HUAWEI nova 16s Pro: Flagship camera in a mid-range smartphone body

This year, Huawei changed its naming policy for smartphones and divided the domestic series and international series into two. It starts with the flagship Pura range – the devices reaching global markets are called Pura 90s Pro and Pura 90s Pro Max, corresponding to the more familiar Pura 90 and Pura 90 (as well as several other popular models).

The same applies to the new series. They don’t have any changes in design or specifications compared to the Chinese ones, which are called nova 16s and nova 16s Pro respectively. Under this name they entered the Russian market.

We noticed that the HUAWEI nova 16s is more like a mid-range model, with the 12+256 GB version starting at 44,999 rubles. It uses the Kirin 8020 hardware platform, two rear cameras, and a relatively small (compared to older models) 6.68-inch screen. It’s a lighter yet thicker smartphone with no particularly impressive specs, but it looks good and seems to be very competitive in its niche.

Huawei nova 16s Pro With prices starting at 59,999 rubles for the 12+256 GB version (64,999 rubles for the 12+512 GB version), it already enters sub-flagship territory – but it seems that it is well prepared for the event. A triple rear camera system is installed here, based on an impressive 200+50+500,000 pixel scheme, a 6.84-inch diagonal screen, the older (although not the latest) Kirin 9010S platform, and a 50-megapixel front camera. In terms of price, nova 16s Pro is almost the same as Pura 90s Pro. Let’s see if it has anything special compared to it and other sub-flagship smartphones.

Design and display

In appearance, HUAWEI nova 16s Pro has little change compared to the spring version of nova 15 Pro. It also has a large screen and the body is almost as thin and light.

But the nova 16s Pro is still a bit thicker—apparently, the smartphone has grown by 0.2 mm due to the larger battery capacity. And it gets heavier – 218 grams. Therefore, mixed feelings arise when using this gadget. At the same time, the width and height are huge (there are almost no bezels around the display), the body is thin – and at the same time… very heavy. A little unexpectedly heavy. But I must say, the weight distribution of the smartphone is in order; the same camera block is not heavy.

The style of the same camera block remains more or less unchanged – but now it no longer “winks” at us like last time, but looks into the eyes – with two black circles on the island, one containing the three main cameras and the second containing the color spectrum sensor and dual flash.

The camera naturally protrudes significantly from the slim body, but this doesn’t look like some kind of anomaly, for example, in the Pura 80 Ultra or the Pura 90s Pro Max, and some semblance of balance is still retained.

Let me add that this smartphone comes with a transparent plastic cover – thanks to which the gadget takes on its overall shape.

There are also interesting color variations: the light blue and iridescent (also with blue notes) versions of the HUAWEI nova 16s Pro look very impressive. But we had a smartphone for testing, painted plain black.

Huawei nova 16s Pro is equipped with a 6.84-inch LTPO OLED display with a resolution of 2856×1320 pixels. Pixel density – 460 ppi. Format – 19.5:9. Refresh rates vary from 1 to 120 Hz. There are no issues with the brightness and clarity of the picture.

The screen surface houses a dual front-facing camera unit with a color spectrum sensor.

Software and hardware

HUAWEI nova 16s Pro is the company’s next-generation smartphone running the EMUI 16 operating system. I talked about it in detail in my review of the Pura series of smartphones: the main thing you need to know is that it is still the same EMUI as before, but it has its own voice assistant Celia, which has finally reached an international level and also learned Russian.

Moreover, you can choose between Celia and Yandex’s AI engines headed by Alice, which also includes smart caller ID. In addition to several assistants with a fairly wide range of functions, image processing options are built into the gallery: remove objects, select portraits from a series of portraits with the best facial expressions, increase brightness, straighten images, increase clarity of text. There are also some things people are already familiar with, such as interactive lock screen themes with gesture response, smart search and app recommendation services.

Otherwise, everything is familiar – this is an operating system based on open source Android, which doesn’t have Google Mobile Services out of the box, but software from or closely related to Google will work thanks to a special microG environment. The Play Market store is accessible through the same environment, but you can install any app through the AppGallery brand store and third-party stores (such as RuStore) or simply by unzipping the installation apk file.

Globally, EMUI is a fast and attractive environment that suffers from too much recommended software to install (or has pre-installed) and takes up a lot of memory space, but it is a joy to use the smartphone.

The hardware platform of Huawei nova 16s Pro is the same as its predecessor nova 15 Pro, which is Kirin 9010S. It uses eight cores: one old Taishan V121 clocked at 2.5 GHz, three Taishan V121 clocked at 2.05 GHz, and four ARM Cortex-A510 clocked at 1.5 GHz. Older cores are multi-threaded. Maleoon 910 accelerator takes care of graphics processing. This platform is manufactured using SMIC’s 7nm process technology. Basic commands are supported, but there is no hardware support for ray tracing (Huawei’s breakthrough here is the Kirin 9030 platform, which we see on the brand’s flagship devices), and Vulkan configurations are limited to version 1.1. But there’s a built-in neural processor that finally helps in real-world tasks (generally AI on Huawei smartphones isn’t particularly impressive, but the nova 16s Pro is a step in the right direction).

Even in resource-intensive tasks, the top base performance (by current flagship smartphone standards) is actually more than adequate. In PUBG Mobile, for example, the device can produce high frame rates (90-120 frames per second), and the nova 16s Pro doesn’t overheat or throttle at all, even at long “distances.”

As for the memory, everything is in order for the HUAWEI nova 16s Pro, although there are difficulties in this regard: 12 GB of RAM is guaranteed, accompanied by a 256 or 512 GB drive.

Wireless connectivity is quite advanced – for example, a Bluetooth 6.0 module and Wi-Fi 7 are installed. There’s no good news for those who like to travel abroad, though – the two physical SIM card slots aren’t complemented by support for virtual eSIMs, alas.

camera

Like the Huawei nova 15 Pro, there are three cameras on the rear, responsible for the same three focal lengths, but – and this is even a bit shocking – they are all updated, and completely updated, compared to their predecessors.

Also, this set looks slightly less interesting than the flagship Huawei Pura 90s Pro. The main camera uses the same 1/1.28-inch sensor and is also equipped with a RYYB color filter, which provides the sensor with higher sensitivity, but the resolution here has reached 200 megapixels. But the lens aperture is already fixed – f/1.8. The telephoto module receives a sensor with a resolution of 500,000 pixels, working with periscope optics with an aperture ratio f/2.6 (and 88mm EGF, which enables 3.7x zoom). Both cameras feature phase detection autofocus and optical stabilization. The wide-angle module is unstable, but also has autofocus and a resolution of 500,000 pixels (optical aperture – f/2,2).

From left to right, top to bottom: wide-angle, standard viewing angle, 2x hybrid zoom, 3.7x optical zoom and 10x hybrid zoom shooting examples

The camera set is of a very high standard and is typical of flagship smartphones rather than gadgets that are slightly lower in the price range. In terms of cameras, the nova 16s Pro is not much worse than the Pura 90s Pro of the same model, which seems to make “nova” somewhat meaningless. Yes, there is no variable aperture on the main module, which only affects the inability to obtain spectacular “stars” when shooting at night. There is also a less powerful zoom module with a slightly shorter focal length. But at the same time, more advanced wide-angle cameras were installed – with significantly higher shooting standards. Overall, in terms of shooting quality, the HUAWEI nova 16s Pro can probably easily beat any smartphone in the same price range – from the Samsung Galaxy S26 FE to the Xiaomi 17T Pro. Excellent color reproduction, a Huawei specialty (provided, among other things, by an additional high-resolution color spectrum sensor), high detail, especially when shooting with the main camera, and a fully functional 10x “hybrid” zoom, also suitable for low-light conditions – the quality is outstanding.

Portrait mode doesn’t disappoint either: four focus points, high sharpness, high-quality bokeh, various bokeh effects – again at a very high level. The only thing the nova 16s Pro camera lacks is excellent macro photography capabilities, which is also a typical feature of Huawei smartphones.

The story of the camera of the HUAWEI nova 16s Pro is complemented by a very high level of front module, which is characteristic of this series of smartphones, of which this smartphone once again surpasses the Pura 90s Pro. 50MP, autofocus (and phase detection, dual pixel), high-aperture optics f/2.4 – Used in conjunction with the color spectrum sensor to ensure excellent color reproduction.

Operate autonomously

In addition to the camera, the second highlight of HUAWEI nova 16s Pro is the battery with a capacity of up to 7000mAh, which allows this large-screen phone to easily maintain a full day’s power. In addition, there is almost no energy loss in the background, so in other usage scenarios, the gadget can “survive” for up to two days.

in conclusion

At first glance, the HUAWEI nova 16s Pro seems to be an overpriced smartphone destined to be “friendly fire” from the very similarly priced HUAWEI Pura 90s Pro. But on closer inspection, everything becomes more interesting – here is a set of rear cameras, with which “nova” is even ahead of “Piura” (and ahead of competitors from other brands), as well as an excellent front camera and autonomy, which you would never expect from such a thin gadget with a similarly huge and bright screen. Huawei has created an excellent “youthful” smartphone.

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