HTC 10 vs Nexus 6P

[gendo667]

How's the call quality on the 10? My wife got burned on the M8 with bad call quality and a wonky USB connection. I'm trying to get her off the G4, with its boot loop issues and all. I'm trying to talk her into the 10.

 

[Jerry Hildenbrand]

How's the call quality on the 10? My wife got burned on the M8 with bad call quality and a wonky USB connection. I'm trying to get her off the G4, with its boot loop issues and all. I'm trying to talk her into the 10.

Average. But — wifi calling and hd voice aren't working on my unlocked model. Haven't had time to look into why. Very possible I've gotten used to both features and normal just sounds bad to me.

 

[anon(8938849)]

My HD voice isn't working on Verizon prepaid. I didn't know before but you have to have postpaid for those features. I've never really used them on any phone before though, so I'm used to normal voice calls. To me the 10 sounds fine, like every other flagship. Truthfully call quality is something that I never really think about as I don't notice any real difference from phone to phone.

 

[getbretweir]

If you plan on keeping it for 2+ years, I'd wait to see the HTC Nexus before making a decision. I'll have my 6p for a while, but I need a business phone, and as much as I love the 10, I'm going to wait it out and make my decision after the Nexus is released.

SD card isn't important to me though, and I prefer the larger display. To my eyes the display just looks nicer on the 6p. Also the battery is better in the 6p, which Jerry confirmed ... That's a huge deal for me (about an extra 45-60 min SOT).

And even though the monthly security updates aren't all that important to me, getting the latest OS first is a very compelling reason to stay with Nexus.

If Android N has a feature or two that I really like, I know having to wait the extra few months will be painful (even though M currently meets all my needs).

The 6p is good enough to wait at least another few months IMO. I'm really loving it and look forward to taking some great pics this summer and have football season and the latest Nexus at the end of it, two things I really enjoy.

 

[getbretweir]

duplicate

 

[LeoRex]

And even though the monthly security updates aren't all that important to me, getting the latest OS first is a very compelling reason to stay with Nexus.

You have it backwards... people need to take security updates more seriously.

These phones are all little digital Titanics, and out there, somewhere, is a malware iceberg. It's only a matter of time before someone puts together a nasty bit of code that wreaks havoc on millions upon millions of exposed devices. And they'll most likely be using an exploit that's been reported on and fixed, but only loaded on a small slice of phones since so many OEMs are suffering from cranial-rectal inversion.

 

[capncoad]

I have both phones right now and my thoughts are as follows:

HTC 10 has better headphone audio. It's a significant improvement and if you're an audiophile with good cans, it's a hard feature to pass up.

Nexus 6p has better speaker audio. Richer, louder and overall noticeably better.

Both are equally fast. There is virtually no performance difference i can detect doing basic things. I do those goofy side by side app launches and page loads and i really don't think the CPU is the bottleneck between these phones. AKA the Snapdragon 820 may be hampered by lousy storage performance thanks to Android encryption. The good news is that animations on the HTC 10 are Nexus level smooth. I'm really picky about animation consistency and dropped the S7 edge due Samsung's famous struggles with 60fps transitions.

HTC 10 has better buttons. Click, solid and not easily pressed like the Nexus

Nexus has better low light camera performance. At least before I've seen HTCs patches. (Verizon branded here). HTC and the S7 stray towards brighter noisier photos while Nexus has some software HDR vudu that keeps the picture natural and smooth. Just prepare for some processing waits. I've read comments from camera gurus who think HTC is too liberal with the ISO settings.

Have not tested both in bright conditions. My Nexus takes beautiful daylight photos and i imagine the HTC 10 will have similar results being the same sensor and all.

I prefer on screen buttons.

HTC 10s fingerprint scanner is just as good as the Nexus. Fast and easy.

It's not much of a contest the Nexus display is much brighter, has better viewing angles and has less scrolling blur. HTCs panel is quite saturated and pleasing. It's a bit in the cooler side from the warmer 6p. But the 6p takes this comparison easily.

HTC has a better settings interface. But both are quite similar.
--

I want to trust that my HTC 10 will get patches soon on Verizon but that's really the big question. Am i willing to take the big headphone audio advantages HTC has and trust Verizon to send fixes in a timely manner for camera? Will it actually bring the camera to parity with the Nexus anyway? Also...why is Google doing a better job with no OIS than HTC with OIS?

I'm leaning towards returning the HTC. But I'll give it more time and see how i feel in a few days.

 

[neo905]

I have both phones right now and my thoughts are as follows:

HTC 10 has better headphone audio. It's a significant improvement and if you're an audiophile with good cans, it's a hard feature to pass up.

Nexus 6p has better speaker audio. Richer, louder and overall noticeably better.

Both are equally fast. There is virtually no performance difference i can detect doing basic things. I do those goofy side by side app launches and page loads and i really don't think the CPU is the bottleneck between these phones. AKA the Snapdragon 820 may be hampered by lousy storage performance thanks to Android encryption. The good news is that animations on the HTC 10 are Nexus level smooth. I'm really picky about animation consistency and dropped the S7 edge due Samsung's famous struggles with 60fps transitions.

HTC 10 has better buttons. Click, solid and not easily pressed like the Nexus

Nexus has better low light camera performance. At least before I've seen HTCs patches. (Verizon branded here). HTC and the S7 stray towards brighter noisier photos while Nexus has some software HDR vudu that keeps the picture natural and smooth. Just prepare for some processing waits. I've read comments from camera gurus who think HTC is too liberal with the ISO settings.

Have not tested both in bright conditions. My Nexus takes beautiful daylight photos and i imagine the HTC 10 will have similar results being the same sensor and all.

I prefer on screen buttons.

HTC 10s fingerprint scanner is just as good as the Nexus. Fast and easy.

It's not much of a contest the Nexus display is much brighter, has better viewing angles and has less scrolling blur. HTCs panel is quite saturated and pleasing. It's a bit in the cooler side from the warmer 6p. But the 6p takes this comparison easily.

HTC has a better settings interface. But both are quite similar.
--

I want to trust that my HTC 10 will get patches soon on Verizon but that's really the big question. Am i willing to take the big headphone audio advantages HTC has and trust Verizon to send fixes in a timely manner for camera? Will it actually bring the camera to parity with the Nexus anyway? Also...why is Google doing a better job with no OIS than HTC with OIS?

I'm leaning towards returning the HTC. But I'll give it more time and see how i feel in a few days.

I am curious if you could compare the impact of OIS on video recordings on both devices? 1080p on the 6P is OK but 4K video is terrible. Video might be where the lack of OIS really hurts the 6P but maybe not.

Posted via the Android Central App

 

[capncoad]

I plan to test the 4k soon.

 

[neo905]

I plan to test the 4k soon.

Cool. Could you also compare 1080p to 1080p OIS video?

Posted via the Android Central App

 

[Soundtallica]

I had the 6P, and aside from its size and the fact that my phone was starting to bend it was a real pleasure to use. But since the 10 came out I've been lusting over it because it has close to stock software, all the features I want, and most importantly an SD slot. Ever since a way was found to hack the unlocked 10 to work on Verizon (no way I'm going back to the slow updates and bloatware on the carrier version), I immediately sold my 6P to get one. Even though I was able to get $465 for it which is decent, I'm struggling to justify the $200 more I'd need to get the unlocked 10... is it worth it?

 

[wynand32]

I'm torn as well in choosing between the 10 and the 6P. I've had the 6P for a couple of weeks now, and like it except for two issues.

First, my 6P screen has just the slightest pink tint at certain angles--and it's not even the tint that bothers me, it's the transition. If it were always that color temp (that's how I'll describe it), then it would be fine, but it changes just enough when I move the screen around that I can notice it. It's worst when the screen is dimmest, but of course that's a common use case.

Second, headphone volume on my 6P is pitifully low, and I don't even listen at booming volumes. My favorite pair of audio-technical (ATC-ANC23's that I got dirt cheap a few years back) are unusable. Plug the same headphones into my iPhone 6, and they sound excellent as always.

So, if the HTC 10 has that much better headphone output and a decent and consistent color temp, than it's tempting. I don't want to give up brightness because outside viewing is important to me, and I do like the size of the 6P (my aging eyes appreciate things being just a tad bit bigger). And of course Nexus and upgrades. Even so, I'm torn. I suppose I'll check out the 10 at T-Mobile sometime before my 6P return period is up (30 days at Amazon) and make my decision then.

 

[Slow_S10]

Wow, Thanks for all the responses everyone. I couldn't begin to respond to all of them individually. But it sounds like the phones are even closer in capability than I originally assumed with the 6P even edging out the HTC 10 in certain areas.

One thing that I am glad that Jerry mentioned is that the 6P apparently has better battery performance when compared to the 10 when they not connected to Wi-Fi. Considering I spend more than half of my days no where near Wi-Fi that makes a huge difference. Currently the 6P gets me through a whole day of moderate use but with not much left over in the tank, that could be a huge deal breaker if I can't get the same usage out of an HTC 10.

The improved headphone audio from the 10 while nice would mostly be lost on me as I don't listen to much music through headphones. I primarily listen to podcasts with headphones at work, and I listen to music over my Chromecast Audio at home. So that's one of those features that for me would occasionally be nice to have but is not going to be a huge factor in which phone I choose.

With these new comments and comparisons that everyone has posted I think I may just stick with the 6P after all. The HTC 10 is really compelling and if it was a decision on which to buy outright I would probably pick the HTC 10, but since I already have a 6P I'll probably just stick with it. They are just too close for me to justify buying another phone right now, and I really do like my 6P.

 

[LeoRex]

"Because new" is a tough thing to resist. But you are dead on... when you take that out of the equation, there isn't a ton on the 10 that would warrant you to unload the 6P for it. Now, if you relied heavily on wired headphones, or wanted something with a smaller footprint because the 6P's size is an issue, etc... or if you had something old and were comparing the two head to head on which to buy... OK, that's a different story. But if you like your 6P and it's one of those grass/greener issues, well, every lawn has weeds.