We subjected the Huawei Mate 50 Pro to our rigorous SBMARK audio test suite to measure its performance both when recording sound using its built-in microphones, and when playing audio through its speakers.
In this review, we’ll analyze how it performed in a variety of tests and several common use cases.
Overview
Key audio specs include:
- Two speakers (top center, bottom right)
- No audio output Jack
Reproduction
Pros
- Good tonal balance overall
- Good dynamics and spatial performance
- Good volume performance
Versus
- Amplitude rendering could be better considering the size of the device
- Inconsistent tonal balance at maximum volume
Registration
Pros
- Effective noise reduction
- Stereo note recordings
- Effective audio zoom function
Versus
- Poor tonal balance in most recordings except live video
- Slightly stronger than average distortion
- Heavy background processing results in poor background tonal balance and very noticeable artifacts
The Huawei Mate 50 Pro is a good smartphone for audio playback, offering a pleasant sound signature and overall experience, with good tonal balance and good dynamic, spatial and volume performance.
The smartphone also offered some nifty features in the recording area, including audio zoom and very effective background noise reduction. However, the Mate 50 Pro didn’t perform on the same level as playback, lacking consistency across use cases.
Trial summary
Learn about SBMARK audio tests: For scoring and analysis in our smartphone audio reviews, SBMARK engineers perform a series of objective tests and undertake more than 20 hours of perceptual evaluation under controlled laboratory conditions.
(For more details on our playback protocol, click here; for more details on our recording protocol, click here.)
The following section compiles the key elements of our extensive testing and analysis performed in the SBMARK laboratories. Detailed performance evaluations in the form of reports are available upon request. Do not hesitate to contact us.
How the audio playback score is composed
SBMARK engineers test playback through smartphone speakers, the performance of which is evaluated in our labs and under real-life conditions, using apps and preset settings.
The Mate 50 Pro is a great smartphone for audio reproduction, offering an overall pleasant timbre and smooth tonal balance, with clear highs, pleasant mids, and a satisfying low end of the spectrum. It also performed very well in our dynamic tests, thanks to the sharp and precise attack, as well as great precision and bass power. Huawei has built up quite a large audio scene, but given the device’s large size, we would have expected even more. Locability was outstanding, with individual sound sources easy to spot, and balance and distance rendering both accurate.
The Mate 50 Pro also offered good volume performance, with good intelligibility at minimum volume and a very high (but slightly harsh) maximum volume level. Audio artifacts were fairly well under control, but some compression and distortion were evident at maximum volume.
Hear about the playback performance of the smartphone tested in this comparison with some of its competitors:
Recordings of smartphones playing some of our songs at 60 LAeq in an anechoic environment via 2 microphones in AB configuration, at 30 cm
Here’s how the Huawei Mate 50 Pro fares in playback use cases compared to its competitors:
Playback of use case scores
The Timbre score represents how well a phone reproduces sound across the audible tonal range and takes into account bass, mids, treble, tonal balance, and volume dependence. It is the most important attribute for reproduction.
Frequency response of music reproduction
A 1/12-octave frequency response graph, which measures the loudness of each frequency emitted by your smartphone as it reproduces a pure sine wave in an anechoic environment.
The Dynamics Score measures the accuracy of changes in the energy level of sound sources, such as how accurately a bass note or impact sound of drums is played.
Secondary attributes for spatial testing include pinpointing the location of a specific sound, its positional balance, distance, and amplitude.
The volume score represents the overall volume of a smartphone and how smoothly the volume increases and decreases based on user input.
Here are some sound pressure levels (SPL) measured while playing our sample recordings of hip-hop and classical music at maximum volume:
| hip-hop | Classic | |
| Huawei Mate 50 Pro | 74.8 dBA | 71.1 dBA |
| Apple iPhone 14 Pro Max | 74 dBA | 71.1 dBA |
| Xiaomi 12S Ultra | 72.6 dBA | 69 dBA |
The following graph shows the gradual changes in volume from minimum to maximum. We expect these changes to be consistent across the range, so that all volume steps match user expectations:
Music volume consistency
This line graph shows the relative loudness of the playback versus the user selected volume step, measured at several volume steps with correlated pink noise in an anechoic box recorded 0.20 meter on axis.
The artifact score measures the extent to which the sound is affected by various types of distortion. The higher the score, the less noticeable sound disturbances are. Distortion can occur due to the sound processing in the device and the quality of the speakers.
Playback Total Harmonic Distortion (maximum volume)
This graph shows total harmonic distortion and noise over the audible frequency range.
It represents the distortion and noise of the device playing our test signal (0 dB Fs, Sweep Sine in an anechoic box at 40cm) at the device’s maximum volume.
How the score of the audio recording is composed
SBMARK engineers test recording by evaluating recorded files on reference audio equipment. These recordings are made in our laboratories and under real-life conditions, using apps and default settings.
The Huawei isn’t as good of a recording device as it is for playback, but it still delivered a decent performance in our tests. Timbre was good when recording with the main camera, but left room for improvement with other apps as the tonal balance sounded muffled with both the selfie camera and memo app. Dynamic performance was poor overall, although envelope rendition was still pretty good with main camera recordings. The signal-to-noise ratio was also good in both main and front camera recordings.
Videos from the main camera offered average locateability of sound sources and a slightly restricted sound stage. The voices also sounded slightly further away than they should have been. With the selfie camera in portrait orientation, the audio scene was even more restricted, with very blurry localizability. On the plus side, the recordings of memos on the Mate 50 Pro are in stereo, offering good range and locability.
Recording volume was consistently good across all use cases, but recordings of loud content were severely hampered by compression and distortion. A very distinct distortion was evident even with sudden loud noises. Huawei’s heavy noise reduction algorithm caused phase problems in some recording elements. The background has also been heavily processed, resulting in poor tonal balance of the background and very noticeable artifacts.
Here’s how the Huawei Mate 50 Pro fares in recording use cases compared to its competitors:
Use case scoring
The Timbre Score represents how well a phone captures sounds across the audible tonal range and takes into account bass, mids, treble, and tonal balance. It is the most important attribute for registration.
Video frequency response of life
A 1/12-octave frequency response graph, which measures the loudness of each frequency captured by your smartphone while recording a pure sine wave in an anechoic environment.
The Dynamics Score measures the accuracy of changes in the energy level of sound sources, such as how accurately plosives in a voice (p, t, k, for example) are reproduced. The score also considers the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), such as how loud the lead voice is compared to the background noise.
Secondary attributes for spatial testing include locating a specific sound’s location, positional balance, distance, and amplitude on recorded audio files.
Directness of registration
Smartphone directivity graph while recording test signals using the camera app, with the main camera. It represents the acoustic energy (in dB) on the angle of incidence of the sound source. (Normalized to 0° angle, in front of the device.)
The loudness score represents how loud audio is normalized on recorded files and how well the device handles noisy environments, such as electronic concerts, while recording.
Here are the sound levels recorded in the audio and video files, measured in LUFS (Loudness Unit Full Scale); for reference, we expect volume levels to be above -24 LUFS for recorded content:
| Meeting | Videos life | Selfie videos | Memorandum | |
| Huawei Mate 50 Pro | -25.9 LUFS | -20.4 LUFS | -19.6 LUFS | -21 LUFS |
| Apple iPhone 14 Pro Max | -26 LUFS | -22.9 LUFS | -19.2 LUFS | -19.6 LUFS |
| Xiaomi 12S Ultra | -28.3 LUFS | -20.8 LUFS | -19.1 LUFS | -20.4 LUFS |
The Artifacts score measures the extent to which recorded sounds are affected by various types of distortions. The higher the score, the less noticeable sound disturbances are. Distortions can occur due to in-device sound processing and microphone quality, as well as user handling, such as how the phone is held.
In this audio comparison, you can hear how this smartphone handles wind noise compared to its competitors:
Recordings of a voice sample with slight background noise, facing a 5 m/s turbulent wind
Background evaluates how smoothly various sounds around a voice blend into the video recording file. For example, when recording a speech at an event, the background shouldn’t interfere with the main vocal, but should provide context of your surroundings.
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