BERLIN — Huawei is a company that likes to cover all bases. Besides its flagship Huawei Mate and P series of devices, all of which come in several sizes and flavors, it also has a number of low-priced devices, and a separate smartphone sub-brand called Honor in some countries.

On Thursday, ahead of the official start of the IFA show in Berlin, Huawei launched yet another line of phones — the Huawei nova.

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The idea behind the nova appears to be this: Offer a phone with solid (though not flagship-level) specs and an affordable price, but with an absolutely premium feel. This is why, during the presentation, Huawei spent more time on the device’s design than anything else.

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The Huawei nova is a 5-inch phone with a “new generation” of 2.5D glass (that means it’s slightly curved at the edges) and a metal body that sports a lot of subtle curves. The bezels are crazy-thin at 1.8mm, making the phone smaller than most 5-inchers, and the overall look and feel will never betray that what you’re actually hold is a mid-ranger.

However, as far as mid-range phones go, the Huawei nova is solid in the specs department. True, it has Snapdragon’s 625 octa-core chipset, which is a couple of notches behind the 8xx series. But with 3GB of RAM, 32GB of storage, a 12-megapixel camera on the back (couple with an 8-megapixel on on the front), a fingerprint sensor and a 3,020mAh battery, the Huawei nova should be powerful enough for all but the most power-hungry users.

The Huawei nova plus  has the same set of basic specs, but with a 5.5-inch screen.Credit: Huawei

Huawei also launched a larger, slightly more powerful version called the Huawei nova plus (above). It has the same set of basic specs, but is a bit larger with a 5.5-inch screen. It also has a 16-megapixel camera on the back and a 3,340mAh battery.

The Huawei nova and the nova plus will come in three colors — gold, silver and grey — when the phones become available in 50 countries (Europe included) in October. The Huawei nova will cost 399 euros (there will only be one, 32GB version), while the Huawei nova plus will be priced at 429 euros.

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