Huawei Nova 3 review

Performance

In terms of performance, the Nova 3 is predictable. We say 'predictable', because it's rocking the same HiSilicon Kirin 970 chipset that we have seen several times before on Huawei phones. Nearly a year since we first saw it, it's still the flagship chipset in Huawei's lineup. Seeing it here on the mid-range Nova 3, however, isn't nearly as disappointing as it was on the P20 Pro.

It seems Huawei may be a bit worried about the performance of this chipset in context to its closest rival, the OnePlus 6. Our review unit came with an unlocked bootloader and prevented us from installing any major software benchmark, either from the Play Store or by sideloading. Confirming with our colleagues from other publications revealed their devices were similarly hampered.

Due to this restriction, we have decided to reuse our benchmarking scores from previous Huawei devices running the Kirin 970. Had the Nova 3 been capable of running these tests, we are confident the results would have been the same.

Expectedly, the Nova 3 is thrashed soundly by the OnePlus 6 in every test. The Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 inside the OnePlus 6 is a more recent flagship SoC and the Kirin 970 simply cannot compete.

GeekBench 4.1 (multi-core)

Higher is better

• OnePlus 6
  9011
• Xiaomi Mi 8
  8494
• Nokia 8 Sirocco
  6725
• Huawei P20
  6722
• Huawei P20 Pro
  6679
• Honor 10
  6591
• Xiaomi Mi 8 SE
  5908
• Xiaomi Mi A2
  4625
• Huawei P20 Lite
  3756

GeekBench 4.1 (single-core)

Higher is better

• OnePlus 6
  2450
• Xiaomi Mi 8
  2431
• Nokia 8 Sirocco
  1934
• Huawei P20 Pro
  1907
• Huawei P20
  1897
• Honor 10
  1894
• Xiaomi Mi 8 SE
  1890
• Xiaomi Mi A2
  1617
• Huawei P20 Lite
  938

AnTuTu 7

Higher is better

• OnePlus 6
  264200
• Xiaomi Mi 8
  217298
• Huawei P20 Pro
  209884
• Nokia 8 Sirocco
  209577
• Huawei P20
  206906
• Honor 10
  200440
• Xiaomi Mi 8 SE
  170218
• Xiaomi Mi A2
  130927
• Huawei P20 Lite
  87431

GFX 3.1 Manhattan (1080p offscreen)

Higher is better

• OnePlus 6
  58
• Xiaomi Mi 8
  53
• Huawei P20 Pro
  40
• Honor 10
  37
• Huawei P20
  36
• Nokia 8 Sirocco
  34
• Xiaomi Mi 8 SE
  23
• Xiaomi Mi A2
  15
• Huawei P20 Lite
  5.1

GFX 3.1 Manhattan (onscreen)

Higher is better

• OnePlus 6
  55
• Xiaomi Mi 8
  50
• Huawei P20
  39
• Honor 10
  37
• Huawei P20 Pro
  37
• Xiaomi Mi 8 SE
  22
• Nokia 8 Sirocco
  18
• Xiaomi Mi A2
  14
• Huawei P20 Lite
  4.9

Basemark OS 2.0

Higher is better

• OnePlus 6
  4440
• Xiaomi Mi 8
  3858
• Nokia 8 Sirocco
  3460
• Huawei P20
  3338
• Honor 10
  3337
• Huawei P20 Pro
  3252
• Xiaomi Mi 8 SE
  2658
• Xiaomi Mi A2
  2240
• Huawei P20 Lite
  1455

Benchmarking aside, the Nova 3 does perform reasonably well in everyday usage. There is, however, some hitching while scrolling in apps, so it's not a completely smooth experience. In comparison, the OnePlus 6 does feel noticeably smoother and faster.

Gaming performance is decent as well. Most mobile games don't hit the hardware that hard and the Nova 3 has enough grunt to take care of even modern titles such as Asphalt 9 and PUBG. The phone also comes with Huawei's GPU Turbo feature that is designed to improve performance and efficiency in games, although it currently works with only two games (one being PUBG). You can read more about our experience with GPU Turbo.

Performance in other areas was good too. The phone ships with a fast fingerprint sensor that quickly and reliably unlocked the phone every time. The Nova 3 also includes a new IR based face unlock feature. Similar to FaceID on the iPhone X, the Nova 3 uses infrared light to map your facial data and then to verify it every time. This has the advantage of being more secure than using just the front-facing camera and it also works in complete darkness. While IR is known to trip up in extremely bright sunlight, bad weather ensured we didn't encounter any problems.

Fingerprint sensor and face unlock settings

The IR based face unlock was fast but not as fast as something like the simple camera based unlock on the OnePlus 6. Unfortunately, it's also not quite at the same level of robustness as Apple's FaceID, which means it cannot be used instead of the fingerprint sensor (not that Android has any provision for such arrangement at present). It would be nice to have the option to use face unlock for things like purchasing apps, making payments and opening apps like password managers that typically work with fingerprint sensors presently. Not necessarily as a replacement for fingerprint sensors but at least as an option.