Huawei Mate 20 lineup of smartphones is already confirmed to be launched on October 16 in London. Ahead of the launch next month, Huawei confirmed that the devices would run EMUI 9.0 based on Android 9 Pie. The beta version of the Android Pie-based EMUI 9.0 was introduced at the ongoing consumer electronics show IFA 2018 here. "With the launch of EMUI 9.0, Huawei becomes one of the first handset makers to launch a custom OS that is based on Android Pie, which I think speaks volumes of our close relationship with Google," Wang Chenglu, President of Software Engineering, Huawei Consumer Business Group, told reporters of IANS.
Overall, EMUI 9.0 performs 12.9% faster than its predecessors, and supports faster app launch speeds, Huawei said. Internal tests showed that EMUI 9.0 launched Instagram 12% faster and Spotify 11% faster.
"Every change, from consolidating the settings menu, to optimising the performance, to including new digital wellbeing and productivity features, is made to ensure EMUI 9.0 delivers a great, user-friendly experience," Wang said.
EMUI 9.0 comes with GPU Turbo 2.0, the second generation of Huawei's graphics processing acceleration technology, which supports even more games and at a greater capacity. The latest iteration of the solution can intelligently optimise intensive workloads and give the devices a performance boost on demand while reducing power consumption, claimed Huawei which has surpassed Apple to become the world's second-largest smartphone seller after Samsung.
Besides gaming, the solution also improves other areas that are essential to a quality user experience, such as touchscreen responsiveness and network connectivity, among others.
Another major feature coming with EMUI 9.0 is "HiVision", which enables the camera app to recognise major landmarks and famous paintings and provide users with information using its augmented reality (AR) capability. Simply by pointing their smartphone cameras to an object of interest, users will be provided with information ranging from history to interesting facts, Huawei said.
EMUI 9.0 also features a new "Password Vault", where users can securely store their encrypted password with face or fingerprint for various services and retrieve easily whenever they need them.
It also has a new "Digital Balance" dashboard, which tracks device usage metrics and allows users to set a usage quota for each app. Another digital well-being feature incorporated in EMUI 9.0 is "Wind Down", which helps users to relax before heading to bed, Huawei said.