PROS
- Excellent build and ergonomics
- Fab screen
- Sense 5 is visually slick
- Great performance
CONS
- Non-expandable memory
- Mediocre battery life
- Keyboard needs a visual refresh
KEY FEATURES
- 1080 x 1920 pixel, 4.7in display
- 4MP camera with OIS and Ultrapixel
- 9mm thick aluminium chassis
- 1.7GHz quad core processor
- 2300mAh battery
- Android 4.1 with HTC Sense 5
- Manufacturer: HTC
- Review Price: £549.99
HTC ONE LONG-TERM TEST
Read the review of the HTC One M8
The HTC One has now been out for a year. Since we originally reviewed the phone, it has been crowned our phone of the year 2013, beating the Google Nexus 5, iPhone 5S and Samsung Galaxy S4.
As you might have guessed – we still like it. In fact we still think the HTC One is one of the best mobile phones on the market even though it's not quite as fast as some of the newer competitors.
However, it now has a rival from its own family. The HTC One M8 has launched and it's a very good phone indeed. It offers an improved camera, a tweaked design and a slightly larger screen.
Since our original review, a few different versions of the HTC One phone have been released, other than the standard silver type we initially looked at. The Google Play HTC One edition has vanilla Android rather than the HTC Sense software used in the original. However, it is not available in the UK – a real shame.
A few new colours have also been outed, and these are a bit easier to get hold of here. There’s a deep red, a striking blue, a gold shade and a near-black dark grey.
Here are a few pictures to see how they compare to the version seen in the review below.
Related: HTC 10 review
HTC One: What has changed?
In the year since the HTC One’s launch we’ve seen its processor go from cutting edge to being a slight ‘has been’. The Snapdragon 600 processor of the phone is no longer used in new mobiles, discarded in favour of the Snapdragon 800, which allows for faster clock speeds and has an updated graphics processor.
However, it’s not something we notice much in actual use. The HTC One can play pretty much every game the newer top-end phones can handle (that we’ve tried) and sequential updates have only improved the performance of the phone.
The phone’s superlative features remain top of their game too. The HTC One is still the phone that feels best in-hand out of all the top-end Androids, and it has better internal speakers than any of its big-name rivals.
HTC One – never been topped
What is also interesting – and a bit sad – is that HTC has not quite managed to recreate the spark of genius that resulted in the HTC One in its subsequent phones. There have been two other One-series phones in the range, the HTC One Mini and the HTC One Max, but neither has been quite as good. Unlike the Sony Xperia Z1 Compact and Xperia Z Ultra it’s not quite a case of a bigger and smaller version of the HTC One.
Part of this is down to the way the phones are made. The HTC One has an aluminium frame with plastic inlays, but the Mini and Max look and feel more like plastic phones with some aluminium plates grafted onto them. They are not as classy or immaculate as the phone that inspired them, the HTC One. The One Max in particular looks like a bit of a mess next to it.
The HTC One is much better-looking than the One Max
HTC One Software
Since the HTC One’s launch there have been a few little software changes too. First of all, the Deals app no longer works – the service has been discontinued. This makes being unable to install it even more annoying, but it was never an asset in the first place so at least we haven’t lost out on anything.
The latest build of the HTC One software also comes with a new app, KeyVPN. This lets you securely connect to your work computer with your phone – it was a very easy way for HTC to make the phone more Enterprise-friendly. Other than that, you still get everything we talk about in the software section of this review.
One neat little improvement is that HTC now lets you get rid of the BlinkFeed widget if you like - one of the most common criticisms of the phone when it launched. However, one obvious niggle remains. It sounds tiny, but it's irritating. It's far too easy to switch the keyboard into a different language when typing, and we recommend switching to a third-party keyboard as soon as you get hold of the phone.
Carry on reading for our full review of the HTC One.
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