Huawei’s pitch for its P-series phones is that they’re all about style, with gently-curved edges around a relatively restrained front bezel, at least at the sides. This isn’t a Galaxy S8 in bezel terms, but it’s equally not cursed with much in the way of excess bulk.
We live in an age of increasingly large and tall premium smartphones, where the smaller models are often those with serious compromises, so it’s genuinely pleasant to see Huawei bringing the internal processor goods in a phone that comes with a 5.1-inch display. That smaller display allows the P10 to have dimensions of just 145.3x69.3x6.98mm with a carrying weight of just 145 grams. It’s been a while since I’ve tested a phone that’s as small, light and pleasant such that I could forget it was in my pocket until it started ringing.
A very large part of the Huawei P10’s appeal is in the extensive colour range that Huawei produces the phone in. No, you’re not going to love every single colour choice, but some of them are truly striking if you like ostentatious behaviour while still leaving a few more sedate choices for the more conservative phone buyer. I personally can’t see the appeal in the green-coloured (sorry, Pantone "Greenery") P10, but to each their own.
The P10 also has a few more subtle design notes that make it stand out. The power button is ridged (a trick Huawei seems to have *ahem* “borrowed” from the HTC 10) and also very subtly ringed in red. This stands out on some handset colours more than others, but it’s a lovely touch nonetheless.
The dual-lens camera array on the rear of the phone sits perfectly flush with the phone body, so there’s no camera bump at all. Like the iPhone 7, the Huawei P10’s front button isn’t a button at all, but instead a tiny motor sitting behind a flat plate. They’re not all original touches, but they’re handled well and with a good sense of style.
Huawei has similarly lifted the idea from Apple of a fixed fingerprint sensor that pretends to be a button, but even that’s licensed technology anyway. What Huawei has done that’s remarkably smart is to use the one button to cover all the standard Android interface basics.
It’s a fine and fast fingerprint sensor of course, but beyond that, if you tap lightly it acts as a back button, while a tap-and-hold takes you back to the home screen. Swiping across the button from the left brings up your recent apps list.
The one mystifying aspect here is that this rather wonderful feature is disabled by default, so if you don't know it's present, you might only use onscreen navigation elements and curse the fingerprint sensor as a waste of space.
There are only a few aspects of the P10 that left us wanting. For one, while the larger P10 Plus sports a WQHD display, the P10 makes do with a 1080p display instead. Ridiculously high resolutions are perhaps overkill on smaller screens, but you can get 1080p on true budget phones these days, and it’s not a great compliment to the P10’s excellent camera either.
It's also a little disappointing that the P10 doesn't include any sort of water resistance. It’s clearly a cost-saving measure that would otherwise tilt the P10’s pricing up unacceptably, but we're seeing it increasingly as a key feature for premium phones. Without it, you get the P10 wet at your own risk.