[Honor View 10 Guides, News, & Discussion] MrBitBite:
How does Honor perform smartphone reliability test and what's it's level in the smartphone industry？Do they follow double standards while testing flagship phones and non-flagship phones？I've always been curious about these until a few days before I saw one authoritative product manager from Huawei posted a detailed answer of my doubt on the popular Chinese forum "Zhihu". From this post, I get to know more about them. So I translated it with google and modified the language a little bit so that I can share it with your guys. Hope this is helpful to you while you're choosing your next decent smartphone.

The post from Uncle Xiong on "Zhihu" is as follows. Hope you enjoy it guys, and if it is hopeful don't forget to give thanks. Thank you.;)

How’s Huawei Honor’s Reliability Test Standard? Which Level Is It in the Smartphone Industry?

Author: Junmin Xiong

Source: Zhihu

Copyright belongs to the author. Commercial reprint, please contact the author, non-commercial reprint, please indicate the source.

Uncle Xiong coincidentally saw these questions on Zhihu a few days ago, and because I know a thing or two about them. So, I marked it out immediately. And till today, I can spare some time to share some of my humble opinions.

---------- Two hours later ----------

Before drawing a final conclusion, Uncle Xiong will first make an introduction of the reliability test, and, by the way, answer some of the questions which the former answerers are not certain about.

1. Introduction to Huawei's Reliability Test

The reliability test in the R & D phase is equivalent to a mobile phone access mechanism in order to solve the design problems, ensure the normal use of mobile phones, and perform standard production. After the test, then it enters the mass production procedure.

During this phase, various types of hardware and software including antennas are tested for reliability, and the reliability test of the hardware is relatively strict.

In this period, 90% of the problems can be solved, then comes the reliability test of the mass production phase, it will solve the remaining 10% problems.

In the mass production phase, there is generally a variety of stress tests, problems are easy to measure. Testing items and testing methods both follow a standard list. You must strictly follow the flow of the list and operation cannot be done as a matter of experience.

Now, let’s talk about some of the testing items:

1) Drop Test

The drop test simulates the process of dropping a phone from normal height to the hard ground. The distance between the phone and the ground is divided into several ranges including 0.5m ~ 0.6m, 0.7m ~ 0.8m, 1m, 1.2m, 1.5m and so on. Phones are tested from six sides including up, down, front, back, left and right, and four corners. If the display of the phone remains in a good condition after dropping down, then it passes the test.

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In actual use, the phone drops in thousands of different ways. Even if we can simulate 50 to 100 of them, there are a lot of unexpected drops. Here, the roller test can help us imitate a variety of ways how a phone drops and through which we’re able to find the fragile points of the phone.

2) Roller Test

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In the rotating roller, the phone is rolling freely. Before the final confirmation, each device has to go through 2500 times (including 500 times normal test) reliability test in the roller with a diameter of 0.5m and 300 times reliability tests in the roller with a diameter of 1.0m.

3) Buttons Durability Test

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Generally, most cellphone manufacturers will perform the button test for their phones, the step value of the test number is 200,000, and the limit is 1,000,000 times (including the number of routine tests).

4) High and Low-Temperature Storage Test

We simulate the environmental conditions of all the places around the world in our lab. The mobile phones are tested at a low temperature at -40 ℃ and a high temperature at 70 ℃ for 72 hours to measure the performance degradation of the phones in transportation due to frequent temperature change.

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There are lots of other similar tests, such as bearing pressure, distortion, port durability, etc. These tests are set according to the actual use of mobile phones in everyday life, and the test may vary and be adjusted according to the actual using circumstances. But there are also some tests which are called "abnormal" by some people.

Honor 6 Plus Air Rifle Shooting Test

Honor 7 Burst Test​

There is one test that Uncle Xiong will condemn:

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By the way, we do not draw the samples for reliability test on a pro-rata basis. Instead, we randomly draw samples on the production line according to a certain number. For example, we have to extract 200 phones for dropping test and for high temperature and high humidity test, we select 300 phones. Regardless of the number of the phone we produce, we extract two or three hundred phones for each test project including high and low-temperature test, humidity test, drop test and so on. For each product model, tens of thousands of phones are selected to test, it is enough to expose the most of the problems.

The products tested in the figure above are all two or three years before, but our reliability testing standards are getting more stringent. You may have noticed that in the promotional page of Honor phones, there are some reliability data displayed. You may go and check it when you’re available.

Let Uncle Xiong take five and later I will reply the questions we mentioned at the beginning.

---------- 20 minutes later ----------

After a five minutes nap, Uncle Xiong is back again.

2. To some of the remaining questions of the previous answerers:

1) Some of you may be curious, is there a difference of the reliability testing standard between the flagship and non-flagship phones?

If there were standard A and B, then it must be a few years ago, now all the phones are tested with the same highest standards, even the cheapest phones are tested like flagships.

2) How many years is Huawei's mobile phones’ testing standards based on?

Our declared warranty period is one year, but the reliability criteria for all the components of the phone are based on a reliability test for at least five years. According to environmental standards, the testing standard for mobile phones is at least 10 years.

3) Like what @ penyoulaileyouhaojiu said:

"The director of Huawei's quality control department is responsible for the KPI results based on all the abnormal and independent standards. Even manager YU as director in the business group cannot force them to make even the slightest compromise or change their decision. So the quality control department is the department that we all respect."

KPI is indeed independent, as for the "abnormal", well, uncle Xiong thinks......

Specifically, the boss of the quality control department has the one-vote veto of the products, his role is equal to the king from this aspect. As long as confirms that the quality of the product can’t meet the standard, no matter how anxious the Marketing Department is to release new products, or even if the boss has permitted it, he still has the right to vote against it.

But this is also a double-edged sword, as opposed to the power is the responsibility. Once the product is released, if there are any quality problems, the boss of the quality control department will be the first person who is responsible for it.

4) After answering the questions of reliability test, by the way, I will speak a word of the quality control

Compared to the reliability test, quality control is a production process control, that is, to ensure that no problem will occur in the production process, to do all the things right at one time is related to all aspects of the production process.

The big-scale manufacturers who cooperate with us all have extensive OEM experience of the major cellphone brands. Quality control among them is very strict.

The most basic ISO standard in the plant can be used as a reference, as well as various factory quality controls, many QCC control charts, and a very detailed SOP operating manual to ensure every step is standardized and mechanized, and finely controlled to exclude the interference of human factors in every step.

Uncle Xiong will show you an example so that you can understand it better. There is a pass-through rate on the production side during product control process, and that is the product passed through rate in one test. We request the rate should be above 97% ~ 98%, and the remaining 2% to 3% of the mobile phone needs to be reproduced, even if they are just cell phone packaging mistakes. The higher the pass-through rate, the lower the rework rate, representing the better the phone quality.

5) Emphasize: there are two factors that apply equally to all cell phone vendors: BUG and Consumer Criteria

Even if the reliability test and quality control test are strictly in accordance with the standards, BUG may occur at times, which can’t be avoided.

Because the production materials cannot guarantee 100% yield, there are very few errors and man-made damage in all aspects during the production, which are within the controllable range, and it is not a large-scale quality problem. And from the software aspect, software always owns tons of functions, which can’t all be covered by the test. And some errors may gradually appear during use that didn’t occur in the test before. And of course, our engineers will gradually improve them.

Before shipping, the reliability test is performed to a very high standard, such as, software reliability should be more than 99%, but there are points that people will complain about. Different consumers have different needs, and their expectations of mobile phones are different, and for mobile running speed, we all have our own standards, even running test software is not absolutely objective, Uncle Xiong won’t evaluate it here, consumers and the market will naturally choose the on the own.

3. Conclusion

Apple and Samsung are on the top level of the quality standards, and if we step down a little bit, then it must be Honor.