HTC 8S vs Nokia Lumia 820: Which is a Better Budget WP8 Smartphone to Buy?

By the end of 2012, consumers will have a tough time while choosing in between the right Windows Phone 8 smartphone to buy, as major manufacturers including Nokia, Samsung, HTC, Huawei and more have come up with their latest WP8 offerings.

But those, who are looking out for budget WP8 phones, the main confusion during purchasing decision would be between the newly launched Nokia Lumia 820 and HTC 8S.

Globally, both these handsets will hit the retail shelves only in November, which is after the official release of the Microsoft Windows 8 OS. While, both these impressive and colorful phones share almost similar features, however they are still very different from each other, when closely watched. Hence to chalk out the differences for you to decide on the right offering in a better manner, here is a head-to-head spec comparison between the HTC 8S and Nokia Lumia 820.

Dimension & Weight: HTC 8S carries a dimension of 120.5 x 63 x 10.28 mm, weighing at 113 grams and the thicker and heavier Lumia 820 boasts a dimension of 123.8 x 68.5 x 9.9 mm and a weight of around 160 grams.

Display: HTC 8S houses a 4 inch Super LCD 2 capacitive touchscreen display with a resolution of 800 x 480 pixels while Lumia 820 sports a larger 4.3 inch AMOLED ClearBlack capacitive touchscreen display with 800 x 480 pixel resolution.

Operating System: In this segment, both 8S and Lumia 820 are powered by the upcoming Windows Phone 8 OS.

Windows Phone 8 has improved features like dynamic Live Tile Information, social network integration in the People hub, Skydrive and Office 365 documents synchronization, Facebook-events integrated calendar, visual voicemail, threaded email conversations support and many more.

Processor: In this segment, 8S is equipped with a 1GHz dual core Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 processor while Lumia 820 has a dual core 1.5GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 processor.

Camera: On the camera optics front, 8S has a 5MP rear camera with auto focus, LED flash and BSI sensor and a front facing VGA camera for video calling.

On the other hand, Lumia 820 packs an 8MP rear camera with dual LED flash, autofocus and a VGA front camera. It is to be mentioned that Lumia 820 lacks the PureView camera technology present in the Lumia 920.

Storage: While 8S has 4GB internal memory and a 512GB RAM, Lumia 820 has 8GB internal memory and 1GB RAM.

Further, Nokia's offering has 8GB and 7GB free Microsoft SkyDrive storage, which is common for most of the Windows Phone handsets, but HTC has still not confirmed this free storage.

However, both the smartphones have an external micro SD card slot additional memory support up to 32GB.

Connectivity: On the connectivity front, Lumia 820 has features like NFC, Bluetooth 3.1, Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n, Qi Wireless Charging and Wi-Fi Channel Bonding. In comparison, 8S also Bluetooth v2.1+EDR and Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n features.

Battery: 8S is loaded with a 1,700 mAh Li-Po battery while Lumia 820 is equipped with a 1,650 mAh BP-ST battery, delivering 300 hours standby and 14 hours talk time.

Verdict

As both the smartphones – HTC 8S and Nokia Lumia 820 are based on Windows Phone 8 OS, they will have similar software features and UI experience.

HTC brings in the Beats Audio integration like the other smartphones from the Taiwanese vendor, while Lumia 820 has some groundbreaking features like wireless charging, glove friendly touchscreen and more.

If you like to have the best screen display, a pocket-friendly lightweight gadgets and Beats Audio technology, the HTC 8S will be the one you require.

However, if the a good camera and advanced connectivity features such as NFC are your concerns, then the Nokia Lumia 820 is the right choice for you.