Huawei releases Kernel Source for both Honor 9 Lite and Huawei P Smart


A few years ago Huawei and Open-Source hardly could be seen in the same phrase. However, since the Chinese company’s partnership with Google to make the Nexus 6P, the company started to change its closed software nature.

Although the company still hasn’t the best track record when it comes to releasing kernel sources – Huawei Mate 9 took six months, while the P10 duo took three months – it’s getting better with the years.

Back in December, the Chinese behemoth released the kernel sources for the Mate 10 series and for the Honor 7X. Today the company decided to publicly release the Kernel Source for both Honor 9 Lite and Huawei P Smart.

The Honor 9 Lite was announced in December, making its way to India during this month. The smartphone is the first Huawei Honor device to support Treble out the box, arriving with EMUI 8.0 atop of latest Android Oreo. The Huawei P Smart in counterpart a Global version of the Huawei Enjoy 7s.

Gizchina News of the week


Both handsets share nearly the same specs. The power is ensured by the in-house made Kirin 659 chipset paired with 3GB or 4GB of RAM, and 32GB or 64GB of storage. However, the differentiation comes in the camera’s part. While the Honor 9 Lite counts with a pair of 13MP + 2MP camera sensors, the Huawei P Smart carries a single 8MP selfie snapper.

The Huawei P Smart also ships with Android 8.0 Oreo with EMUI 8.0 running atop. The smartphone joins the family of Huawei devices supporting Google’s Project Treble.

The release of Kernel Source Code for both devices will make easy the life of third-party developers thus allowing the custom development community to flourish. Custom ROMs development will allow users who don’t like EMUI to taste the vanilla AOSP Android Experience. Furthermore, if Huawei decides to drop the support, Custom developers can take the responsibility of expanding the handsets lifetime.

Disclaimer: We may be compensated by some of the companies whose products we talk about, but our articles and reviews are always our honest opinions. For more details, you can check out our editorial guidelines and learn about how we use affiliate links.

Previous Windows 10-Running Mini PC ACEPC T8 Discounted to $99.99 [Coupon]
Next Infinix Looks Set to unveil 'India first' smartphone on February 6

8 Comments

  1. Lazar Prodanovic
    January 31, 2018

    Really not interested & a little to late.

    • Marco Lancaster
      January 31, 2018

      Well at least for the Honor 9 Lite, the timing was good. Considering past experiences…

      • Lazar Prodanovic
        January 31, 2018

        So whose Xiaomis regarding A1 but after they ware attacked from media.
        This didn’t add to the A1 value, it added to the Mi 5X value (as its the cheaper one). Now two brothers will have both ends to share between them, AOSP & Linuage. Not interested as the CAF is rather developed & you need to put effort & build better infrastructure for Kirin & it is a little to late from Huawei to realise the Open source potential but better ever than never.

      • joemont
        January 31, 2018

        I have the Huawei P9 and they arent even upgrading it to Oreo, and its not even been 2 years. This was their 800$+ flagship phone, and they dont give af.

  2. Lazar Prodanovic
    January 31, 2018

    Really not interested & a little to late.

    • Marco Lancaster
      January 31, 2018

      Well at least for the Honor 9 Lite, the timing was good. Considering past experiences…

    • Lazar Prodanovic
      January 31, 2018

      So whose Xiaomis regarding A1 but after they ware attacked from media.
      This didn’t add to the A1 value, it added to the Mi 5X value (as its the cheaper one). Now two brothers will have both ends to share between them, AOSP & Linuage. Not interested as the CAF is rather developed & you need to put effort & build better infrastructure for Kirin & it is a little to late from Huawei to realise the Open source potential but better ever than never.

    • Guest
      January 31, 2018

      I have the Huawei P9 and they arent even upgrading it to Oreo, and its not even been 2 years. This was their 800$+ flagship phone, and they dont give af.