Huawei Mate 10 Pro: Outstanding still image performance

The Huawei Mate 10 Pro is an outstanding smartphone for photography enthusiasts. Featuring a dual-camera setup developed in cooperation with Leica, which combines a 12Mp RGB with a 20Mp black and white detector, it achieves an overall DxOMark Mobile score of 97 points. This ranks the Mate 10 Pro as the presently second-best device we have tested, just a single point behind the Google Pixel 2 .
Key television camera specifications :

Dual-cam with 12Mp RGB and 20Mp monochrome sensors
Dual f/1.6 lenses with Leica optics
2x lossless zoom
Phase detection and laser autofocus
Dual-tone LED flash
2160@30fps (4k) / 1080p@30/60fps video

About DxOMark Mobile tests : For scoring and analysis in our smartphone camera reviews, DxOMark engineers capture and evaluate over 1500 test images and more than 2 hours of television in both controlled lab environments and in natural indoor and outdoor scenes. This article is designed to highlight the most important results of the quiz. For more information about the DxOMark Mobile trial protocol, click here .

Test summary

The Huawei Mate 10 Pro excels for however photography, where it achieves a phenomenal Photo sub-score of 100 points, matching the presently highest Photo sub-score of the Samsung Galaxy Note 8. Its key strengths are good exposures, peculiarly in indoor conditions ; a very good wide aperture modality, which produces a balmy, but attractive bokeh effect with few artifacts ; and outstanding autofocus performance. The Huawei Mate 10 Pro is a very capable performer in video modality, excessively, achieving a video recording sub-score of 91 points. Video autofocus is fast and accurate, with good tracking capabilities and by and large abject levels of noise.

Reading: Huawei Mate 10 Pro: Outstanding still image performance

Bright light

Shooting outdoors, or in bright light conditions, the Huawei Mate 10 Pro by and large delivers good prey photograph, even in crafty high-contrast scenes, where both shadow and highlight contingent are well-preserved. episodic photograph instabilities are sometimes noticeable, however, specially on consecutive pictures in challenging light, with some underexposure discernible .
The Mate 10 Pro delivers broadly excellent exposures in bright light, with a warm but pleasant white poise .
White symmetry is broadly accurate and very reproducible across multiple frames. A slender warm color mold is visible in outdoor pictures, but remains pleasant, and some photographers will appreciate the ardent tones. occasional failures in color interpretation can result in over- impregnation for particular colors, however — particularly reds, which display a slender shade bias turning them a little pink in some outdoor shots. texture and detail are excellent on inactive scenes in undimmed faint, and although lower levels of detail are recorded in scenes that include subject gesticulate, they remain very acceptable .

Low light and Flash

Exposures in both indoor and very low-light conditions are excellent, with very available exposures at 20, 10, 5 and 1 Lux. The Huawei Mate 10 Pro besides displays a wide active range in indoor pictures, with our backlit window portrayal displaying nice detail for both the dark portrayal subject and in the bright areas in the setting .
In our challenging backlit portrait scene, the Mate 10 Pro ensured a good exposure in both the benighted and bright regions for a well-adjusted final examination solution .
texture remains identical acceptable on static scenes shot under indoor unhorse conditions, and it ’ s only in very low-light conditions where the loss of finely detail becomes more meaning. Scenes with motion are a small more challenge for the Mate 10 Pro, so if you ’ re after super-sharp shots that include motion, try to shoot in beneficial light. White balance is again accurate and repeatable in low light, with that slightly ardent but pleasant color frame discernible. Color translate, particularly in indoor light conditions, is identical strong, and although a little less saturated in extreme low light, it remains identical acceptable .
Exposures are peculiarly good indoors, with decent brightness, well saturated color and dear levels of detail — particularly in static scenes .
overall flash results on the Mate 10 pro are excellent, producing nice exposures with accurate white libra and color rendering, american samoa well as good contingent conservation. The dart output is well-centered in the skeletal system, with good frame coverage ensuring acceptable lighting in the corners. Using flash in very low-light conditions, some luminosity noise is visible in the apparition regions, but overall white balance, color translation, and detail preservation remain good .
The Mate 10 Pro ’ sulfur dual-tone LED dart module provides good frame coverage, pleasant exposures, and decent color in both flash-only and mix lighting shots .

Zoom and Bokeh

When zoom, the Huawei Mate 10 uses the high 20Mp resolution of its secondary black and white detector and computational visualize to capture a high-quality digital zoom image. With a 2x soar factor, detail preservation is not quite adenine good as on devices using optical rapid climb, such as the Apple iPhone 8 Plus and the Samsung Galaxy Note 8, but it ’ s not far off and is perceptibly better than the single-lens Google Pixel camera. Loss of detail becomes more discernible when you push the soar luger beyond the 2x mise en scene, though. You ’ ll besides find noisy edges and some plangency in zoom photos .
Huawei Mate 10 Pro, 2x zoom
Apple iPhone 8 Plus, 2x rapid climb
Google Pixel, 2x soar
With its Wide Aperture mode enabled, the Huawei Mate 10 Pro is capable of creating a bokeh effect with accurate depth estimate and good subject isolation that is even a touch better than the iPhone 8 Plus ’ mho Portrait mode. Wide Aperture besides detects early objects in the focal flat in addition to the independent subjugate, and delivers repeatable and stable results. There are some artifacts visible under closer inspection, though, and some images taken in bright light show a degree of underexposure .
Huawei Mate 10 Pro Wide Aperture mode .
Apple iPhone 8 Plus Portrait manner .

Video

The Huawei Mate 10 Pro ’ s video footage shows good exposure, gloomy levels of make noise, pleasant colors, and accurate white symmetry in all luminosity conditions. The autofocus works fast and accurately, with good track, and the video stabilization efficiently counters camera motion. On the downside, texture levels are quite low in all light conditions : under tungsten lighting, footage shows a detectable orange form, and there is some visible highlight clipping in high-contrast scenes. Some little low-frequency residual gesture is even visible despite the video recording stabilization .

Photo scores explained

The Huawei Mate 10 Pro achieves a sum photograph score of 100, which is calculated from its scores in tests that examine different aspects of its performance under different ignition conditions. In this section we ’ ll take a closer look at these image quality sub-scores .

Exposure and Contrast

Huawei Mate 10 Pro
88

An excellent overall exposure grade of 88 is comprised of a abject light mark ( 83 ), indoor score ( 93 ) and outdoor score ( 89 ) .
The Huawei Mate 10 Pro achieves good exposure scores at all inner light levels .
The device truly excels in indoor lighting conditions, with excellent exposure on our slippery backlit portrayal and full target exposures in low fall conditions down to 5 lux. In extreme low fall of just 1 Lux ( efficaciously candlelight ) exposures remain very good with functional results .
The Huawei Mate 10 Pro produces useable exposures even in extreme low light conditions of fair 1 Lux .
In outdoor conditions we had lots of success on high dynamic range scenes, with good detail preservation on the shadows and highlights in many shots. It ’ s not quite deoxyadenosine monophosphate effective as the Google Pixel or iPhone 8 for HDR exposures, but remains very adequate to in lots of situations. Points were lost for some vulnerability irregularities however, including some exposure inconsistency over consecutive frames, adenine well as some under-exposed shots, chiefly occurring on backlit high contrast scenes, when shooting towards the light .
Huawei Mate 10 Pro – HDR exposure
Google Pixel – HDR exposure
Apple iPhone 8 Plus – HDR exposure

Color

Huawei Mate 10 Pro
86

Another identical good overall score for color of 86, with excellent color rendering indoors ( 92 )

outdoors (87), as well as very acceptable results in extreme low light (80). The Huawei Mate 10 Pro’s main strength for color are consistent and repeatable white balance in all conditions, as well as good color uniformity in both indoor and outdoor conditions.

Although ashen balance is reproducible and repeatable, a rebuff warm coloring material hurl is apparent on both indoor and outdoor pictures, but whether you consider this a profit or drawback will depend on personal preference. Points were besides lost for periodic color irregularities, which were particularly obtrusive in the bolshevik hues, with a flimsy shade bias much rendering over-saturated reds that shifted towards tap .
Huawei Mate 10 Pro
Google Pixel
Apple iPhone 8 Plus

Autofocus

Huawei Mate 10 Pro
96

An outstanding overall score for autofocus, which is fast and accurate in all fall conditions. For both electrostatic scenes and scenes with submit motion, performance is phenomenal in both indoor and outdoor lighting conditions, achieving the top cross off of 100 in these cases. In identical low light, slightly lower scores of 99 for static scenes and 94 for scenes with movement were achieved, which are hush amaze results for such conditions. The Huawei Mate 10 Pro ’ mho autofocus besides shoots with about zero shutter interim, systematically recording in focus shots over 30 consecutive frames, defocusing between shots .
Autofocus abnormality and accelerate in low light ( 20 Lux ) : Over 30 straight frames and while defocusing between shots the Huawei Mate Pro 10 found focus identical promptly with about zero shutter imprison and systematically delivered in focus images on every photograph .

Texture

Huawei Mate 10 Pro
67

The Mate 10 Pro achieves a commodity, if not amazing, score for texture, with the best results on inactive scenes in both indoor and outdoor fall conditions. In lower ignite conditions between 1 to 20 lux less all right detail is preserved on static scenes, but with acutance ( asperity ) above 50 % at 1 lux, rising to 80 % at 20 lux, the device is able of bang-up very well detail conservation on inactive scenes. Evaluating scenes with subject drift, the greatest detail is preserved in very bright conditions outdoors. resultant role indoors remain very satisfactory besides, but expect a detectable loss of detail in very abject light images ( below 20 lux ) on scenes with subject movement.

texture score per lighting condition and apparent motion in the scene
On hand-held images, using the DxOMark test chart in the lab, you can see that in very undimmed light ( 1000 lux ), exceptional sharpness is achieved on inactive scenes and even in lower light conditions of 20 and 10 lux detail preservation remains identical good .
Huawei Mate 10 Pro, 1000 Lux,
craw
Huawei Mate 10 Pro, 20 Lux, cultivate
Huawei Mate 10 Pro, 10 Lux, craw

Noise

Huawei Mate 10 Pro
71

A effective score for noise with the best results achieved in bright light conditions. Luminance noise is very slightly visible in 100 % crops in areas of undifferentiated color such as the flip in outdoor conditions, but it ’ s alone in truth visible at close inspection and doesn ’ deoxythymidine monophosphate take away from the overall effigy. Under indoor lighting conditions, luminosity noise is more visible but it ’ south reasonably well controlled under indoor lighting between 100 to 20 lux, with significant deterioration of image quality only becoming discernible in extreme moo light up between 1 and 5 lux .
Huawei Mate 10 Pro, 100 Lux, crop
Huawei Mate 10 Pro, 20 Lux, snip
Huawei Mate 10 Pro, 5 Lux, snip

Artifacts

Huawei Mate 10 Pro
66

A reasonably low, but acceptable grade of 66 for artefacts. The most serious publish is the blocking effect, which is regularly visible in areas of uniform color, particularly the sky. Flare is besides sometimes visible, but normally only when shooting directly into the light on slippery senior high school contrast scenes. A cyan shift, airless to over impregnation, was besides observed in many outdoor scenes affecting the blue color of the sky .
In areas in uniform color, notably the clear blue flip, a barricade artifact is discernible .
In a overstate opinion, you can distinctly see the blocking artifact, which appears as light blocks of color .

Flash

Huawei Mate 10 Pro
84

A identical thoroughly score for flare, with systematically good results on both flash merely and using flash in assorted light conditions. The chief strengths of flash pictures are accurate exposures, accurate and repeatable white balance wheel and well control artefacts, although a visible crimson eye effect is sometimes visible on flash only portraits. Some corner shading occurs, resulting in a build up of noise in the shadow areas, but it ’ randomness far from the worse we ’ ve seen and the brassy is well-centred in the inning .

Zoom

Huawei Mate 10 Pro
40

Despite the absence of a second telephotograph lens the Huawei Mate 10 Pro achieves a very goodly seduce for soar. At 2x soar the lossless soar effect applied using the 20Mp monochromatic detector achieves results about a dependable as devices featuring a second telephotograph lens, such as the iPhone 8 Plus, in identical bright light conditions, where good detail is maintained. It ’ s not quite adenine good at 2x in lower light conditions, with the loss of fine detail apparent at 100 lux and a significant loss of detail in identical humble light of 20 lux and below .
In very bright conditions of 1000 lux, 4x soar shots are equitable about acceptable, but in lower sparkle or in any lighting conditions at 8x the loss of detail and visible luminosity noise significantly shock image choice. You can see from the images below at 8x rapid climb the iPhone 8 Plus ’ s telephotograph lens does a better speculate of maintaining all right detail on mid rate soar shots, with fewer artifacts such as ringing visible .
Huawei Mate 10 Pro, 8x soar
iPhone 8 Plus, 8x rapid climb

Bokeh

Huawei Mate 10 Pro
50

The Huawei Mate 10 Pro ’ randomness Wide Aperture mood does a identical goodly subcontract of blurring the background in both indoor and outdoor conditions. Its key persuasiveness is its shallow depth of field, which has an attractive film over. The blur is not a aggressive as we ’ ve seen on some early devices however, and the classic circular highlights that you ’ d expect to see with an optical bokeh effect are not rendered. The effect is very repeatable however, with consistent results achieved across consecutive frames, and very few artefacts are visible around the foreground topic, resulting in a please concluding portrayal .
The Mate Pro 10 ’ randomness bokeh simulation mode delivers a subtle but very attractive background confuse affect with minimal artefacts visible around the portrait .

Video scores explained

The Huawei Mate 10 Pro is a very able device for video recording, although with a slenderly lower television sub mark of 81 overall, it ’ s not quite as strong here as it is with stills. category scores for television include Exposure ( 81 ), Color ( 85 ), Autofcous ( 89 ), Texture ( 48 ), Noise ( 77 ), Artefacts ( 87 )

Stabilization (86). Its stand out performance is for video is autofocus, where, like with stills, it is fast and accurate, with good tracking capabilities in all lighting conditions.

color try is besides identical good, with pleasant colors and accurate white counterweight in all conditions. Although that slender warm color draw we saw with stills persists on video recording under tungsten ignition, it ’ s not unattractive, and a slender cyan shift is visible in skies shooting television outdoors. aim exposures are generally accurate, with the best exposures achieved in bright light conditions, although dynamic range is a short limited shooting eminent contrast scenes. In indoor conditions, television exposures remain good and fairly acceptable in extreme point moo inner light, if a little under exposed, but make noise is well controlled on first gear light up videos, which is a bonus. For stabilization, dear motion reduction is applied on both indoor and outdoor videos, with a flimsy residual gesture .

Conclusion: Dual-camera in a different (but excellent) way

With its RGB/monochrome dual-camera concept, Huawei is following a different concept than most other manufacturers, but the Mate 10 Pro ’ second class-leading even picture results show that the chinese manufacturer is on the right way, and that dear rapid climb and bokeh results can be achieved without a longer focal distance on the secondary camera. The Mate 10 Pro is no slouch in video modality, either. It ’ s not quite on the same outstanding grade as for stills, but is however capable of delivering a identical solid video recording performance all around .
97
mobile
100
photograph