Honor Play common issues and how to resolve them

The subsidiary of Huawei, Honor, is doing an amazing job in the midrange class of smartphones. Besides the Honor series, they recently introduced this gaming-specialized smartphone with all the goodies an avid mobile gamer needs. With more than capable chipset, spacious and bright display, and large battery, the Honor Play is one of the best midrange devices in this newly-popularized gaming segment.

It’s not flawless, though. Some minor issues occur here and there and we made sure to enlist the common ones found online and provide you with applicable solutions.

1. Overheating
2. Camera glitches
3. Phone lagging
4. Screen flickers
5. SIM fails
6. No notifications
7. Bluetooth issues
8. Battery drainage and frequent power-intensive prompts
9. Slow charging
10. Background light issue
11. Slow Wi-Fi and no 4G/LTE
12. Advanced Troubleshooting steps for the Honor Play

1: Overheating

Let’s start with the most-posted issue we found online. And that’s the overheating. The Honor Play is a gaming smartphone with a remarkable set of specs and an above-average cooling system. However, that doesn’t mean that it’s completely invulnerable to heat, especially after prolonged gaming sessions.

In addition, using your handset for extensive gaming while it’s charging is never advised. This might lead to major problems, especially if you make it a habit. However, some users reported this problem after the system update, so there might be some software bug involved as well.

If you’re not sure how to reduce the overheating on the Honor Play, follow these instructions:

• Don’t use your device while charging.
• Remove the casing if you’re doing heavy gaming. Yup, PUBG falls into that category.
• Reduce the in-game graphics.
• Disable GPU Turbo.
• If the problem started after an update, reset your device to factory settings and restore it from a backup.

2: Camera glitches

Huawei and its subsidiary Honor are not quite famous for the timely software updates. But, the larger concern lies in the negative impact some of those late-coming updates have on their respective devices. Some users reported strange camera glitches and pop-ups informing them about the Aperture mode.

In regards to glitches, we must remind you that EIS (Electronic Image Stabilization) might be slower than usual in the low-light surroundings. On the other hand, if the problem is persistent, we suggest following these steps to try and address it:

• Reset Camera app’s cache and data.
• Reset Camera settings to default values.
• Update the firmware.
• Test the camera in the Safe Mode.
• Reset the device to factory settings.

3: Phone lagging

The Kirin 970 CPU, Mali G72 GPU, and 4 GB of RAM should be enough not only to make the overall Android experience snappy but to run all demanding mobile games on ultra settings. That’s why we’re almost certain that any lags experienced by users are probably due to software issues.

With that in mind, here are some steps that should help you fix lagging on the Honor Play:

• Clear cache with the Phone Manager.
• Disable some intensive applications from the Phone Manager. Some apps you don’t need working in the background might slow down the performance.
• Update the firmware.
• Wipe cache partition.
• Reset the device to factory settings.

4: Screen flickers

Now, as we already said on multiple instances, the errors and bugs we enlist are rarely a widespread issue or manufacturing oversight. Most of the handsets pass the rigorous tests before finding their way to an end-user.

The 6.3-inch IPS display on the Honor Play is great, on par with some much more expensive devices. However, some users reported flickers, especially in third-party apps.

Of course, our main suspect is the app itself and not the display, so we suggest following the steps we enlisted below:

• Clear cache and data from the affected app.
• Lower the animation scaling from 1x to 0.5x in Developer Options.
• Reset your device to factory settings.

5: SIM fails

Hybrid Dual SIM option on the Honor Play allows you to use either 2 micro SIM cards or 1 SIM card + microSD storage extension. Your usual setup on most of the contemporary phones. However, some users reported that their SIM card fails to initialize after the restart.

If that’s the case for you, too, do try these steps to fix it:

• Reboot your device.
• Make sure that the SIM card is properly placed in its compartment.
• Reset Network Settings.
• Contact your service provider, the SIM might be faulty.
• Reset the Honor Play to factory settings.

6: No notifications

This is something which, sadly, isn’t uncommon for Huawei and Honor devices (EMUI-powered devices). The process management is frequently too aggressive and it kills off apps from working in the background. Unless you whitelist them in Phone Manager settings. That’s why some users can’t get notifications.

You should be able to address this by following these steps:

1. Open Phone Manager.
2. Choose the Lock Screen cleanup.
3. Whitelist all necessary apps.
4. Now, navigate to Settings > Apps and allow notifications for all needed apps individually.

7: Bluetooth issues

Bluetooth connectivity is another issue we can’t avoid mentioning. These kinds of issues are quite common but don’t forget that the Bluetooth pairing is a two-way street and that a lot of issues might be ascribed to a second device.

The Honor Play case is similar to all others: the Bluetooth either fails to pair or it suddenly disconnects.

If you’re unable to fix this by simply restarting your device, try one of these steps:

• Unpair devices and try pairing them again.
• Check the second device.
• Disable Wi-Fi and Mobile Data temporarily.
• Reset Network settings.

8: Battery drainage and frequent power-intensive prompts

It’s a bit unexpected for a battery to drain on a Huawei device, especially in the idle mode. However, a few reports state that their battery life and SoT (Screen-on Time) dropped substantially, especially after a firmware update.

Follow these steps to improve your battery life:

• Disable Mobile Data always on in Developer Options.
• Prevent unnecessary apps from working in the background with the built-in Phone Manager.
• Manually adjust brightness instead of relying on Adaptive brightness.
• Disable Wi-Fi overnight.

On the other hand, some users were annoyed by frequent power-intensive prompts informing them that certain third-party apps are too heavy on the battery. This can be disabled with ease and here’s how:

1. Open Settings.
2. Tap Battery.
3. Choose Settings (the cog-like icon in the top right corner).
4. Toggle Power-intensive prompt off.

9: Slow charging

The handset comes with the Quick Charger which isn’t exactly a top of the line but should be able to fill in the battery from 0 to 100% in 90 minutes. However, due to a different output of two chargers (it comes either with 9V or 5V), you might wait for an hour more.

The problem here is that some proud owners of the Honor Play wait for much more for their device to fully charge, which isn’t supposed to be the case. There’s an explanation for that, too. Namely, the fast charging automatically switches to slow variant to avoid overheating.

However, if your problem is a bit more serious than that, consider replacing the charger cord.

10: Background light issue

This is a minutia error reported by a few users so it’s hardly something which should affect a general public. Namely, the problem at hand concerns the background lightning which suddenly turns off while the device is idle. This should be the case only during the calls, but some users stated that the display shuts even during the standard usage.

This, like so many other issues from the list, we can safely ascribe to a firmware update. For that reason, your best bet to address it is to factory reset your device.

11: Slow Wi-Fi and no 4G/LTE

The final spot is reserved for another connectivity issues. Some reports state that the Wi-Fi is too slow, while others have issues with enabling 4G/LTE on the Honor Play. Both problems should be resolved by resetting the network settings.

If that won’t help, and if we assume that the hardware isn’t an issue, the factory reset should resolve all issues. However, in regards to 4G, make sure that your SIM card and service provider support 4G before resetting the device.

12: Advanced Troubleshooting steps for the Honor Play

Reset Network settings

1. Choose Settings.
2. Open System.
3. Choose Backup & Reset.
4. Select Network settings reset.
5. Reset Network settings.

Boot into Safe Mode

1. Turn off your device.
2. Press and hold the Power button.
3. Once the Huawei screen appears, release the Power button and press and hold the Volume Down key.
4. You should see the ‘Safe mode’ notification in the lower-left corner of the screen.

Wipe cache partition

1. Power off your device.
2. Press and hold the Volume Down key and Power Button simultaneously.
3. When the phone starts, use the Volume Down to navigate throughout the menu.
4. Select Recovery mode with the single press of Power button.
5. Press the Power button to start Recovery mode. The Android robot with exclamation point should appear.
6. Hold Power Button and press once Volume Up key. The menu should appear.
7. Use the volume buttons to scroll to “wipe cache partition” and confirm with a single press of Power Button.

Enable Developer Options

1. Open Settings.
2. Tap System.
3. Select About phone.
4. Tap 7 times in succession on the Build number.
5. Get back to System and there you should see Developer options.

Reset the Honor Play to factory settings

1. Open Settings.
2. Tap Backup & Reset.
3. Choose Backup Now to save your data to a cloud service. Additionally, you can backup your data to a PC.
4. After it is done, in the same menu choose Reset Phone.
5. Tap Erase All and confirm.
6. The device will reboot and start the process that should last for less than 5 minutes.
7. This will completely restore every customized setting, so make sure to back up your data.

That’s it. If you have anything to add or take from the list, do us a favor and post your valuable feedback in the comments section below.