Honor's H9 smartphone features audio tuned by a Grammy-winner

Honor has announced a brand-new flagship smartphone, the H9.

Available to order today for £380, and on contract starting early next month, the H9 is available in three colours: Glacier (grey), Sapphire (blue) or Midnight (black).

It's running Android 7.0, packs 4GB of RAM and 64GB of ROM (and has a microSD card slot to boost that by up to 256GB). The screen is 5.15in across and has a 1920 x 1080 full HD resolution. Bluetooth is of the 4.2 variety, there's a 3200 mAh battery on board (with fast-charging technology via USB-C) and, praise be, there's a 3.5mm headphone socket in the 7.5mm thick frame.

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The main camera is a 12 MP dual-lens affair, while the front-facer is 8 MP.

Audio file compatibility runs from MP3 to FLAC. Honor has paid special attention to audio quality, retaining Grammy-winner Rainer Maillard to fine-tune the H9's sound and teaming with Monster on something called the Honor Purity equaliser.

The body of the phone is made from glass and metal, with a subtly curved rear panel and fingerprint security.

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Simon Lucas is a technology journalist, with a strong emphasis on the audio/video side of consumer electronics and home entertainment, and has been since 2003. He worked for more than 14 years at What Hi-Fi?, the last six of which were spent as the editor of the magazine and website. Since then he's written for Wired, The Guardian, TechRadar, Stuff, GQ and many more besides. 

In the course of his career he's developed a pretty deep understanding of the way both the publishing and the electronics industries function, as well as the sort of intimate knowledge of audio products (both specific and general) that can make people very wary of him at parties.