HTC One M9 Plus

The One (M8) was (and still is) one of the best looking smartphones available in the market. And HTC evidently knows this, because from the outset, the M9+ could easily be mistaken for its predecessor. It features the same all-metal construction with a brushed metal finish and curvy edges that’s more than easy on the eyes. However, while the One (M8) looked like it was hewn out of a single piece of metal, the M9+ features a clear break around the edges, which makes it look like an ill-fitting rear panel. The Gold on Silver unit we reviewed features the new dual-tone finish, where the edges are a polished gold hue, standing out from the jewellery-finish silver back panel. Unforunately, while we liked the new finish, the uneven edges refused to grow on us, and we were left yearning for the smooth spine of the One (M8). Incidentally, if you don't like the dual-tone look, you can opt for one of the other two colour options – Gunmetal Grey and Gold on Gold.

Unlike the One M9, which retains the 5-inch full HD display of its predecessor, the One M9+ goes full throttle with 2K resolution. Even with its slightly larger screen size of 5.2-inches, the smartphone gets a packed pixel density of 565ppi. While some might argue that the naked eye can’t discern the difference, that doesn’t prevent the screen from looking incredibly sharp. Viewing angles and brightness levels are good, although sunlight legibility isn’t its strong point. The white balance is tipped towards the cooler side, but the colours still pop, making images and videos really stand out. The touch response is smooth as silk, and if you require extra sensitivity you can also enable a glove mode in settings. The display gets a layer of Corning Gorilla Glass 3 for protection.

The HTC One (M8) featured an UltraPixel camera at the rear, and a 5MP snapper in the front. The camera was criticised for not standing up to the competition, and to compensate, the One M9+ packs in a 20MP primary snapper. It's accompanied by a depth sensor to recreate the Duo Camera setup. The company hasn’t given up on its UltraPixel dream though, with this sensor moving over to the front.

While the M9 is endowed with Qualcomm’s top-of-the-line Snapdragon 810 chip, the M9+ uses MediaTek’s top-tier Helio X10 (MT6795T) processor. The 64-bit chipset consists of eight Cortex-A53 cores clocked at 2.2GHz, and gets 3GB of RAM for company.