For the year 2019, Samsung announced four Galaxy S-series smartphones, and the last of the four has finally reached the hands of people outside the company — enabling comparisons.
The Galaxy S10 5G stakes Samsung’s entry into the world of 5G, which promises dreamy download and upload speeds.
On the other hand, Huawei announced their P30 Pro in March as an update to the P-series, which focuses on a smartphone’s photography aspect.
This article will compare these two smartphones in the aspects of performance and photography and tell you all that there is to know about their nuances.
Also read: Samsung Gear Sport vs Huawei Watch GT Sport.
Samsung Galaxy S10 5G Specs
The phone offers one of the largest screens amongst the S10 line of phones. It has a camera set up similar to the other offerings other than the one difference: a flight sensor time to allow for videos and photos with higher depth detection.
It is available in three colour options known as Crown Silver, Majestic Black and Blush Gold.
- Display: 6.7-inch Dynamic AMOLED display (1440×3040 resolution)
- Processor: Snapdragon 855 SoC supported by Adreno 640 GPU powers the S10 5G.
- The rear camera of Galaxy S10 5G houses the following lenses and sensors:
- 12 MP wide-angle lens
- 12 MP telephoto lens
- 16 MP ultrawide lens
- 3D-depth sensor(Time of Flight)
- Front camera: It sports a 10MP wide-angle lens and a 3D-depth sensor(Time of Flight)
- Biometrics: Ultrasonic fingerprint sensor
- Memory and Storage: The Galaxy S10 5G comes with options of 256 and 512 GB internal storage and 8GB RAM
- Battery: 4500 mAH battery coupled with 25W fast charging capability
The phone has no MicroSD card slot.
Also read: OnePlus 7 Pro vs Samsung Galaxy S10
Huawei P30 Pro Specs
An upgrade to the previous year’s P20 Pro, this phone once again focuses on better image quality. As per all the reviews received until now, it has been termed the best camera available yet with the best in class low light capabilities.
After the gradient colour scheme’s success, Huawei included this in all available colours: Pearl White, Amber Sunrise, Breathing Crystal, Aurora, and Black.
- Display: 6.47-inch OLED display (1080×2350 resolution)
- Processor: Kirin 980 SoC supported by Mali-G76 MP10 GPU powers P30 Pro
- The rear camera of the Huawei P30 Pro houses the following lens and sensors:
- 40 MP wide-angle lens
- 20 MP ultrawide lens
- 8 MP periscope lens
- Time of Flight sensor
- Front camera: 32 MP wide-angle lens
- Biometrics: Optical in-screen fingerprint sensor
- Memory and Storage: The Huawei P30 Pro comes with three options for internal storage:128/256/512GB, and 8GB RAM
- Battery: 4200 mAH battery coupled with 40W fast charging capacity
This phone uses a Huawei propriety Nano-Memory external storage card.
| Category | Samsung Galaxy S10 5G | Huawei P30 Pro |
|---|---|---|
| Display | 6.7-inch Dynamic AMOLED display (1440×3040 resolution) | 6.47-inch OLED display (1080×2350 resolution) |
| Battery | 4500 mAH battery | 4200mAH |
| ROM | 256/512 GB | 128/256/512 GB |
| RAM | 8GB | 8GB |
| Colours | Crown Silver, Majestic Black and Blush Gold | Pearl White, Amber Sunrise, Breathing Crystal, Aurora, and Black |
| Processor | Snapdragon 855 SOC | Kirin 980 SOC |
| GPU | Adreno 640 | Mali-G76 MP10 |
| Rear Camera | 12 MP wide angle lens, 12 MP telephoto lens, 16 MP ultrawide lens, and a 3D-depth sensor(Time of Flight) | 40 MP wide angle lens, 20 MP ultrawide lens, 8 MP periscope lens, and a Time of Flight sensor |
| Front Camera | 10 MP wide angle lens and a 3D-depth sensor(Time of Flight) | 32 MP wide angle lens |
| OS | One UI | EMUI |
| Miscellaneous | 25W fast charging capability, Ultrasonic fingerprint sensor, No MicroSD slot | 40W fast charging capability, optical in-screen fingerprint sensor, Nano memory slot for expandable storage. |
Also read: Snapdragon 855 vs Apple A12 Bionic vs Exynos 9820 vs Kirin 980
Performance
The S10 5G uses the Snapdragon 855, whereas the P30 Pro uses the Hisilicon built Kirin 980, both the chips are their respective manufacturer’s flagship offerings. The chips are built on the 7nm architecture allowing for greater efficiency and performance than the older generation.
The Snapdragon 855 sports Adreno 640 GPU, and the Kirin 980 has the Mali-G76 MP10 providing the graphical horsepower.
The chip in the Huawei phone has lower clock speeds than the 855. Although this results in slower performance than the Snapdragon, it does outdo it in battery life.
Huawei is good at maintaining the battery life in its phones with its aggressive background app killing and software optimisation, and EMUI. On the hand, Samsung’s offering has cleaned up its act with One UI giving it an overall better experience and performance.
Battery and Display
Earlier in the article, you may have seen the spec sheet for both the smartphones and two factors stand out over there, and those are the display sizes that the phones offer along with their large batteries.
The S10 5G offers a 4500mAH battery alongside a 6.7-inch Dynamic AMOLED display, while the P30 Pro pairs its 4200mAH battery with a 6.47-inch OLED display. The Dynamic AMOLED is not just another gimmicky name by Samsung, but it is a display technology that brings 100% support for the DCI-P3 colour gamut and HDR10+ toning. In comparison, Huawei only offers HDR10 and 99% in the DCI-P3 gamut.
The S10 5G model is the first Samsung flagship to ship with an upgraded fast charging adapter. Until now, Samsung had been using a 15W brick-based off Qualcomm’s QuickCharge 2.0 platform, but they now use a 25W brick which is still not a match for Huawei’s 40W alternative.
Although the S10 5G has a larger battery and more advanced display, we would say that Huawei may have a higher chance of lasting longer than Samsung because of its lower resolution and smaller size. However, it’s the battery is not as impressive as the giant 4500mAh one that Samsung offers.
Camera capabilities
Photography on smartphones has made leaps and bounds in the right direction in the last few years — an aspect excelled by both smartphones.
The camera setups on these phones vary considerably. They come with different sensors, which all offer different capabilities. Samsung’s Galaxy S10 and S10+ did not come with the 3D-depth sensors and fell behind, but the 5G tells a different story with that sensor, but it still falls short of the P30 Pro.
The P30, as mentioned earlier in the article, has lenses with a higher value of megapixels offering exceptional sharpness.
The primary sensor on Samsung’s phone provides varying apertures but a lesser megapixel value showing lower sharpness. But with the various software optimisations that both the companies offer, the final images seem to be remarkably similar. The 3D depth sensors and wide-angle lenses all provide identical results. Although, the low-light performance of the P30 Pro is on a whole other level.
50x digital zoom on a smartphone is something that one may never have thought of, if not for Huawei. The Periscope lens and Huawei’s 5x zoom telephoto lenses are the ones that make a significant difference here, providing a high level of variation in zoomed quality.
Design
The designs of both of these smartphones are bound to turn eyes because of the unique choices that they employ. The Samsung device has one colour shifting option on sale, while Huawei has five unique options.
Both phones have the industry-standard glass sandwich construction, but they seem to have more of a curve going on in their cases.
The S10 5G improves upon the standard models’ design by offering a sleeker metal railing providing a more excellent hand. While the Huawei, with its borrowed edge display, looks hangs in there in terms of design.
Also read: Samsung Galaxy S10’s new ultrasonic fingerprint scanner and the tech behind it
Fingerprint Sensor
Another point of difference between these smartphones is their security feature offerings. Samsung has done away with the iris scanner and now offers an ultrasonic in-screen fingerprint reading. In contrast, Huawei has dropped its face recognition software for an optical in-screen fingerprint sensor.
While offering better speed, the optical sensor on the Huawei inevitably loses out on the ultrasonic one’s higher safety levels. In contrast, the ultrasonic one limits the type of screen protecting hardware a user can use on their phones.
Conclusion
While both phones are pretty close to each other in terms of general performance, the Huawei P30 Pro is the one that comes out on top in this competition due to its camera capabilities. One may argue that the Samsung phone offers 5G capability, but that technology is still not as widespread to be a deciding factor.
Also read: How Huawei phones might be compromising your privacy and security.
