HMD Global went an extra mile releasing the brand-new Nokia 9 PureView flagship and is riding with a lot of success from then. It is giving tough competition to HMD Global’s competitors. To find out here is Nokia 9 PureView Complete Review telling you whether or not it has live up to the expectations.
Be its photography with five lenses camera with Zeiss and light and high-quality chassis end hardware, the phone seems to stand out in the crowd. The Nokia 9 PureView has already blurred the hazy line that exists between affordable and full-priced flagships.
It had already created a lot of curiosity over the Internet and now it’s time to look at its decent and impressive specs and know whether Nokia 9 PureView lives the ability to take the best photos with 5 lens camera.
Nokia 9 PureView: The Big Picture
The Nokia 9 PureView has already stepped into a crowded market. HMD Global’s previous ventures like Nokia 3.1 Plus or Nokia 7, was aimed at budget and mid-range buyers whereas the Nokia 9 is made straight for the high-end enthusiast with significant value on design and camera performance. HMD clearly believes that bringing the Nokia brand to the flagship category was absolutely essential.
Specs and Features of Nokia 9 PureView
Price and Release Date
The Nokia 9 PureView came out in February 2019 and retails for $699 / £549 / AED 2,299. So, in general, it ranges in $750 to $999 pricing of competing devices. But this makes it cheaper than other powerhouses like Samsung Galaxy S10 Plus, Huawei Mate 20 Pro and iPhone XS Max. Since the phone has a limited release, so we are not sure of its widespread availability.
Design
As expected the design of the Nokia 9 is with the excellent build quality. HMD here has opted for 6000-series aluminum while the metal frame has an anodized finish. The front design is although conservative while the thin silver lining gives the phone smart look.
It has got buttons on the right edge that catch the light as you move the phone around. The phone shows-pleasant contrast and the same design is found at the back that is slightly glossy with a classy and premium look. And how can I forget to mention that its camera arrangement equipped with 5 camera redefines novelty?
HMD opted for Gorilla Glass 5 that covers the front and the rear. The phone’s face is flat and the back has a distinct curve near the side edges. HMD also went with an appealing deep blue color for the glass.
Now let’s talk about the fingerprint reader as the fingerprint sensors under the display glass have become the latest trend in flagship design. But unfortunately, the Nokia 9 PureView’s has far by the worst fingerprint scanner. It won’t recognize your print after a half-dozen attempts.
Unlike other phones that expose their camera lenses to the world, the Nokia 9’s lenses are tucked underneath full rear cover so that you do not scratch or smudge over them. Not only has this but its glass rendered the 172 g heavy Nokia device very sturdy and robust. It also ensures its IP67 certification via which the phone can be submerged in 1 m (3 ft) of water for up to 30 minutes.
Connectivity
The Nokia 9 PureView has 6 GB of LPDDR4X RAM and 128 GB of UFS-2.1 storage memory. Around 113 GB is user-accessible while the rest is taken up by Android 9. Since the device does not support a microSD slot, storage space is not expandable. But it features two nano-SIM slots and supports DRM Widevine L1.Further, the specifications include the USB-C port at the bottom with USB-OTG connected via USB 3.1. Unfortunately, the transfer speeds are a failure which is not even close to USB 3.1 when included a USB cable. Lastly, it has 3.5-mm headphone jack missing from the device; however, it does include a USB-C dongle.
Software
The Nokia 9 PureView is an Android One smartphone and runs an unmodified vanilla version of Android 9 Pie. It has got no bloatware or any other preloaded software. The only non-stock software it includes is the camera app, provided by HMD Global and not of Google.
Android One smartphones receive two years of timely operating system updates and three years of regular security updates. However, the latter is supposed to be released monthly according to Nokia.
Display
The Nokia 9’s display becomes it’s one of the strongest features and Nokia calls it as a PureDisplay. It has got the large pOLED panel and the high pixel count lends it a crisp tightness to on-screen elements to make it stand out. The color is excellent that gives the screen a natural look.One can select color profiles from vivid, cinema, and basic, or can set the phone to dynamic. Viewing angles are also quite good. The HDR10-capable P-OLED 2:1 display measures 5.99 inches and a native resolution of 2880×1440, results in a high pixel density of 538 PPI.
On the other hand, the drawbacks of OLED technology is the requirement for PWM for brightness regulation. Those more sensitive to PWM flickering although might suffer from the usual consequences. Maximum brightness is measured at 641 nits on average with enabled ambient light sensor, and brightness distribution was a decent 92%. And by disabling the ambient light sensor maximum brightness is limited to just 482 nits.
It has a Night light feature wherein the brightness spectrum the display could be dimmed to 2.2 nits, perfect for eyes in the dark. This feature tints the display slightly yellow for improved readability. The “Vibrant” option switches to the DCI-P3 color space and gives accurate popping colors and an increased amount of blue gives a cooler representation of colors.
The biggest criticism is the auto-brightness tool. The screen pushes out plenty of light, more than to be used outdoors. The problem lies in the software, therefore, the brightness control is too aggressive which is maddening.
Performance and GPS
The Nokia 9 comes with NFC, Bluetooth 5.0, 802.11ac Wi-Fi, and LTE Cat. 16 that supports the expected standard of a high-end flagship smartphone in 2019. All thanks to the huge variety of frequencies it supports and thus connects very well to 4G networks worldwide.
Talking about the performance, on benchmarks such as GeekBench, AnTuTu, and 3DMark, you will find that the Nokia 9 does really well. But yet again the Nokia 9 PureView does not quite live up to the scores, and the blame goes to its software. Hence the Nokia 9 runs somewhat poorly with some of the updates. Apps may sometimes hang or crash completely or take too long to open.
Gaming
Thanks to its Adreno 630 GPU which is one of the fastest currently available smartphone GPUs, that lets the Nokia 9 PureView out of trouble when it comes to running the latest Android games. The experiment showed it is capable of achieving maximum frame rates even at maximum settings, smoothly and flawlessly. Also when you hold the device in landscape mode then the sound waves are reflected by the palms of your hands originating on both sides of the device.
Speaker
The Nokia 9 PureView’s has in-built single speaker located on the right-hand side of the USB-C port which can get surprisingly loud sometimes. Unfortunately, you will observe that it tends to exaggerate mids and highs. This effect thus becomes worse with increased volume levels which are decent for gaming, and voices.
Battery Life
After a week testing, it was found that Nokia 9 holds its respect to battery life. It has got a 3,320 battery, which is smaller compared to batteries in other competing phones. Also, Android 9 Pie software comes with excellent battery optimizer, known as Adaptive Battery which does a commendable job. Only the problem lies in the charging time for it takes a long time to charge especially via Qi wireless chargers.
Camera
The Nokia 9 PureView’s five-camera array is its main selling point. It definitely does stands apart from other smartphones. One phone equipped with five cameras working simultaneously creates the perfect photo. It has got a total of five 12 MP cameras located at the back, each one of which features a Zeiss lens and an aperture of f/1.82 with some additional benefits for professional photographers.
For instance, Nokia 9 is capable of saving RAW files (DNG) instead of JPEGs. In addition, captures up to 1,200 levels of depth, allowing for astounding bokeh effects.
HMD worked with Light Qualcomm, and Carl Zeiss together to create Penta-cam work. Two of the sensors snap full-color images while remaining three-snap monochrome images for contrast, depth, and exposure data. The photos speak for themselves for they are spectacular with amazing clarity. But then you may observe the lack of focus and grain in some shots.
The selfie cam has a 20MP sensor of its own and all the shooting modes are available to the selfie camera. The only real omission is slow-motion. Also, the Nokia 9 can capture video up to 4K resolution on the rear and the front using the central lens rather than the entire Penta camera array.
Another drawback is the camera app itself that turns out to be comparatively slow and unresponsive for a smartphone. So when you will switch between different photos and setting it takes a lag of seconds. Thus, it takes a while for a photo to appear in the Google Photos app.
Nokia 9 PureView: The Verdict
When HMD Global released the Nokia 9 PureView, one could have fallen in love instantly. But the device does not take the full advantage of its innovative quintuple camera design. The phone although looks great with an excellent display, and high-end features. The ambitious idea of its camera and fingerprint reader is certainly not that special.
Nevertheless, the device comes with the list of drawbacks but at the same time with quite a good price and amazing photography, this flagship does offer high-end hardware. So decide for yourself by going through this Nokia 9 PureView Complete Review and enjoy this amazing smartphone.
