Julian Jest, an analyst at Informa, said he was impressed with the M8's new 5 megapixel front-facing camera, which allows for a wider image capture, making it "ideal for video calls and the ultimate selfie photo." However, he called on HTC to do a better marketing job with the M8 than it did for its predecessor, noting that technology improvements alone won't make the difference.
Analyst Carolina Milanesi, of Kantar WorldPanel, offered faint praise, saying the M8 is "incrementally better" than the M7, adding that the camera improvements and a Dot View cover (for getting time and messages in a dot matrix display through a special phone cover) are standouts. Overall, she called the phone a "very solid high-end product" that can compete with the Galaxy S5.