suppose that last one is the true super power.

Camera

Building on the U11’s well-rounded 12 MP single camera, HTC has added a second, 16 MP, 2x zoom telephoto lens to the equation. Having impressed us last year with the U11’s sharp, vibrant pictures, we were hoping this secondary lens would only enhance the experience, and much to our delight, it has.

Image Quality

Pictures taken on the HTC U12+ are exquisitely detailed without ever over-sharpening, and color accuracy is generally very good. When it comes to high dynamic range, this camera tames highlights better than top competition by consistently and effectively pulling in fine details from beneath the flares of harsh lighting and composing them clearly and accurately – it’s truly excellent and exceedingly useful. By the same token, sometimes – rarely – the HTC U12+ struggles a bit with finding as much detail in the shadows as it can in brighter hotspots with some especially dynamic scenes.

The secondary, 16-megapixel camera carries on all the same characteristics of the main shooter, with little perceived difference in overall quality – something that can’t be said of every dual-camera setup. These cameras are easily established as some of the sharpest tools on the market with which to cut up some crisp, beautiful shots. Now if only it could snap pics just a bit faster.

The dual front-facing cameras produce images that are quite well-detailed as well. But skin tones, and all colors really, came out slightly more muted than we would’ve liked, and certainly more so than the rear cameras captured. This aside, selfies will be mostly flattering, with effective beauty and bokeh modes that touch up and highlight the subject competently. Bokeh shots are well-executed with this dual-camera setup; blur is applied evenly and accurately with very few, if any, mistakes.