GPU Turbo: 14 Huawei phones are about to get a big speed boost

Generally speaking, when you buy a phone, opening the box and switching it on marks the high point in your relationship. For the next two years, you can expect dents, scratches and a gradual slowing down to leave you feeling increasingly jaded, until something newer and shinier slips into your pocket. Sunrise, sunset.

If Huawei is to be believed, the Chinese smartphone giant is about to seriously buck this trend with something it’s calling GPU Turbo. Initially announced for the upcoming Honor Play smartphone, an improvement will be coming to certain Kirin-powered devices via an OTA update. The company is very vague about what it’s actually done, but the results are said to boost both graphical performance and battery life when 3D-rendering. Huawei claims devices with the update will pump out pixels 60% faster, while improving battery by 30%.

That’s a pretty bold claim and one that should be taken with a pinch of salt until we can run our tests against the enhanced devices but more bang for your buck would certainly be welcome. The Kirin 970 processor for example, which powers the excellent P20 Pro and middling P20, is certainly no slouch but is some way behind the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 processor particularly when it comes to graphics performance, being a closer competitor to last year’s 835 chip.

As you can see in the graph above, the P20 Pro (Kirin 970) is pretty close to the OnePlus 5T (Snapdragon 835) but the OnePlus 6, with its Snapdragon 845 processor, is a long way in front. Although it’s worth noting that it doesn’t make much difference in everyday use, given frame rates are capped at 60fps in most smartphones anyway. In any case, Huawei reckons it can close that largely theoretical gap and we look forward to testing for ourselves when the improvements roll out.

So which phones will get the update and when? Fourteen Huawei handsets are getting the GPU Turbo treatment. You can find the full list and estimated release dates below.