Huawei Pura 90s Pro Max review

New fixed-lens telephoto, main camera loses the 1.0" type sensor

The highest-tier Pura for this year bridges the gap between last year's Pro+ and Ultra and streamlines a few hardware aspects. The mostly gimmicky (if intriguing in principle) switchable lens telephoto of the Ultra has been replaced by a new, more conventional solution, that's also quite superior to the Pro+'s setup. The main camera, meanwhile, has gotten a smaller sensor (1-inchers have been steadily disappearing), but gets to keep the variable aperture.

The new telephoto camera uses a 200MP 1/1.28" sensor - same size as the one in the Pura 80 Ultra which is also a tie for the largest sensor in a telephoto camera with the Oppo Find X9 Ultra. It's not the same OmniVision OV52A imager found on the Oppo, however, and it's seemingly not the one from the Pura 80 Ultra either, since Huawei is explicitly stating that theirs has an RYYB subpixel array and it's the first of that kind in the industry (Huawei has a long history of preferring Yellow sub-pixels over Green). A certain SmartSense model was floated in earlier reports, called the SCC80XS, but we currently have no way of confirming it.

The lens is longer than the one on the Find, with the Pura 90s Pro Max offering 4x zoom (3x on the Oppo), with the usual caveat that Huawei focal lengths are never what they appear. Here, the phone reports an 89mm equivalent in hardware apps, while the photos have 96mm in the respective EXIF field. Either way, the lens is stabilized and is CIPA-rated for up to 7 stops of stabilization.

The Pura 80 Ultra's optical zoom-in functionality (which itself wasn't entirely honest) is gone for the 90s Pro Max, and getting more reach beyond the nominal 4x will require some in-sensor remosaicking action, which the 200MP imager should be well-equipped to deliver. Why they insist on 10x instead of 8x, remains a mystery.

On the main camera, we're looking at another 1/1.28" sensor, only this time it's a 50MP one. It's also got an RYYB subpixel arrangement, of course. Now, the previous generation had 1.0" type sensors on the main cameras on all but the vanilla model (so the Pro, Pro+ and Ultra), but this time it's a new LOFIC (Lateral Overflow Integration Capacitor) type sensor, so it should be at least as good, maybe. The lens has OIS and a variable aperture in the f/1.4-f/4.0 range (another typical Huawei feature).

The trio of cameras on the back is completed by the ultrawide that has a 13mm equivalent lens with an f/2.2 aperture and autofocus. The sensor is also a Huawei staple - a 40MP RYYB unit.

There's also what Huawei calls True-to-Color camera, which is a dedicated spectral sensor for more granular color temperature sensing and accurate white balance in complex lighting. They're claiming a 43% improvement in 'color restoration accuracy' compared to the Pura 80 generation, too. Specific scenes should be rendered a lot better than on rivals, they say, like high saturation mixed lighting (a pretty extreme pink/orange/purple neon test setup was shown) and high saturation blue lighting (think of an underwater aquarium).

Over on the front, there's a fairly modest 13MP selfie camera - same one as on the entire previous generation in the lineup. It's still got a wide 21mm lens and it has autofocus, so it's not entirely basic - it's just the sensor that sounds a little old-school at first glance.

• Wide (main): 50MP (1/1.28", 1.22µm - 2.44µm), f/1.6-f/4.0, 24mm, PDAF (12cm - ∞), Laser AF, PDAF, OIS; 4K60 video recording
• Ultrawide: 40MP, f/2.2, 13mm, PDAF; 4K60.
• Telephoto: 200MP (1/1.28", 0.61µm-2.44µm), f/2.6, 89/96mm, PDAF (15cm - ∞), OIS; 4K60.
• Front camera: 13MP, f/2.0, 21mm, PDAF; 4K60.

The EU-bound versions of the Pura 90s Pro Max will have a smallish subset of the company's camera-related AI smarts. What will be missing is AI Remove (object eraser), AI Best Expression (all of the group members' smiles from multiple images brought into a single shot), AI Move (moving elements around the image after the fact), and AI De-glare (removing reflections).

Either way though, the AI Composition functionality will be on board, and it's the one that Huawei is most proud of, it seems. It offers scene and intent understanding, plus composition, focal length and aspect ratio assistance. Huawei says the Pura 90s Pro Max's AI Composition algorithms are vastly more capable than competitors' efforts and offer continuous zoom suggestions in the 1x-10x range (as opposed to no cross-lens switching on other models), pitch/tilt and camera position guidance, and recognition of humans, pets, and architecture.

Daylight photo quality

Main camera

The Pura 90s Pro Max's main camera takes excellent daytime photos. Detail is great and has a fine structure that makes even random textures look good. Colors have plenty of pop without overdoing it and the white balance is reliable. Dynamic range is excellent too.

Daylight samples, main camera (1x)

Images captured in the 25MP mode are also looking good, though they don't quite have that absolute per-pixel definition of the 'regular' 12.6MP shots. If you stare long and hard at head-to-head comparisons, you might be able to spot a smidge of extra detail here or there, but otherwise, it's mostly just a bigger image, not a more detailed one.

Daylight samples, main camera (1x), 25MP

The sensor might be a little smaller, but the lens is now a little brighter, and it still offers a variable aperture capability, so we did a few comparison sets at the two ends of the aperture range as well as two intermediate steps. As before, you only get to set the aperture in Pro mode, while in Photo mode the phone will pick the setting for you (but in reality it will stick to f/2.0 in most casual daytime scenarios).

Logically, the main observable difference is in the depth of field, and that's particularly obvious with nearby subjects. If you want to make sure you get more of your subject in focus, opt for the smaller aperture, though that will inevitably mean busier backgrounds. With distant subjects, there's no real sharpness benefit in shooting at f/4.0 - in fact, it just might hurt sharpness a tiny bit, compared to the 'default' f/2.0.

Daylight samples, main camera (1x), Pro mode: f/1.4 • f/2.0 • f/2.8 • f/4.0

The Pura 90s Pro Max does excel at portraits too. At 1x you get lively skin tones, excellent facial detail and a decent amount of subject separation. Portrait mode adds a bit of computational blur, and it's not half bad either.

Daylight samples, main camera (1x), Photo mode

Daylight samples, main camera (1x), Portrait mode

The full-res 50MP images from the main camera may actually be capable of resolving a little extra detail though that's not going to be a true 50MP worth of it. You could adopt a workflow where you shoot in 50MP and then post-process your images down to the default 12.6MP yourself and the results will potentially be marginally better than the regular results, though it remains debatable whether it's worth it.

Daylight samples, main camera (1x), 50MP

Daylight samples, main camera (1x), 50MP to 12.6MP conversion

The out-of-camera 2x zoom shots are very good, with random textures like foliage rendered well most of the time and fine straight lines remaining fine and straight.

Daylight samples, main camera (2x)

The 25MP toggle works at 2x zoom too, and here it's a more pronounced case of larger, not more detailed images.

Daylight samples, main camera (2x), 25MP

2x headshots turn out very good as well, if not quite as crisp on a pixel level. We don't think the Portrait mode's extra blur is needed here, but the option is there for you.

Daylight samples, main camera (2x), Photo mode

Daylight samples, main camera (2x), Portrait mode

Telephoto camera

As we've come to expect from Huaweis, the telephoto camera will serve you a slightly cropped in version (96mm reported focal length equivalent))of its native field of view (89mm) when you're shooting in binned down resolutions (12.6MP and the enhanced 25MP mode) vs the high-res mode (which captures 50MP shots, not 200MP) - it's all part of the company's camera peculiarities.

Regardless of the inner workings that get you there, the 4x zoom photos are pretty great. Detail is very good, even if grass can look a little... abrasive. We'd tone down contrast if this was up to us, but ultimately dynamic range is great as well. We observed no white balancing blunders and color rendition is easy to like.

Daylight samples, telephoto camera (4x)

Again, we're not too sure about the 25MP mode - it's not that the photos are bad, they just don't seem to be meaningfully better than the 12.6MP ones.

Daylight samples, telephoto camera (4x), 25MP

The High-res mode will save 50MP photos and those are reasonably respectable - again, you'll need to have a pretty specific use case to actually benefit from those.

Daylight samples, telephoto camera (4x), 50MP

The 4x zoom camera is probably your best bet for portraiture. If you're looking for head-and-shoulders framing, a fair bit of compression, and some good subject separation without having to resort to Portrait mode, that's what you're going to get. Facial detail is superb as well.

We'll admit that the out-of-focus areas can be a bit nervous if you have busy backgrounds, so while the separation is there, the background just might be a little distracting nonetheless - Portrait mode will blur that away. That said, its action is a bit excessive and the results may look artificial. You have no way of controlling the blur level in the viewfinder, but you can adjust it in the gallery after the fact.

Daylight samples, telephoto camera (4x), Photo mode

Daylight samples, telephoto camera (4x), Portrait mode

Portrait mode offers another focal length preset labeled 5.6x which translates to 134mm - another classic focal length for portraiture (technically the classic is 135mm, of course). The pixel-level quality is still great, the blur is still a bit much, probably.

Daylight samples, telephoto camera (5.6x), Portrait mode

The phone's next zoom level shortcut is 10x, but we figured we'd pinch to zoom to 8x for a few shots, which we're treating as 2x from the telephoto camera's native focal length, though it's never clear with Huawei's zoom practices. Either way, we'd rate the results as very good in terms of sharpness and detail, with the rest being the same as the 4x images. So pretty great stuff at 8x then.

Daylight samples, telephoto camera (8x)

With that in mind, you'll be forgiven for being annoyed by Huawei's decision to make 10x the go-to zoom level in the viewfinder. Sure, the photos are alright, but they do have more of a dreamy look with a 'generated' rendition of detail, instead of the more realistic take of the 8x shots. We'd appreciate a shortcut to 8x in the viewfinder.

Daylight samples, telephoto camera (10x)

Ultrawide camera

On the ultrawide end we're also getting very good results. The phone saves 12.6MP photos by default to match the resolutions from the other cameras, even though here it's starting from a 40MP sensor. Even so, detail is very good for an ultrawide camera, a flagship-grade one too, as long as you're shooting in well-lit scenes - shadows in indoor scenarios will likely be soft-ish. Global properties are also up to a high standard, with a wide dynamic range and likeable colors.

Daylight samples, ultrawide camera (0.6x)

The ultrawide camera offers a 25MP mode too, with a bit more of the same questionable benefits in terms of detail vs. the very real larger files.

Daylight samples, ultrawide camera (0.6x), 25MP

Funnily enough, the high-res mode photos, saved in the nominal 40MP resolution, typically produce slightly smaller file sizes than the respective 25MP counterparts. They are quite soft too.

Daylight samples, ultrawide camera (0.6x), 40MP

Close-ups

The Pura 90s Pro Max has a Super macro mode which adds a manual focusing slider to the viewfinder, as well as a thumbnail with an additional wide view of the scene if you're shooting on the telephoto camera.

We shot the usual subjects at 2x, 4x and 10x, plus we're including both 12.5MP and 25MP samples at the 2x and 4x zoom levels. We'de say the 12.5MP 4x shots offer the best balance between magnification and pixel level quality, but we're also enjoying the versatility you get from being able to shoot at different focal lengths with relatively small tradeoffs in quality.

Close-up samples, 2x

Close-up samples, 2x, 25MP

Close-up samples, 4x

Close-up samples, 4x, 25MP

Close-up samples, 10x

Selfies

The selfies we got out of the Pura 90s Pro Max are hard to fault too. A bit more saturation wouldn't hurt, but even so colors are quite likeable and skin tones are accurate. Dynamic range is great too. The wide native field of view allows you to have plenty of context and the autofocusing capability means you won't be sacrificing sharpness in the occasional up-you-nose shot. Low-light results are very good as well.

Selfie samples, 0.8x

The 1x zoom level comes with a negligible drop in quality in good light, though low-light shots suffer more substantially - stick to the native 0.8x for those. The 2x zoom level could be useful for shooting from across the room, but you need to be willing to accept a significant drop in pixel-level quality.

Selfie samples, 1x

Selfie samples, 2x

Low-light photo quality

Main camera

The Pura 90s Pro Max's low-light photos from its main camera are very good to excellent, depending on how you draw your lines. The images we're looking at are pretty impactful, with plenty of contrast and vibrant colors, though they still maintain wide dynamic range and color fidelity. Still, we'd probably dial contrast down a notch. On a pixel level, detail is nice and sharp and there's no noise or grain to speak of.

Low-light samples, main camera (1x)

Somewhat surprisingly, the dedicated Night mode often produces images that are different enough to be worth mentioning. For example the first scene is noticeably warmer and brighter, and that extra brightness is sort of a common theme. We're not sure we're liking the Night mode shots better though, and they also take a few seconds of capture time, so we'd perhaps just stick to the full auto.

Low-light samples, main camera (1x), Night mode

At 2x zoom, detail can be pretty patchy in some scenes (2 and 3 for example) but things can be quite sharp in others (1, 4, and 7), and we're not quite sure what sets them apart. Sure, the less likable ones are shot at higher ISOs, but they don't strike us as particularly darker than the other ones taken at lower sensitivities. So yes, your mileage at 2x will vary somewhat greatly depending on the scene's lighting.

Low-light samples, main camera (2x)

The Night mode's effect on these is also quite varied, from the extra warmth in the first scene to a nudge in brightness in the third and fourth, to barely anything in the second.

Low-light samples, main camera (2x), Night mode

Telephoto camera

The telephoto camera's 4x photos are very good too. Detail is sharp and rendered nicely, dynamic range is wide. Color rendition is a bit of a mixed bag - while never truly bad, white balance can be off on occasion, and saturation can be a little too much every now and then.

Low-light samples, telephoto camera (4x)

You can have a look at how Night mode affects a few of the scenes - again, it's not the most reliable and consistent behavior.

Low-light samples, telephoto camera (4x), Night mode

The plasticky detail rendition at 10x isn't the most likeable but we'd still consider these photos pretty alright for most common use cases.

Low-light samples, telephoto camera (10x)

Low-light samples, telephoto camera (10x), Night mode

Ultrawide camera

The ultrawide camera maintains a good level of performance in the dark. If you refrain from pixel-peeping, you can call these photos excellent - exposures are bright and dynamic range is great, plus colors are nicely vibrant. Upon closer inspection, however, you'll notice that detail is relatively soft - not bad, but not particularly good either.

Low-light samples, ultrawide camera (0.6x)

Night mode doesn't do a lot of good - it brightens the exposures further, resulting in blown highlights, without bringing in any real benefits.

Low-light samples, ultrawide camera (0.6x), Night mode

Video recording

The Pura 90s Pro Max can record video up to 4K60 with all four of its cameras. There's no 8K option, and there's no 24fps setting for 4K either, not even in the (relatively unremarkable) Pro mode. HDR Vivid recording is available up to 4K30 (but not in Pro mode, where it's grayed out), and there's no Log option in either mode. The default codec is h.265 (HEVC) but you can switch back to h.264.

The video stabilization approach remains unchanged - it's always on for all modes, and there's also a Steady shot mode that caps the resolution at 2.7K (at either 30fps or 60fps).

You can hit '> play' below and use the '>| next' button to advance through the playlist of all video samples, or you can watch the full playlist on YouTube.

Video quality out of the Pura 90s Pro Max is very good. The three rear cameras output footage that's remarkably consistent in its color and tone and it's very nice altogether - the colors are looking lovely, dynamic range is excellent, contrast is great. The main camera's detail is very good at 1x and actually pretty decent at 2x too, the telephoto is good at 4x and so-so at 10x, and the ultrawide is pretty good in its own context too. A rather well-balanced performance then.

Video screengrabs, daylight: 0.6x • 1x • 2x • 4x • 10x

It's quite similar at night, which is at least a little surprising. The otherwise not particularly impressive ultrawide maintains a pretty high standard in the dark, especially as ultrawides go. The main camera is also nicely sharp at 1x, though the 2x footage is no longer as good. The telephoto's 4x clips are also sharper than most, just don't expect miracles at 10x. Dynamic range and colors remain top-class at night too.

Video screengrabs, low light: 0.6x • 1x • 2x • 4x • 10x

Stabilization also left us quite happy too. Walking shake is handled very well, and shooting from a stationary position also produces steady clips. Pans have the slightest hints of hesitation at the beginning and end, but you could probably negate that with more careful action.