HTC U11 Review
KEY FEATURES
- 5.5-inch quad-HD display
- Snapgradon 835 / 4GB RAM
- 64GB storage / microSD
- ANC USB-C earbuds included
- No headphone jack
- 12MP camera w/ OIS
- 3000mAh battery
- Amazon Alexa
- Edge Sense
- Manufacturer: HTC
- Review Price: 7000MAD
HTC U11 – DESIGN
Time after time, HTC shows how to execute its hardware designs perfectly. The "liquid surface" glass on the back stands out like no other glass-backed phone, coming down to the way it curves off of the edges and how the color is embedded in the glass rather than coated on the inside. No matter which of the five colors you pick up, the colors shift and change as you move it around — it's a striking and unique design that stands out.
The entire phone is beautifully crafted and assembled, with a satisfying heft you get from few phones. That continues into the perfect curve of the glass on both sides of the phone, the way the buttons click and how solidly the haptics vibrate. These are things that are so often overlooked in order to achieve mind-bending designs, but HTC sticks with as important parts of the experience. HTC has also arrived fashionably late to the party with IP67 water resistance, which is a welcomed addition nonetheless.
The fact the U11 has been designed to meet IP67 certification standards will also be a boon for accident-prone users, and means the phone will be able to survive accidental submersions in liquid at depths of 1m and below for 30 minutes.
You shouldn't look at an HTC phone today expecting it to have a standard 3.5 mm headphone jack. What you will get in return is an audio experience that's a step above the competition. That starts with the in-box USonic headphones, which sound better than your typical bundled earbuds and now include active noise cancellation powered by the phone. It's a nice treat to actually get good, feature-filled headphones in the box (along with a USB-C to 3.5 mm adapter). These are headphones for the U11 only.
HTC's new BoomSound speaker setup is also here, which combines both the front-firing earpiece speaker and down-firing loudspeaker for a better sound stage.
HTC U11 – SCREEN
Outside of its slightly chunky bezel, the U11’s screen is top-notch. The 5.5-inch screen’s quad-HD (2560 x 1440 pixels) resolution ensures text and icons are uniformly sharp and you’ll struggle to spot any individual pixels.
The Super LCD 5 panel also offers decent colour temperature levels, with none of the RGB spectrum looking too cool or too warm, though they don’t look quite as vibrant as competing phones with AMOLED panels. Viewing angles are also suitably wide.
Performance
The latest Snapdragon 835 is inside running the show, supported by 4GB of RAM and an ample 64GB of storage plus an SD card slot. Those specs are right in line with the competition, and should serve the U11 well for a good 18 months — let's hope HTC keeps its software updates rolling accordingly.
Battery life
A 3000mAh battery wasn't exactly acceptable on the massive U Ultra, but is a more appropriate cell size in the 5.5-inch U11. When paired with the power savings of the Snapdragon 835 processor, battery life on the U11 is solid. The phone could easily handle my typical day that involves lots of Wi-Fi time, keeping up with email and social networks and roughly 3 hours of screen-on time — all with about 20% battery to spare.
Luckily Quick Charge 3.0 is here for when you plug in over USB-C, and that 3000mAh battery charges fast.
HTC U11 – CAMERA
Photo quality is an area HTC has struggled to compete in. This is because HTC’s custom UltraPixel tech, which supposedly improves processing speeds and low-light performance by capturing light on larger pixels, has in the past had a tendency to overexpose photos.
This was a massive issue on the HTC 10 and its predecessors, and a key reason there were doubts about the U11’s 12-megapixel camera, which runs the same tech and captures gigantic 1.4μm pixels.
Taken in regular light, photos universally look excellent. Colour balance is solid and images don’t look overexposed or oversaturated. Shutter response, while not the fastest, is also more than quick enough for impromptu snapping.
Video recording is also suitably smooth and the four mics do an excellent job of recording 3D sound.
The U11’s 16-megapixel front camera is pretty par for the course as selfie cameras go and proved more than good enough for self portraits and video calls – though again, low-light performance isn’t stellar.
| Operating System | Android 7.1.1, HTC Sense |
| Platform | Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 |
| Network | 4G LTE Cat. 16 |
| RAM | 4 / 6GB |
| Storage | 64 / 128GB UFS + microSD |
| Dual SIM | Some regions. Hybrid SIM2/SD slot |
| Display | 5.5-inch Quad HD SuperLCD 5 Corning Gorilla Glass 5 |
| Main Camera | 12MP, 1.4μm pixels, f/1.7 lens, OIS, EIS UltraPixel 3, UltraSpeed AF, HDR Boost |
| Front Camera | 16MP, f/2.0 with UltraPixel mode |
| Water/Dust Resistance | IP67 |
| Battery | 3,000mAh, Qualcomm QuickCharge 3.0 |
| Audio | HTC BoomSound Hi-Fi HTC USonic USB-C + noise cancelling headphones |
| Colors | Ice white, brilliant black, sapphire blue, solar red, amazing silver |
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