Huawei has had to change its business strategy a lot over the last few years because the United States put trade restrictions on them. We’ve seen the company focus more on its wearables business while also getting more into tablets.
This is what we’ve seen. We saw the Huawei MatePad Pro and the Huawei MatePad 11 come out earlier this year, both of which I really liked. Two very different tablets are out there for two very different types of people, and I’d bet that some people will like the MatePad 11.
Huawei Spec
| Specification | Huawei MatePad 11 |
|---|---|
| Dimensions & Weight | 286.5 x 184.7 x 6.7mm609g |
| Display | 10.95-inch LCD2560 x 1600 resolution120Hz refresh rate |
| SoC | Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 SoC1x Kryo 585 @ 2.84GHz3x Kryo 585 @ 2.42GHz4x Kryo 585 @ 1.80GHz |
| RAM & Storage | 6GB RAM64/128GB storageExpandable via microSDXC card |
| Battery & Charging | 7250mAh22.5W wired fast charging5W reverse wired charging |
| Security | Side-mounted fingerprint scanner |
| Rear Camera(s) | Primary: 13MP, f/1.8 |
| Front Camera(s) | 8MP, f/2.0 |
| Port(s) | USB Type-C |
| Connectivity | Wi-Fi 6Bluetooth 5.0802.11 a/b/g/n/ac dual-band WiFiGPS, GLONASS, BeiDou, Galileo |
| Software | HarmonyOS 2.0 (based on Android?) |
| Audio | 4 speakers |
| Accessories | Huawei M-Pencil supportSmart magnetic keyboard (optional)Mouse support |
Huawei tablet design
If there’s one thing I think Huawei has been getting right every time, it’s the design of their tablets. It’s the same with the Huawei MatePad 11. Each of their tablets has a well-thought-out design that is easy to use for a long time. It’s hard to design a piece of glass wrong, but Huawei is always good at this. When the tablet is in landscape mode, there is a front-facing camera and a notification LED above and below the screen.
A USB-C port, a micro SD card slot, and four speakers are all on the Huawei MatePad 11. For a more content-oriented tablet, there isn’t a headphone jack. Headphone jacks seem to be becoming rarer and rarer. This tablet doesn’t have one. Finally, there are two cameras on the back.
The Huawei MatePad 11 has been great for watching Twitch streams and other content. People sometimes have to deal with a situation where their favorite app isn’t available on the company’s own AppGallery. It can be a little frustrating, but it’s a lot better now and there are ways to deal with it. Read also; Huawei P50 Pocket Review: Specifications, Features Because NewPipe is free and open-source, I used it on the MatePad because it acts like a web wrapper with extra features. For example, I used it to watch videos on YouTube. For movies, TV shows, and YouTube, this tablet is great.
The new MatePad Pro can also connect wirelessly to a Huawei laptop so that it can be used as a second screen. It works very well with the MatePad 16. Use the tablet as a touchpad when you need to, and you can also play audio over it instead of your laptop speakers if you want to.
AppGallery is always getting better.
I’ve had the most trouble with AppGallery because there aren’t many apps. There is a YouTube app that works when it is installed, but you can’t sign in because it needs Google Play Services. Apps like Twitch can only be downloaded from third-party APK sites. The Petal Search tool from the company does most of the work for you, but there are some surprising omissions. Not even Petal Search can find a Twitter app other than Twitter Lite. There are no automatic updates for apps you install, and there are no automatic updates for apps you already have. Your favorite apps might not work on your phone if you don’t do anything extra to get them.
HarmonyOS, as a concept, is still as hard to understand as ever.
When the Huawei MatePad Pro came out, we didn’t know how it worked with Android. Huawei doesn’t know what it thinks the phone is. It can run Android apps, look like Android, and even use adb, but it’s not clear what Huawei thinks it is. During its launch, we asked Huawei about it, and this is what they said. Read more; The FTC is suing NVIDIA over acquisition of Arm
Some phones and tablets running HarmonyOS 2 now let users keep their digital assets safe by letting Android apps run on them. Huawei has followed the rules for open source licensing. HarmonyOS can run Android apps that have HMS Core built in. HarmonyOS 2 is a commercial version made by Huawei that is based on the open-source project OpenHarmony 2.0 for smart devices in different situations. It has Huawei’s unique abilities and proprietary technologies from EMUI.
Android is made with the help of the AOSP open source project, and OpenHarmony is made with the help of the OpenAtom Foundation, which runs both. Huawei is one of the main contributors to the OpenHarmony project, and it wants more vendors and developers from all over the world to help it out as well. This way, we can all help the open source community grow and make things better for people who use it. – A spokesperson for Huawei
A better picture of what’s going on with the Huawei MatePad 11 comes from printing out the contents of the /proc/version file, which shows what’s going on. Files like this one give you information about the Linux kernel version you’re using, the name of the machine and host address that was used to compile it, the compiler used to compile it, and the time that the file was written and built. As you can see from the above, the compiler front-end used for the Android NDK (Native Development Kit) is Clang. Clang is the only compiler that the Android NDK can use.
Even if HarmonyOS turns out to be another Android fork (which looks more and more likely every day), I don’t think that’s a bad thing. Because Android is open source and EMUI has been around for years, it makes sense that Huawei would want to build on this. It’s easy to use, has a lot of useful features for a tablet, and looks good, too. This tablet would be great if it worked well with all of the apps and games I already use. It’s a shame that Huawei doesn’t use Google apps.
Tablet: It’s a good media player, and with the keyboard accessory you can buy for it, it could even be used as a small laptop replacement. If you want to do that. In spite of not having it for review, I used it with the MatePad Pro and found that it worked very well.
Huawei is trapped
Here’s what’s wrong with Huawei right now: It’s stuck. When it comes to phones and tablets, Huawei will only be able to use what Qualcomm has leftover. For now, the company can only buy 4G chips from Qualcomm. It can’t make its own HiSilicon Kirin chips anymore. It also can’t sell these products outside of China without Google, which makes it hard to sell these products there. Even in China, Huawei’s popularity has been dwindling. This is why we’ve seen a lot of great fitness bands and the like in the last few years.
You can tell that the Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 inside the MatePad 11 is good, but when this tablet first came out, it wasn’t even up to date. If I’m being honest, I think that if Huawei had allowed people to unlock their phones’ bootloaders again, it might have helped them get back in the good graces of the tech community. Not only could people put anything they wanted on their phones, but it would be much, much easier to put a Google Apps package on the phone and avoid that problem. You’d also have people who aren’t very excited about it try it, though. They might not know what they’re doing, though.
Conclusion
HarmonyOS and the Huawei AppGallery are where they are now because of the company’s efforts to get around the U.S. trade ban. HarmonyOS has done a good job of making Huawei’s software look better, but it hasn’t done a whole lot for the company’s real business. It’s still in a loop of having to play catch up to get the most important apps on its phones and tablets.
I don’t think Huawei’s move away from the Android name has helped it get very far, though. Taken as a whole, it was meant to help the Android brand be seen as something else because “Android” is thought to be linked to Google in the wider world. If it isn’t Android, then why would it need Google to help it run? I don’t think it’s done as well as it thought it would, even though the devices it’s making are powerful and easy to use.
