The HUAWEI nova 13 is an important smartphone for HUAWEI in South Africa as it is competing in the highly competitive midrange for a broad range of users, ranging from content creators, through to tech-savvy fashion-forward youths, so it must boast an attractive design, great photography and videography capabilities, and good battery life and luckily this HUAWEI midranger does not disappoint in any of these regards.
Tipping the smartphone scales at 195 g and measuring in at a pocketable and grip-friendly 161.4 x 75.3 x 6.98 mm, the HUAWEI nova 13 packs an eye-catching dynamic plaid texture design that makes it a bold standout as well as provides it with a unique attitude compared to rivals in this pricerange.
Even the camera ring dubbed Super Star Orbit Ring by HUAWEI draws some admiring glares to the inherit capabilities provided by the 50 MP Ultra Vision Camera (F1.9 aperture) that is coupled with an 8 MP Ultra-Wide Macro Camera (F2.2 aperture) with the smartphone able to capture fantastic stills in virtually any conditions along with good looking 4K video.
It is worth noting with AI being the buzzword in the industry that HUAWEI has included some AI camera features with this smartphone and these actually include some of the most handy ones we’ve come across thus far. AI Best Expression for instance enables you to effortlessly fix accidents in photos by capturing burst shots of your selfies or groupies and then allowing you to swap out accidents like dodgy expressions or closed eyes for instance, with the best smile or wow moment expressions from the subjects which works a treat and feels like modern magic.
The selfie shooter too is pretty epic, and in this instance is a 60 MP Front Ultra-Wide Portrait Camera (F2.4 aperture) camera that takes stunning portraits and selfies whilst also being capable of 4K video recording to you should look good on video calls if using your smartphone in a pinch or shooting content.
You review the photos, play the latest mobile gaming titles, and consume your multimedia content on the nova 13’s stunning 6.7″ FHD+ (2412 × 1084) OLED which sports a 120 Hz refresh rate as well making things buttery smooth while gaming or simply navigating EMUI 14.2. Boosting that snappiness is the CPU powering the smartphone, which in this case is a Kirin 8000 Octa-core processor.
In terms of other features, you get a large 5000 mAh battery that will get you through a working day, but if your mobile gaming sessions or content shooting leaves you in need of a charge, you will be happy to know that the nova 13 supports 100W HUAWEI SuperCharge Turbo which is still the fastest charge available and is accessible right out of the box courtesy of HUAWEI’s fast charger that is included.
One thing to note in terms of future-proofing is the fact that you don’t get 5G connectivity but the 4G LTE speeds are still good and there are still not many 5G enabled coverage areas around South Africa.
At the end of the day this good looking midranger ticks all the feature, spec, and design appeal boxes and is an excellent choice at its RRP of R10999 via HUAWEI’s website (R2000 discount currently available). For that money, you can also look at Samsung’s Galaxy A56 5G or an iPhone 13.
