Let's just get to the elephant in the room immediately: yes, the HTC One A9 bears a strong resemblance to the iPhone 6s (Review). The flat metal back, thickness, unibody design, curved corners, antenna lines, protruding camera, and speaker grille at the bottom are all similar to design cues on Apple's flagship. However, the One A9 is larger than the 6s, has prominent HTC logos at the back and in front, and has its rear camera positioned at the centre instead of in the upper left corner.
It's also important to note that the some of these design elements such as the antenna lines, metallic unibody and curved corners were used by HTC long before the iPhone 6 and 6s launched. Additionally, the front is patently different from the iPhone and borrows cues from the HTC One M9+ (such as the fingerprint sensor). While there are certainly similarities, we are of the opinion that it is unfair to say that HTC has blatantly copied the iPhone, or designed the A9 with the sole intention of piggybacking on the success of Apple's design.
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Now that we have that out of the way, we feel that the HTC One A9 is a fantastic looking smartphone. It's slim, sleek, stunning in all of its colour options, and still easy to handle. The power and volume buttons are on the right; the speaker grille, Micro-USB port and 3.5mm socket are at the bottom; and the SIM and microSD slots are on the left. The power button has a rough texture to help you distinguish it from the volume rocker, which is a useful touch.
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The front of the phone has the selfie camera, earpiece, and proximity sensor at the top, and the fingerprint sensor at the bottom. The phone doesn't have capacitive Android keys, instead using on-screen keys for those functions. The fingerprint sensor doubles up as a home key, but this can be disabled if you prefer. The phone can be woken using motion launch gestures or by touching the fingerprint sensor. If you've activated the sensor, simply keeping your finger on the scanner will quickly unlock your phone; first waking it and then reading your fingerprint. You can store up to five fingerprints, which can be used to unlock the phone and interact with supported apps such as 1Password.
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The screen of the HTC One A9 is a 5-inch full-HD Amoled panel with Corning Gorilla Glass 3 protection. As is the case with Amoled screens, there is a hint of warmth in the colour tone, although this isn't bothersome in any way. We personally prefer a little bit of warmth in the tones, as this makes the screen easier on the eyes. Colours pop and blacks are deep, which makes visuals appear more dramatic and dynamic. Above all, sharpness is absolutely fantastic, and on the whole the screen is nothing short of brilliant for a full-HD panel.
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Specifications and software
The HTC One A9 is powered by the 1.5GHz octa-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 617 SoC, and is one of only a handful of phones that have adopted this processor. Compared to its series predecessors, the 615 and 616, the 617 has been designed to offer better performance and battery life as well as higher LTE speeds, better Wi-Fi handling capabilities, and support for Qualcomm Quick Charge 3.0. The HTC One A9 supports Quick Charge 2.0 out-of-the-box, but unfortunately doesn't ship with a compatible charger, which is annoying, and feels to us like a blatant case of cost cutting. However, we tried charging the one with a third-party Quick Charge 2.0-compatible charger, and charging was noticeably quicker, with the phone drawing power much more rapidly than before.
Apart from that, the One A9 also has 3GB of RAM, 32GB of internal storage (expandable by up to 200GB using a microSD card), Wi-Fi 802.11n as well as 802.11ac, and 4G connectivity on its single nano-SIM slot (FDD Band 3 and TDD Band 40 both supported). There's also a 2150mAh battery, Bluetooth 4.1 with apt-X, and HTC's Boomsound audio enhancement software built in. The A9 is incredibly well-specced, and is practically flagship-grade in many ways.
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After the Nexus 5X (Review) and Nexus 6P (Review), the HTC One A9 was one of the first smartphones to launch with Android 6.0 out-of-the-box. All of Marshmallow's key features are present and proper, including Doze Mode, Now On Tap and app permissions. Performance and snappiness around the system is brilliant as well.
HTC, gave us assurances of quick system updates at launch, promising the latest firmware updates within 15 days of Nexus devices getting them. Sure enough, an OTA update to Android 6.0.1 was available when we checked. Apart from incremental fixes and security updates, it also brings support for Qualcomm Quick Charge 3.0.
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Layered on top is HTC's Sense UI, now in its seventh iteration. The A9 runs a slightly tweaked version of the interface called Sense 7.0_g, which minimises Sense's influence, relying more on core Android functionality for certain things. This doesn't mean that the phone lacks the typical HTC touches, as Sense is still firmly in control of the device, but the optimisation makes the phone a little bit better when it comes to performance and functionality.
Key differences we noticed in this version of Sense are that the Quick Settings menu, notifications shade and app switcher are the same as those on stock Android, and certain HTC apps such as HTC Backup, HTC Music, the HTC Internet browser and Scribble have been removed. Instead, focus is placed on using Google apps such as Drive, Chrome and Play Music for those functions. However, a lot of signature Sense apps, such as Calendar, Clock, Gallery, Camera, Weather and Sense Home remain present, giving the One A9 the best of both worlds. Sense itself is as good as it has always been, with an excellent combination of aesthetics, ease of use and performance.
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Camera
The HTC One A9 has a 13-megapixel primary camera with dual-tone LED flash, and a 4-megapixel 'Ultrapixel' front camera. Both are capable of recording full-HD video, and modes such as manual, hyperlapse, slow-motion video and panorama are all present. HDR and optical image stabilisation are both in place as well.
The HTC Camera app is a little bit different from the ones we've seen on previous HTC devices, but remains as easy and comfortable to use as always. Basic controls such as the flash, camera switcher and HDR buttons are within easy reach, while specific modes such as panorama, pro, hyperlapse and slow-motion video can be reached through a mode menu. Recording video is a one-step procedure, and various settings can be tweaked, such as photo and video resolution, geotagging, grid and more. It's quick and easy to use, and you can also set up motion launch gestures to quickly launch the camera from sleep mod
