Huawei P60 series introduced with variable aperture lens, two-way satellite messaging

23 March 2023

Huawei just announced its P60 series of phones with three entries. There’s the vanilla Huawei P60, the Huawei P60 Pro and the Huawei P60 Art, which brings a more avant-garde design to the series.

All three phones share the same core hardware - 6.67-inch LTPO OLED screen with FHD+ resolution (1220×2700 px) and a 1-120Hz refresh rate. The panels are protected by Kunlun glass and sport a built-in fingerprint scanner.

Cameras are the P60 series’ forte so let’s switch our focus for a bit. All three phones share the same 48MP main camera with an RYYB sensor and OIS. The sensor brings an f/1.4-f/4.0 ten-speed variable aperture with automatic scene-based switching.

This approach should capture the optimal amount of light, depending on the shooting environment. Huawei’s marketing materials are praising the new RYYB sensor’s light-capturing abilities as industry-leading. The main cam also supports up to 4K video recording.

Moving on to the ultrawide sensor – P60 and P60 Pro share the same 13MP unit with f/2.2 aperture while P60 Art gets a 40MP sensor with the same aperture. Up next is the telephoto lens – P60 brings a 12MP telephoto module with an f/3.4 aperture, OIS and 125mm equivalent lens. P60 Pro and P60 Art get fancier 48MP telephoto modules with OIS and a 90mm equivalent lens capable of 3.5x optical and 100x digital zoom.

The telephoto lens on P60 Pro and P60 Art has an f/2.1 aperture, which should fare much better in night shots than competing modules from other makers. Huawei says its new 48MP telephoto lens can capture the largest amount of light in the industry which is a pretty bold claim. The sensor also features three-axis stabilization.

The P60 series is equipped with Huawei’s XD Fusion Pro texture engine, which strives to reproduce object textures as close to the way they are perceived by the human eye.

All three P60 phones are equipped with the Snapdragon 8+ 4G chipset – an LTE-only version of the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 SoC from last year.

Another noteworthy feature on the P60 series is their ability to send and receive Beidou satellite messages. You can send and receive text messages when there’s no ground signal around but this feature will be limited to China.

Huawei P60 and P60 Pro bring 4,815 mAh batteries with 66W wired charging on the vanilla model and 88W on the Pro. Both versions also support 50W wireless charging. P60 Art packs a slightly larger battery capacity at 5,100 mAh and the cell is silicon-carbon, providing higher energy density compared to its lithium-ion-based counterparts. All three phones boot Harmony OS 3.1 out of the box and are IP68 rated.

Huawei P60 and P60 Pro come in Feather Purple, Feather Black, Emerald Emerald as well as a limited Rococo White option. P60 Art comes in Blue Sea and Quicksand Gold colors.

Pricing for the P60 starts at CNY 4,488 ($657) for the base 128GB trim and goes up to CNY 5,988 ($877) for the 512GB model.

P60 Pro starts at CNY 6,988 ($1,023) for the 256GB model and CNY 7,988 ($1,170) for the 512GB version.

P60 Art comes in two versions – 512GB for CNY 8,988 ($1,316) and a 1TB model for CNY ($1,610).

Open sales for the P60 and P60 Pro in China start on March 30. Huawei P60 Art will be available from April 7. International pricing and availability will be detailed at a later date.