The HTC One (M9) follows in the tradition of the original HTC One and last year’s HTC One (M8) with a refined aluminum chassis. While the look of the phone is similar to last year’s model, HTC has implemented a few subtle design tweaks which make the phone easier to grip, making it feel very similar to the original One. Like previous One models, the One (M9) is available in a handful of colors, but HTC has chosen to give the phone a two-tone metal finish which makes the handset easily distinguishable from older HTC devices and the competition.
While one of our sources was adamant that the front of the HTC One M9 would look different from last year’s model, the device unveiled today sports the same speaker grill and front-facing camera placement that we’ve seen in the dozens of leaks over the past few months. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing. HTC has refines the front a little by using a single piece of metal (the M8 has two plastic speaker grills) that covers the speakers and wraps around all sides of the display.
If you’re not excited about the new HTC One M9’s design, HTC is hoping that HTC Sense 7 will be enticing enough to buy the new phone. On the surface, HTC Sense 7 looks very similar to HTC Sense 6, but there are dozens of new features which make the software more powerful. Since we all love to stand out in a crowd, HTC has built in a new Themes app which allows you to customize the look of the software to your heart’s content. The customization options include icon packs, on-screen soft key, notification panel, widgets and more. Themes can be created on the fly by using the color pallet of your favorite pictures or you can download dozens of pre-configured themes available through its theme store, but it is also working with select designers to create new themes on a regular basis.
Once you’re done customizing the look of your phone, HTC hope you’ll use its new location aware launcher which organized and suggests apps based off of your usage and location. If you use certain apps at work and other while at home, the HTC One M9 will organize them on the home screen, making them immediately accessible when you get to work or home. The feature is simple to use, but we’ll probably be turning it off since we’ve very particular of how our home screen is laid out.
BlinkFeed is received a minor facelift as well, cleaning up the flow of the app when diving through its settings, but the most noticeable change comes with Yelp integration. With your location information, Yelp will not display restaurant notifications around meal times right on your lock screen, making it extremely easy to discover new places even without trying.
Even with all of HTC’s added customizations, HTC Sense 7 is as soon or smoother than HTC Sense 6. Apps open and close without and glitches, but we were not able to test the phone’s performance with any games or benchmark apps. HTC’s software team has done a lot of optimize the software to work with the One M9’s Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 processor, but we’re sure that the 3GB of RAM helps a lot as well.
The camera experience on the HTC One M9 is dramatically different than what HTC has delivered over the past two years. HTC has taken the UltraPixel sensor and moved it to the front and bumped the resolution of the main camera to 20 megapixels. There are plenty of Android smartphones on the market with 20 megapixel sensors, but we were truly impressed with the images that we were able to capture. We took a picture of a friend from 3 feet away and were able to zoom in and see the reflection in their eyes. We can’t wait to spend some more time with the HTC One M9’s camera to truly push it to its limits.
HTC is also adding new software features to enhance the camera experience. The DuoCamera feature is still present despite the fact that the One M9 only has a single sensor on the back. The phone is able to reproduce the effect by capturing 5 images at different focal length and stitch them together to blur out the background. New image customization options include a variety of image masking feature which allow for some creative manipulation by blending two different pictures of cropping two pictures together with various shapes. You can also use HTC’s new gallery app to view all of your images that have been saved to the cloud or find all the pictures of a specific person with facial recognition.
The HTC One M9 is truly an impressive device. The phone feels better in the hand than previous versions and the new software features are a huge improvement over previous versions of HTC Sense. We’ll just have to see if HTC’s marketing team and pull together a powerful campaign that can convince the public that the HTC One M9 is the best smartphone of 2015.
Hi Nick,
I was just wondering what the 4th on screen button was for. It looks like a power button. Is it just to turn the phone off? Thanks.
In thus instance, yes. But it is customizable and users have the option of rearranging the order of the soft keys
Hi Nick, nice review. A big question: can the soft keys be set to auto hide? To call them back by swipe up when needed? So we don’t need to use not so good 3rd party apps for this. Please answer.
You can download an app from playstore, called GMD Immersive to auto hide the buttons without root
I did read from another review that there’s a built-in button that you can set there to hide the on-screen buttons.
(Like, replace the power button with the hide button)
Here:
Oh, nice… Good find, Caragua. I actually like that feature a lot.
Hi, is this feature part of Sense 7?
Hi all, thanks for the tips. I am using M8 and I am using paid GMD Immersive app for a long time. It does a good job but far away from perfect (like issue with the keyboard). Anyhow, I will use my M8 for a year more and I am hoping that Sense 7 will support soft keys auto hide feature by itself, because when it is part f the system it works the best. So still my question is: does Sense 7 support this feature? Can someone please confirm this?
Hi all, thanks for the tips. I am using M8 and I am using paid GMD Immersive app for a long time. It does a good job but far away from perfect (like issue with the keyboard). Anyhow, I will use my M8 for a year more and I am hoping that Sense 7 will support soft keys auto hide feature by itself, because when it is part f the system it works the best. So still my question is: does Sense 7 support this feature? Can someone please confirm this?
Nick, seems like you were impressed with the M9’s camera, but other websites seem like they were disappointed with it?
You didn’t have grain/noise issues on yours? Would you say the M9’s rear camera is better than the 4 ultrapixel camera of the M8?
It’s definitely better than the old ultrapixel camera. We read the articles which talked about noise and grain, but we’re not concerned. As mentioned in our post, there’s enough data to work with that you can zoom into someone’s eye to see their the reflection. Yes, there is noise when you’re zoomed in that close, but you’ll never notice it unless you zoom to 100% of if you have an 8K display.
Nick, it can’t be better in low light than the M8, not photographically or scientifically possible. I don’t buy the pixel race, speaking as a photographer. For phone cameras to improve, only the optics improving and sensor increasing in size will improve shots. OIS is also a great help at night. I’m not impressed. They should have developed Ultra pixels further and the sensor bigger. Ditching this ethos and just taking the “Me too” route is showing weakness. M9 is a master of nothing camera wise, whereas the M8 was fantastic at night. 20mp resolution literally means nothing, if the optics are cheap, which they are on the M9. More is not better.
The current 2 best phone cameras at market are iPhone 6+ & Note 4. They are about to be eclipsed by the S6/Edge.
Also, Zoe highlights app has gone from being fantastic to trash in updates. Now you have to upload publicly, just to be able to download it.
ALso, you didn’t mention that the sides are actually painted plastic, not metal? I’ve seen a few reviewers who loved the previous One’s mention this, but not you. I liked the solid polycarbonate on the m7 and all metal M8, I don’t like this move.
Please Nick, be objective as you can. If you just reward complacency, laziness, regression and failure with praise, you will get more of the same. HTC, need a kick up the arse for next year…period…
There’s a difference between better overall and better in low light. There are always tradeoffs that need to be made when considering a sensor with larger pixels and one with more.
That being said, the UltraPixel sensor is still there. Just flip the phone around and snap a picture with the front camera if you want better low light images.
I actually loved the M8’s camera for what it could do. I don’t pixel peep on phone camera shots, because you’re never gonna get anything that great blown up and I compose my shots properly, I never crop. The M8 was great for candid shots & apart from the stupid gimmicky effects, that duo lens had a useful purpose. It helped greatly with focusing.
Also what are you talking about plastic sides?
Yeah, misinformed and edited accordingly
Also the camera had pre-release software so it was not what the consumer will have, or what will be seen the reviews happen.
The phone comes to market in 2 weeks, how much different do you think it’ll be?
I do think it will a lot more refined. Also on several videos I have seen there was the software update icon in the top left hand corner, so I wouldn’t be surprised if there is already a lot of improvements already.
Hey Nick, Nice summary of the hands-on….Can you ask your source if the redesigned front would make it to next year flagship!?:P….Kinda confused whether to upgrade from my M7 to M9 or wait for M10…Though HTC might have been logical in its iterative design in order to control production costs but as an HTC fan I am used to expect a refreshed flagship design (that’s what has been the USP of the HTC phones and most of the loyal fan base is coz of their ability to take the design innovations to the next elegant level)….
His source was full of shit. I wouldn’t be asking that source anything else.
How is the battery?
No clue. But I’ll let you know once I get my demo unit.