Review: HTC One A9 "The Android Iphone"

When the history of Android is written, HTC’s name will go down as one of the early innovators that propelled the young platform to its fullest potential. This Taiwanese company built the first ever Android phone as well as the first Nexus. But when HTC’s history is recorded, the One A9 smartphone will stand out as that time the Android pioneer tried to build an iPhone.

Ever since the One M7 at the start of 2013, HTC has been cultivating a signature aluminum unibody design, characterized by a particular mix of subtle curves and precise straight lines. The company’s designers have spoken about wanting to keep its phonesrecognizable as HTC products at first sight, and this year’s One M9 stayed true to that ethos with a remix of its two predecessors’ designs. The new One A9, however, discards much of that heritage and instead opts for the iPhone look. The back has been flattened, the stereo speakers have been replaced by a new home button with a built-in fingerprint reader, and the corners now have the exact same radius as the iPhone’s. There’s no question about it: this is an iPhone clone.

 

HTC didn’t stop at just copying the iPhone’s looks. The One A9’s battery is closer in size to the iPhone’s than the Android average, and the rest of its specs also appear to pay no mind to the usual Android spec race. Instead, HTC is prioritizing software — with the 5-inch One A9 being the first non-Nexus device to ship with the latest Android Marshmallow — and aiming to create an integrated and optimized user experience.

It’s like HTC took a look at Apple and Google, the two biggest winners of the mobile world, and decided that the way to revitalize its own slumping fortunes was to combine the best of both. Apple’s appealing form and Google’s multifaceted function.

THE DESIGN IS GRACEFUL IN ITS ELEGANCE, DISGRACEFUL IN ITS COPYING

If you read the One A9’s spec sheet, you’d immediately classify it as a mid-range phone with nothing special about it. Which is precisely why you shouldn’t read spec sheets. Using the One A9 has shown me a phone that makes the absolute most of its components, resulting in a device that compares favorably with most other companies' flagship smartphones.

 

It all starts with the design. I’m smitten with it. Yes, it has those iPhone-aping qualities of thinness, lightness, and pleasingly rounded sides, but HTC has added a couple of extra touches that I also really enjoy. The ridged power button, very much in the style seen on Motorola’s recent phones, is easy to find by touch alone, thanks to the tactile contrast between its roughness and the A9’s otherwise smooth form. Together with the slight camera bump, the power button is my anchor point for recognizing which way is up when pulling the phone out of my pocket1.

This may sound like a small matter until you use something perfectly symmetrical like Sony’s Xperia series and keep bringing the phone’s back to your face.

The capacitive home key can’t be pressed in, which I initially thought would be a downside relative to the iPhone or Galaxy phones with real buttons, but I actually prefer HTC’s implementation. It makes unlocking the phone more convenient, whether it’s resting on my desk or tucked away in a pocket. With the integrated fingerprint reader, I only need to find the home button and cover it with my thumb while pulling the phone out of a pocket and by the time I’ve got it in front of me, the Android home screen is already waiting for me.

UNBELIEVABLY LIGHT AND EASY TO HANDLE

The two most common things said about aluminum-encased smartphones are that they feel more premium because of the material, but also that they’re more slippery than conventional handsets. Both are true of the One A9. I absolutely love holding and using this phone, and I never get the feeling that it’s a cheap iPhone imitation — HTC has copied every bit of the quality of Apple’s phone along with the look2. But as an experienced iPhone user, I also know how easily that phone can slip out of its user’s grasp when handled without a case — the HTC One matches that aspect of it too.

If you’re curious, HTC is using Al 6063 grade aluminum in the One A9, which the company says was chosen for having "the broadest range of textures and subtle color options."

HTC extends the aesthetic appeal of the One A9 by using a very good AMOLED display. This 5-inch, 1080p panel reminds me of Samsung’s excellent Galaxy S6 screen. The latter has a much greater pixel density, however the advantage that grants over the One A9 is pretty much ephemeral. HTC’s display looks just as organic, just as much like a real piece of printed paper sitting atop the glass, as Samsung’s. Viewing angles, contrast, and even color accuracy — usually a weak point for AMOLED screens — are all top notch on the A9. I love the warmth and vibrancy of its colors. They are just right, feeling punchy without straying into looking artificial.

THE FINGERPRINT READER IS A GREAT ADDITION

Another good engineering choice made by HTC is the removal of the company’s famed stereo BoomSound speakers. That’s made the new fingerprint reader3 possible, and I’d much rather have that than really loud stereo speakers on my phone. HTC has instead focused its audio efforts on improving the listening experience via headphones, integrating a powerful amp, supporting high-res audio and Dolby Surround Sound, and even laying out the internal circuit board to minimize electrical distortion.

It’s very quickly become the norm for fingerprint readers on smartphones to be really fast and accurate, and the One A9 is no exception. You can expect performance as good as the iPhone’s Touch ID from this device.

Testing it with a set of high-end Audeze EL-8 headphones, I actually got to a louder volume with the One A9 than I could achieve with my iMac, and the sound was crystal clear at all times. It’s the attention to details like these that makes the difference between the best phones and the rest. You don’t need to be aware of the technical spec, nor to even know what HTC has done behind the scenes, to better enjoy listening to music on this phone.

So the One A9 has great sound, a great display, and a great, if unoriginal, design. All of that could be said of the One M9 that came before it, and the big question with the A9 was whether it would address its predecessor’s biggest weakness: the camera. The good news is that, yes, this is HTC’s best camera to date and it marks a significant improvement over the One M9’s mediocrity. The bad news is that HTC’s best is still only decent by wider industry standards.

CAMERA PERFORMANCE IS NO LONGER A BIG PROBLEM, BUT NEITHER IS IT A STRENGTH

The best thing about the One A9’s camera is its quickness. The phone can go from my pocket to shooting a photo and back in my pocket within a handful of seconds. And I can be reasonably assured of getting a good shot because this is the first One device since 2013’s M7 to include optical image stabilization. The One A9’s exposure metering and white balance are also reliably accurate. That makes the camera much more forgiving to sloppy operation, which, if we’re honest, is the default way we all use our phones, and thus very important to get right.