Much has been said about silicon‑carbon as the future of smartphone battery technology over the past year, especially with its growing adoption by Chinese smartphone manufacturers like Honor, OnePlus, Oppo and Xiaomi.

Most of this chatter is centered around its absence from the latest flagship phones by major brands like Apple, Samsung and Google. Despite being some of the biggest smartphone makers in the world, they’re still using the same lithium-ion batteries that have been the norm since the original iPhone debuted in 2007.

Lithium-ion batteries have certainly served us well over the past two decades, but flagship battery capacities have hovered around 5,000mAh for years, and we’re simply not seeing meaningful gains anymore.

Silicon‑carbon phones, meanwhile, are breaking through that plateau. By swapping the traditional graphite anode for a silicon‑carbon composite, these batteries can pack far more lithium into the same space. The result is a density boost of around 20-40%.

Several recent models, like the OnePlus 15 and the Oppo Find X9 Pro, have sprinted past the 7,000mAh threshold without turning into brick-sized monsters, signaling a real shift in what’s achievable. And now that this next‑gen battery tech has finally started trickling into devices released here in Australia, I can properly test whether the hype matches reality.

Which brings me to the Honor Magic8 Pro. The global/Australian model I tested is equipped with a colossal 7,100mAh silicon-carbon battery — the largest I've ever tested in a smartphone. Crucially, the European variant uses a smaller 6,270mAh battery, meaning its battery life performance will be significantly different from the model I've tested over the last two weeks.

It barely lost any power in standby

During my first week with the Honor Magic8 Pro, I was admittedly too busy to fully test it, so I didn’t insert my SIM card or use it as my main device.

However, I kept it turned on the whole time while connected to my Wi-Fi network, so it was still getting emails and notifications from social media and other apps.

After four days with light usage to test out camera functionality and check my social media, I was blown away to discover that the Magic8 Pro had only dropped down to 91% from a full charge.

Sure, this isn't how most people would use their phones, but it did illustrate to me that it would be more likely to go the distance than my usual primary device, the Galaxy S26 Ultra, which has dropped 4% in the last hour without being used at all.

First day as a primary device

Of course, the real test would come with an active cellular connection. It's no secret that connecting to a cellular network — particularly over 5G — makes a sizeable.

Much of that is due to polling, in which your phone will constantly test its connection to the nearest cellular tower or hunt for better signals when coverage is weak.

With my SIM card in and the phone as my main device, I was still impressed by the Magic8 Pro's battery life. After a full day of moderate use — mindlessly scrolling through socials, browsing the web, streaming on Spotify and watching YouTube videos — it had only dropped to 72% by the time I went to bed.

Better still, having opted against charging the phone overnight (something that I would never dream of doing with any of my previous phones), I woke up to find that the Magic8 Pro's battery had only dropped down to 71%.

Pushing it a little harder on day two

Having this much juice leftover gave me the confidence to take the Honor Magic8 Pro out for a second day on the same charge. This time, I decided to push it a bit by downloading and installing the online PvP and PvE shooter The Division Resurgence, along with several required resource packs over Wi-Fi. Even after all that, the battery didn’t drop a single percent. So far, so good.

Although I didn’t play long sessions, I estimate my total playtime was about 1 hour and 30 minutes throughout the day at 'Very High' graphics settings, playing exclusively over 4G and 5G connections. This, along with my usual phone usage, resulted in the Magic8 Pro's battery dropping to 28% by the end of the second day.

Needless to say, two-day battery life is a game-changer, but having enough battery to continue into a third day? That's next-level. As much as I appreciated that there was still some battery left, and that the phone could conceivably last well into a third day, I decided it was time to fully recharge the phone again.

Faster charging (theoretically)

If you’ve ever wondered why your iPhone or Galaxy handset doesn’t chase extreme charging speeds, it’s because pushing high wattage creates heat, and heat is the fastest way to wear down the graphite‑based lithium‑ion batteries these phones still rely on.

That’s far less of a problem with silicon‑carbon, which can accept far higher charging rates without the same level of stress on the battery. In the case of the Honor Magic8 Pro, that means wired charging speeds of up to 100W and wireless charging up to 80W.

Unfortunately, the Magic8 Pro does not include a charging brick in the box, and I don’t own an Honor SuperCharge adapter, so I wasn’t able to test its full 100W charging speeds. My 65W UGREEN charger also lacks Programmable Power Supply (PPS) support, so the phone fell back to standard USB‑PD rates, topping out at around 25W in my testing.

If fast charging is a priority, make sure you pick up a charger that supports Honor’s proprietary SuperCharge protocol — PPS alone won’t unlock the phone’s maximum speeds.

Benchmarking in real world conditions

For a realistic measure of the Honor Magic8 Pro’s battery longevity, I ran PCMark’s Work 3.0 battery life test, which continuously performs everyday tasks until the battery drops under 20%.

I left the display untouched, avoiding artificially low brightness or screen refresh rates. Under these conditions, the Magic8 Pro still achieved a strong screen-on time (SOT) of 15 hours and 36 minutes. In comparison, my Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra lasted 11 hours and 43 minutes.

According to research by Reviews.org from 2021, the average Aussie logs about 5.5 hours of SOT per day. Taking that into consideration, the benchmark result translates to around 2.8 days of battery life in real-world usage, which seems fairly consistent with my own experience.

Sounds great — what's the catch?

Given how great silicon-carbon batteries seem to be, there are a number of reasons why the world's biggest smartphone manufacturers are yet to adopt the technology. For one, Chinese companies are leading the charge when it comes to silicon‑carbon battery production and deployment, making it difficult for non-Chinese brands to source in large quantities.

Swelling is also a characteristic of silicon-carbon batteries, and while that's completely accounted for during the manufacturing process of these batteries, it's understandably still a cause for concern.

Additionally, silicon-carbon cells degrade more quickly, potentially reducing a handset's battery capacity within the first few years. However, it’s worth remembering that their initial, much larger capacity means that even with this loss, they’ll likely still offer longer overall life than the lithium-ion batteries currently found in most phones.

Despite these drawbacks, major brands like Samsung and Apple are almost certainly tracking the progress of silicon-carbon technology closely. After all, the existence of phones like the Honor Magic8 Pro, which boasts a battery life exceeding two days on a single charge, must surely serve as a wake up call to the world's largest smartphone manufacturers.

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I’ve been using iPhones ever since the 3GS, and an Apple ecosystem has grown around me — from the M5 MacBook Pro to my Apple Watch Ultra 2. But as my iPhone 15 Pro is on its last legs (as a content creator, I’ve really put it through its paces), it’s time to upgrade and I’m stumped.

Normally, my inner voice would be saying “just get an iPhone” to silence the blue bubble FOMO, but the Honor 600 stands as one of the few Android devices that actually plays nice with the ecosystem instead of fighting it.

And this isn’t just in software, the aesthetics are seriously premium, you’re getting a giant battery, mesmerizing OLED display, AI smarts in (mostly) all the right places and a banger camera system.

I do have some gripes (more on them later), but for £549 — £50 less than the iPhone 17e — you’d be hard pressed to find a better direct foe to Apple’s lineage.

The anti-Android aesthetic

It all starts with the Honor 600 being a serious looker and real premium feel in the hand — slim and lightweight at 6.7 ounces with unibody cold-carving process creating that sleek aluminum frame around the body.

But the real attention to detail comes in two ways. First, that super skinny bezel at 0.98mm (actually the thinnest in the industry right now) really does make the front basically look like its all display, while giving your thumb plenty of real estate to navigate while one-handed.

Then there’s the translucent composite fiber back. Touching it, you’d think it’s glass. But I promise you it’s not, and it actually makes the phone much more durable too. Throw in IP68, IP69 and IP69K water and dust resistance, alongside being SGS 5-star rated for drop and crush resistance, and this is ideal for clumsy hands like mine.

Living in both worlds

So here’s the secret weapon. I know Android Quick Share has managed to crack the AirDrop formula for Apple devices, but Honor’s been doing this for a while and with the upgraded OneHop technology, you’re getting much broader interconnectivity with other gadgets too!

It all starts with the Honor Workstation app for one-tap file sharing with iPhones and Macs, which in my time testing transferred data at a much higher speed too. One word of warning, though, both the Honor 600 and the MacBook need to be on the same WiFi network to make this happen.

But it goes further with a shared/synced notes system similar to the iCloud alternative. Open up a Workstation note and it’ll appear on your phone in real-time. Then comes the Apple Watch integration where the 600’s messages can sync to my Ultra 2.

It’s not the completely perfect “it just works” levels of Apple integration you get with an iPhone, Apple Watch and MacBook working together, but it’s close enough for what I need to do.

The day-to-day

Of course, one of the ways that Android phones stand up to iPhones is by offering better hardware for less, and that’s exactly what the Honor 600 does. Beyond the design aspects we’ve already talked about, there’s a giant 6.6-inch AMOLED screen running at 120Hz with a crispy 458 pixels-per inch.

Colors melt off the screen — especially when you flick on Vivid Display that uses AI to enhance clarity and color — with anything you watch, play or work on moving buttery smooth. But the real superpower here is brightness that hurts (but in a good way), as sunlight mode can tweak that peak brightness all the way up to 8,000 nits…yes you read that right.

That meant even in the most direct sunlight (even when its reflecting off the cover glass), I had no problem seeing content. And for late night use, this is contrasted by the 3,840Hz PWM dimming and AI defocus features that has legitimately made this display feel easier on the eyes when doomscrolling.

Then there’s the software that brings it all together: the MagicOS 10 skin on top of Android 16. There’s plenty of customizability to the UI, but out-the-box it felt familiar to an iOS-style app pages formula, which then slowly reveals other familiarities like the Dynamic Island-like Magic Capsule on top too for quick reference to real-time notifications.

But it’s 2026, so of course the phone has AI, which for the 600 extends far beyond your standard writing tools and translations. I’ve already talked about the AI display tweaks you can make, as well as the fun image-to-video stuff you can do too. But a lot more comes into play with that dedicated AI button.

With either a short, long or double press, you can jump into various features like a circle to search, and get suggestions based on on-screen content through the image model. There’s also AI battery scheduling too for identifying your usage patterns and optimizing power allocation, and a deepfake/voice clone detection system, though on that latter one it wasn’t entirely accurate with a 75% success rate in my testing.

Plus, with that giant 6800mAh battery inside, I’m able to comfortably make it through an entire day of regular use (Apple Music, checking socials, messaging, TikTok doomscrolling, a couple quick games) with around 35% left in the tank — a far cry from the fumes I’m left with on my iPhone at its peak.

Getting snap happy

Of course, one of the biggest selling points for a phone is its camera, and in my time testing, the 600 mostly nails it. That 200MP main snapper definitely delivers some flagship-level pictures with some additional flair to boot.

You can turn on pro mode to get the full res, but I highly doubt anyone will, because with 16-in-1 pixel binning, you’re getting a lot more light to the lens and incredible clarity in every shot. Throw in CIPA 6.0 pro-grade optical image stabilization and low light shots are not a problem for this either.

But most impressive is that color temperature sensor doing some great work in understanding the vividness of what you’re shooting, while the AI color engine gives you a chance to mimic your favorite camera styles from the likes of Fujifilm.

And while the AI image-to-video is definitely more gimmick than a serious feature, I can’t deny it’s a lot of fun to use for bringing inanimate objects to life. Round the front you’ve got a 50MP shooter also produces bright, crispy, color accurate shots too.

There’s just one issue though — that 12MP ultra wide and macro camera is a bit of a letdown compared to the monster 200MP main. There’s a fair bit of edge blur and reduced sharpness that can create a slightly mushier quality to the 0.5x shots.

For those wanting versatile creativity, better balance would’ve been nicer here.

The frustrations

That being said, there were a couple of things that I missed while daily driving the Honor 600. First, that mid-range Snapdragon 7 Gen 4 chip is speedy enough for the day-to-day basics and some multitasking, but it can start to get under pressure for anything more intensive.

Thanks to the vapor chamber, it won’t overheat under that sustained load, but it will just take a while to do things like render advanced photo edits, and gaming is on the slower side until you tone the graphics settings down a bit. And given the focus on the design here, you can find similarly-priced phones like the OnePlus Nord 5 or the iPhone 17e with more bang for your buck in this area.

And second is the lack of wireless charging. This has been common for the standard number series of Honor phones for a while now, and if you are more keen to do wired charging, this can absolutely keep up with 80W charging speeds and even 27W reverse wired to keep your earbuds topped up. But as someone who dived right into the MagSafe ecosystem, this is a tough pill to swallow.

Bottom line

However, all that being said, I’m stumped. My inner voice saying “just get the iPhone” has been silenced and it’s not just about specs — it's the fact that switching no longer means losing the Mac/Apple Watch features I love. Instead of fighting it, the Honor 600 embraces that seamlessness, and it’s one of the best phones I’ve tested in a long while.

It feels like the “Pro” phone the midrange has been waiting for and maybe, just maybe, it’s the one that will make some folks consider switching. I’m definitely getting that feeling.

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The Honor 600 and 600 Pro are launching soon, and while we’re testing them for reviews and camera face-offs real soon, I can tell you about one feature I’ve been having fun with — AI Image to Video 2.0.

In the words of an infamous U.K. Ronseal advert (ask your British mates), it does exactly what it says on the tin: you take your pictures, throw them into a multi-modal video generation model with a prompt and the picture is turned into a small clip up to 8 seconds long.

And after testing this feature for myself, it’s fair to say the second generation of this model vastly improves the contextual understanding of vague prompts, and made me ask a question: what even is a photo anymore in 2026? Not in a bad way…let me explain.

The key upgrades

So with this new multi-modal model, the 600 Series is able to take a deep semantic understanding of what it reads from your prompt and what it sees from your picture. It will tie the two together to make sense of what kind of video you want to see, fire it over to a data center to do the heavy lifting and give you an end result in about two minutes.

For the second generation, Honor’s bringing some fun new ways to get creative to the table:

• Image + Instruction to Video: Instead of just giving it a picture and not being able to direct the scene, you can now upload multiple reference photos and add text commands to dictate exactly what happens.
• First-and-Last Frame: You can add a before and after picture, and watch a smooth transition between the two scenes — be it people walking between two locations or morphing entirely into other characters.
• Preset templates, effects and camera movements: There’s a massive selection of camera templates here that you can insert into the prompt, from stylizations and color grading to camera movements like the classic Hitchcock zoom.

And through all of these (as you’re about to see), the visual consistency here is impressive. There are some moments where it can stutter a little bit, but on the whole, this is just pure fun.

Bringing it to life

So at the preview event I attended, Honor set up a couple of small model demonstrations for us to take quick snaps of with that impressive 200MP main camera to see what we could generate.

First, this cute little Panda in a park setting. I snapped it, opened the create tab in the gallery app and simply said “the Panda skips through the grass.” And the result was rather adorable — introducing character movement and almost giving it a Toy Story-esque feel of whimsy. The model had identified it as toys and adapted accordingly.

Next, the Subbuteo set (shout out to any fans). I wanted to really put it to a test with a super vague prompt and a photo that may make it hallucinate. So I picked the angle where the goalkeeper was hard to see leaning back in the net and prompted saying “the ball is saved.”

You can tell the 600 Pro had a bit of a hard time figuring out what I meant here with the ball having a life of its own, but it did make some logical creative decisions to arrive at what I was saying — adding an entirely new goalkeeper.

Sound effects are a little weird on both, but purely for the sake of a quick video meme to share with your friends and family, this is really rather good.

Outlook

Yes, I know I’m the person on the Tom’s Guide team warning about the AI bubble, and actively hoping it bursts so we can all finally get affordable tech again. But that doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate it when it’s implemented in a fun way, which is exactly what Honor has done.

With it seamlessly added into the flow of your built-in gallery app (or even with the dedicated AI side button), the 600 Series does solid work at bringing you beefy camera hardware and allowing you to play around with it in new ways.

Is it a gimmick? Sure. But a gimmick can still make you smile.

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Silicon-carbon (Si-C) batteries are here, and are here to stay. Almost every flagship and mid-range phone made by Chinese manufacturers in the past two years — even those sold in the US (like the OnePlus 15) — now pack fast-charging Si-C batteries with capacities ranging from 6,000mAh (Xiaomi 17 Ultra) to 10,000mAh (Realme P4 Power). Yet Apple, Google, and Samsung have been reluctant to adopt this new battery technology.

That’s why ultra-thin handsets like Apple’s iPhone Air (3,190mAh) and Samsung’s Galaxy S25 Edge (3,900mAh) deliver merely adequate battery life, while Honor’s 6.1mm thick Magic8 Pro Air (5,500mAh Si-C) easily cruises along for over a day on a charge. It’s the same with many of the best foldable phones. Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold7 comes with a measly 4,400mAh cell, while Oppo’s Find N6 and Honor’s Magic V6 boast 6,000 and 6,660mAh Si-C batteries, respectively.

Poke around the Internet, and you’ll find a lot of FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt) about Si-C batteries. Last year, I asked a Google exec on the Pixel team when Google would start using Si-C batteries in Pixel handsets, and the response I received was — and I paraphrase — that Si-C batteries aren’t mature, safe, or durable. Meanwhile, every Chinese phone I’ve used with a Si-C battery (like Oppo’s awesome Find X9 Pro) has been a revelation.

Because, as it turns out, two-day battery life is a game changer. So what’s going on here? Are Si-C batteries really unsafe? Are durability and longevity an issue? Is there a cost or manufacturing barrier? I decided to go directly to the source and interview experts at Honor, OnePlus, and Oppo about Si-C batteries. I talked to Hope Cao, Honor senior product expert, and Rudolf Xu, senior product marketing manager, OnePlus. Here’s what I found out.

Note: Oppo was unable to participate in this interview because of scheduling constraints (Chinese/Lunar New Year followed by Mobile World Congress). But since OnePlus and Oppo are related companies, it’s safe to assume that OnePlus and Oppo share almost identical Si-C battery technology.

Si-C batteries are mature and improving rapidly

It’s pretty clear that standard Lithium-ion (Li-ion) cells with traditional graphite anodes have hit a limit when it comes to energy density. By adding silicon content to the anode, Si-C batteries offer vastly higher capacities in the same physical space. But silicon in anodes expands and contracts a lot during charges and discharges, and is challenging to integrate safely into cells. And that’s where each manufacturer’s secret sauce comes in.

Honor was an early player, delivering the industry's first Si-C battery in a phone back in 2023, with the Magic5 Pro. The company’s progress has been remarkably aggressive ever since. For the Magic V6’s fifth-generation Si-C battery, Honor and partner ATL were able to achieve 25% silicon content. But the 1TB Chinese market version of the Magic V6 features 32% silicon content, resulting in a folding phone with a massive 7,150mAh battery. As Honor's Cao puts it, this milestone is "marking the start of the 7,000 mAh era for foldable phones".

OnePlus joined the party a bit later with the OnePlus 13, which featured 10% silicon content. For its latest flagship, the OnePlus 15, the company’s proprietary Silicon NanoStack design managed to raise the silicon content to a 15% industry high. By combining this with a custom dual-cell architecture, the OnePlus 15 packs a whopping 7,300mAh Si-C battery into a standard candy-bar smartphone footprint.

Si-C batteries are enabling ultra-sleek designs

The most immediate consumer benefit of Si-C batteries is their profound impact on industrial design. Since these cells deliver significantly higher energy densities, manufacturers like Honor, OnePlus, and Oppo are able to offer thinner form factors with outstanding battery life. This also makes Si-C batteries ideally suited for folding phones like the Honor Magic V6 and Oppo Find N6, or ultra-sleek flagships like the OnePlus 15.

For Honor, Si-C batteries are critical to the company’s folding phone strategy. Keeping these devices highly pocketable requires a split battery design with two smaller, thinner cells. Thanks to Si-C batteries, the Magic V6 manages to pack up to 7,150mAh into a chassis that’s merely 8.75mm thick when folded. Honor”s Cao emphasizes that "Flagship-level capability does not necessarily require sacrificing a slim, lightweight in-hand experience."

OnePlus is focused on using Si-C batteries to improve the look and feel of traditional candy-bar smartphones, noting that consumers are showing a "fresh appetite for compact flagships". Si-C batteries allow the company to slightly reduce device thickness while greatly increasing battery capacity. As a result, the OnePlus 15, which boasts a 7,300mAh Si-C battery, combines a slim, premium design with industry-leading battery life. It’s no wonder that it has the best phone battery life of any device that Tom’s Guide has tested.

Si-C batteries are more expensive and more difficult to manufacture

Despite all the aforementioned benefits, the transition to Si-C batteries faces a couple of significant hurdles. As you’d expect, Si-C batteries are fundamentally more difficult to manufacture and more expensive than standard Li-ion cells.

Honor is transparent about the higher cost, and states that Si-C batteries are typically 20% to 40% more expensive to manufacture than Li-ion batteries at the cell level. This premium reflects higher material costs, stricter production environments, and more complex manufacturing processes the company has developed to mitigate the rapid expansion and contraction of silicon in anodes while charging and discharging.

OnePlus also confirms that Si-C batteries are more expensive. Xu is candid about current prices, saying, "We do not foresee Si-C anode batteries becoming cheaper than conventional graphite-anode cells in the near term."

Si-C batteries require state-of-the-art engineering

The challenge with using silicon in anodes is its extreme volatility. As the silicon in the anode absorbs lithium ions, it expands drastically, which creates extreme mechanical stress within the cell. Both companies overcome this obstacle in their Si-C batteries through impressive engineering feats.

Honor handles this problem in multiple ways. Cao explains that the company broke away from traditional anode designs "by layering the silicon and graphite systems like a 'sandwich'.” It also developed a Chemical Vapor Deposition (CVD) process that allows the silicon in the anode to expand in a more uniform way, reducing mechanical stress. Honor also uses a microscopic "spider-silk" adhesive, an elastic binder that keeps the cell’s internal dimensions stable under compression.

OnePlus tackles this issue by using spherical silicon-carbon particles and an aerospace-grade coating that the company developed in house. Beyond the Silicon NanoStack battery itself, the OnePlus 15 uses an AI-based battery management system (BMS) to prevent the cells from degrading over time.

Si-C batteries are safe and durable

Given how much silicon in anodes expands while charging, and the resulting mechanical stress, both companies have taken exceptional steps to ensure that their Si-C batteries remain safe and durable for years to come. This includes extreme testing that exceeds the certification requirements used for Li-ion cells.

​Honor’s testing goes far beyond industry standards. Besides obtaining mandatory CB (IEC 62133), UKCA (UK Conformity Assessed), and CE (European Union) certifications, the company subjects its Si-C batteries to tests in extreme conditions to ensure stability. As Cao notes, "In response to the unique expansion characteristics of Si-C batteries, Honor conducts even more rigorous evaluations, such as puncture resistance tests, extreme stress tests, structural deformation tests, and high-temperature stability tests."

​OnePlus is similarly thorough, and runs more than seventy unique tests on its Si-C batteries. The company evaluates cells in a broad range of temperature, voltage, and stress conditions to make sure its Si-C batteries meet strict durability and safety targets. According to Xu, device longevity is critical to OnePlus, and the Silicon NanoStack battery used in the OnePlus 15 is designed to maintain "over 80% of its original health after 4 years of use."

Bottom line: two-day battery life for all

So there you have it. After hearing from experts at Honor and OnePlus, two leaders in the field of Si-C batteries, I hope you have a better understanding of what this technology brings to the table — the benefits, the limitations, and the remaining challenges. What’s abundantly clear is that Si-C batteries today aren’t some exotic fad. They are a mature, safe, and durable technology that drastically improves the smartphone user experience, and are here to stay.

With Chinese manufacturers relentlessly marching forward, it’s only a matter of time until Apple, Google, and Samsung join the Si-C battery party. And that's a good thing, because their manufacturing volume and marketing power will make this technology accessible to everyone — in other words, ubiquitous. After all, who doesn’t want a fast-charging smartphone with two-day battery life?

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Mobile World Congress (MWC) used to just be about phones! But just like CES back in January, it’s basically now also a computing show where you can see a whole lot of new laptops in action.

And a few of the biggest companies on the planet have gone all out to win the hearts and minds of general users, pros and gamers alike with their contributions to the year of the laptop.

Just because the MacBook Neo is hogging the spotlight doesn't mean there aren't any blockbuster announcements happening here. From Lenovo’s zany concepts to machines you can buy today, here are my 5 favorite machines coming out of Barcelona and onto my desk soon.

1. Honor MagicBook Pro 14

Honor is back again with the MagicBook Pro 14, and this time it’s outfitted with Intel Core Ultra Series 3. I’ve always been a massive fan of Honor’s laptops for finding an ideal balance between the three P’s — performance, power efficiency and portability.

This does exactly that for another consecutive year, while also adding in some real premium upgrades here like a gorgeously vivid 3120 x 2080-resolution OLED display at 3:2 aspect ratio, a top-notch feeling keyboard and a weight loss over last year’s model (coming in now at 1.39kg).

And all of this is thrown into a sleek aluminum chassis that’s quite the looker from all angles and easy to stow away in the backpack — along with a stupendously long battery life courtesy of that 92Wh cell inside.

2. Lenovo Legion Go foldable prototype

It started life as a quirky gaming handheld with a folding screen, but once fully unfolded, you can attach that 11.6-inch panel to a keyboard deck to return to your netbook era. I know this is just a concept — a prototype you’ll never be able to buy.

But in that brief moment of going back in time, it made me realize just how much I had started to legitimately miss using something so small. The more compact frame does feel far nicer to carry around, while not giving up on the ergonomics of that keyboard. I just hope that 11-inch laptops make a comeback.

3. Lenovo ThinkBook Modular concept

Part two of the Lenovo trio blends a Framework laptop with an Asus Zenbook Duo to make for an impressively modular prototype that I so hope becomes real soon. Welcome to the ThinkBook Modular concept — a pogo pin-driven dream of versatility that lets you use the system in any way you see fit.

Want a dual-screen experience? Just pop the keyboard deck off and replace it with a second display. Want to present something cool, take the display off, connect it via USB-C and attach a stand to it to show things off. Looking for another USB-C port? Slide that HDMI socket off the side and replace it.

Repairability and ease of upgradeability is becoming more and more crucial in 2026, and Lenovo’s concept shows how exciting this could be.

4. Lenovo Yoga Pro 7a

I was a big fan of the Lenovo Yoga Pro 9i Aura Edition at last year’s show, but one thing became a limiting factor — battery life because of the use of a dedicated RTX 50-series GPU inside.

But as I predicted way back in January last year (and have been so vindicated on), integrated graphics have evolved at such a rapid pace and AMD’s Strix Halo is the crown jewel of an example of this.

So what happens when you take that Yoga Pro lineage and mash it with an AMD Ryzen AI Max+ chipset? Simple, you get the Yoga Pro 7a. This is a mighty MacBook Pro competitor with a massive OLED panel, a touchpad that sports stylus support for doodling, and a way better battery life.

5. Tecno Megabook S14

And finally, a shout out to my ultraportables crowd. Getting something uber thin and light is getting very pricey nowadays, but the Tecno MegaBook S14 would beg to differ. It is officially the world’s lightest 14-inch OLED laptop at just 899 grams.

The aluminum body feels premium to the touch with good keyboard/touchpad ergonomics to boot. Power-wise, there is a bit of a compromise with Intel Core Ultra Series 1 silicon, but still good enough for general office productivity and binge watching the night away.

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Honor's MWC 2026 offerings contain both real devices and futuristic concepts. But as good as the actual launching products like the Magic V6 are, the one that's clearly captured the attention of the tech world is Honor's Robot Phone concept.

On the back of an otherwise regular smartphone, behind a sliding cover, lives a gimbal-mounted 200MP camera, powered by a tiny custom motor. Inspired by the Pixar Lamp (in case you couldn't guess from the way it moves and makes cute oohs and aahs in the trailer), this gimbal is meant to give the phone character and functionality that other smartphones simply can't match.

While Honor isn't letting the public touch the Robot Phone yet (with one of its minders sharply telling off one TG-er who dared to poke the screen), we've watched the demos closely and reviewed the facts carefully. And what we seem to have here is a phone of two halves, each imagining a future for the smartphone in divergent ways.

The Phone

We'll begin with the hardware first, even though Honor is adamant that this device is more than just a smartphone with a big gimbal bolted to the back. Because, for one, it's actually a remarkably small gimbal.

Despite having three axes of movement, a miniature motor ensures the 200MP camera module moves snappily and precisely when required. And there are a lot of potential uses that Honor showed off, such as tracking during recording video calls, super-steady video for when things get hectic, and something Honor calls AI SpinShot. That one lets the gimbal rotate at a set speed to a specific point to create dramatic footage that you would normally need more than just a phone for.

Plus, the camera's been built in collaboration with the cinematography masters at ARRI, which is an impressive partnership for a concept device.

The Robot

To be honest, Honor could have just stopped there - that's more than enough unique functionality to make this concept one worth talking about. But that apparently wasn't enough, which is why this is a Robot Phone rather than a Gimbal Phone or something like that.

The built-in AI functionality lets you have conversations with the phone, and the gimbal will respond.

Honor showed off the phone nodding or shaking its "head" to respond to user questions, and how it can dance along to music, moving quickly or slowly as the beat requires. You can ask questions too, such as how your outfit looks, and the phone will note what you're wearing and give you some encouragement, with a thoughtful head dip and nod from the camera to accompany it.

There's more AI to find with the camera, too. Honor mentioned on stage how the Robot Phone features "AI editing" and" Agentic shooting," but didn't go into detail about what that meant or how it worked.

Honor's presentation also mentioned that the Robot Phone would gain further uses, for both on-desk tasks and out and about, later in the year. So it sounds like Honor plans to keep developing this concept, if not actually turn it into a commercial product you can buy in at least China, if not other countries too.

Which is it first: Robot, or phone?

It's obvious that the Honor Robot Phone is meant to have personality and expressiveness that the average AI-powered phone currently lacks. I don't know if that's something that users want, but I know a few people who are already curious about the gimbal tech that underpins this phone.

For me, I still consider my phone a tool, and I don't need a tool to have a pre-installed character. But perhaps for tech users who have conversations with chatbots like ChatGPT or Gemini every day, this is the kind of thing they expect their next phone to have.

Honor seems to have done a clever hedging of its bets with the Robot Phone at MWC 2026. Two ideas about the future in one phone means twice as many chances of making the right call.

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Foldable phones are still in an arms race. Manufacturers are desperate to prove they can make the biggest screens with the smaller creases, with the most camera tech and most spacious batteries. And Honor is one of the foremost brands at stuffing more and more into its folding phones, especially with its new Magic V6, freshly unveiled at MWC 2026.

Honor's confirmed that Chinese sales are coming this month, but global sales won't come until the second half of the year. So this early reveal is more about Honor calling its shot before other foldable phone makers launch their devices later in the year. How sporting of them.

Take a brief tour with me of the Magic V6's specs and special features, and see if you think a next-gen Galaxy Z Fold, Pixel Fold or even the rumored iPhone Fold stand a chance against this.

Premium looks

We start off strong with the design of the Magic V6. While the alternative black or white versions of this phone sound sophisticated, this red vegan leather edition really stuns. And that's before you admire the gold trim around the edges and the toughened "Super Steel" hinge, with its subtle grid design. If a duke from ages past were to have a foldable, it might be one as luxurious-looking as this one.

But in a similarly historical vein - much like a 19th century phrenologist, all I want to do is get my calipers out and do some measuring. Honor claims that the skinniest version of the Magic V6 measures 8.75mm thick when shut, 4mm thick when open, and tips the scales at a surprisingly light 219 grams. Sadly the non-white versions, like the red one here, aren't quite as thin, but it still feels wonderful to handle.

The screens on the Magic V6 are a 7.95-inch inner display and a 6.52-inch outer one. Both have anti-reflective displays thanks to new silicon nitride layers, a feature Honor's keen to note is used on luxury cars. And like previous Magic V models, you can use a stylus on either screen.

Looking to the inner display, Honor touts a 44% crease depth decrease compared to the Magic V5. It's still there if you're looking for it, but we're way past the point where you're likely to be distracted by it. And that's if you can stand to look at the screen, as an alleged 5,000-nit peak brightness (6,000 nits on the outer one) helps things stay visible.

Cameras are not as big a deal on the Magic V6 as it has been on previous generations, but Honor's still got impressive specs to share. We have 50MP main and ultrawide cameras and a 64MP telephoto camera on the back, and 20MP front cameras for the inner and outer screens.

These are all tuned with the in-house AiMAGE Color Engine, which Honor highlighted in our demo by showing how accurately it could capture the lustre of golden jewellery. Something I know we all struggle with.

But the specs keep getting better from here. Running all the phone's operations is the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5, with the Magic V6 being the first foldable to use this chip. Honor offers 16GB RAM and 512GB storage by default, which is just as generous as previous Magic V models have been. Not an easy thing to keep going during RAMageddon.

And to continue the roll of big, impressive numbers, the Magic V6's silicon carbon battery dazzles with its 6,600 mAh capacity, which is the highest in any foldable phone to date. And refuelling comes from 80W wired and 66W wireless charging, assuming you have the right chargers to hand.

Honor's quite proud of the fact the the battery it uses in the Magic V6 is more energy dense than one found in a Tesla. Unfortunately, we don't get the best version globally, as the China version of this phone has over 7,000 mAh of capacity by adding an even denser 32% silicon "Blade Battery." And while I couldn't test the battery life for this review, the Magic V6's inner display apparently lasts for 24 hours on a single charge according to testing by TÜV Rheinland.

Software that even iPhone users will want

Beyond the raw specs, Honor still has more to show off with the Magic V6. It comes with improved multi-tasking with the option to slide across a virtual desktop of apps, arranged to your liking. It's more like OnePlus or Oppo than Samsung, which I am all in favor of.

Gemini cross-app actions are here, and can work with either Google apps or Honor's own. More uniquely, the Magic V6 has an "AI meeting agent," which can apparently summarize your meetings in real time. But Honor also says it can listen out for your name, or other key terms you give it, letting you tune out freely while knowing the Magic V6 will alert you if your boss calls on you to give an update on that project you should have already finished by now.

Then there's all the Apple cross-compatability powers that will be coming via an over-the-air update later in the year. We've seen some of these on other devices from other brands before, like mirroring screens and sending files, but Honor's gone even further.

You can use the Magic V6 as a second screen for your Mac, much like Apple will let you do with an iPad via Sidecar mode. The Magic V6 is also able to access your iWork and iCloud to access files you have stored there. You can also pair AirPods with a similar interface and feature set to using them with an Apple device, and similarly get notifications passed through to an Apple Watch. It all seems designed to attract iPhone users back to Android, but without the additional expense of replacing all your peripherals.

Sadly, the new software and AI tricks, including the iPhone and Mac integration, remains only as a demo you can see at trade shows or in online sizzle reels. We'll let you know how these work at a later date when we get to try them, but going by how Honor and other Chinese companies like Oppo have managed to get their devices through the gate of Apple's walled garden to play with iOS and macOS, I trust that these features work as described. Even if you have to download an app with a long list of required data permissions to make it all happen.

Magic is on its way

Keeping an eye on non-Samsung and Google foldables may seem a pointless exercise if you can't easily buy these devices where you live. But I'd disagree, since the Magic V6 shows just how much more the Galaxy Z Fold and Pixel Pro Fold series can do if users expected it of them.

And even if the iPhone Fold matches up to the incredible device that the rumors have told us about, it will still lack in several areas to Honor's latest and greatest. And may even have worse cross-device collaboration features with Apple's own computers.

I look forward to returning to the Magic V6 later in the year when the final software updates appear and we can give it a full review. But even while I wait, and start to see the rumor mill churn out more and more Z Fold 8 or Pixel 11 Pro Fold rumors, I'll be smiling wryly at the idea that Honor's latest foldable is looming above them, waiting to strike with its wealth of still-superior specs.

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For the longest time, we have seen the standard battery size for most of the best phones sit comfortably around 5,000 mAh, but a new release is aiming to double that capacity.

Realme might not be a company that many of you recognize, but it specializes in affordable smartphones. However, the latest product announced by the company, the Realme P4 Power, looks to be a real game-changer thanks to the 10,001 mAh battery. According to Realme, the new Titan battery can last a full week on a single charge, outlasting even the longest-lasting phones.

While Realme hasn’t released the full specs for the device, it has stated that the phone will feature advanced safety features, while utilizing smart technology to help maintain consistent performance, while slowing wear over time. The phone's "Titan" battery is also stated to last for 1,650 charging cycles before the battery health hits 80%, with Realme guaranteeing the battery health for 4 years, and promising to replace it if it drops under 80% before then for free.

While we might not know the exact battery life of this phone, Realme’s head of product marketing shared an image on X that appears to give a good indication. The image shows off the phone's battery settings page, and appears to show that the phone is on 3% battery after having been on for over 31 days without a charge.

Honor also enters the ring with a bigger battery

It’s not just Realme that’s aiming for a much larger battery, as Honor has also released a device featuring a battery with a five-figure capacity. The Honor Power 2 features a 10,080 mAh battery, alongside a MediaTek Dimensity 8500-series chip and 80W wired and 27W wireless fast charging options.

These new Realme and Honor devices provoke big questions about why companies like Samsung and Google seem uninterested in increasing their phones' battery capacities by quite so much. And the likely answer is that brands like Apple, Google and Samsung currently focus on utilizing existing lithium-ion batteries, while the new Honor (and likely the Realme) uses new silicon-carbon cell instead.

As seen on the OnePlus 15, which manages to offer a battery life that can easily reach two days, silicon-carbon cells are more energy-dense, allowing for a higher capacity without increasing the battery's physical size. However, concerns about these batteries' longevity, and the sourcing of their components, have meant adoption has been slow to date.

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It's nice to know that when you give advice or constructive feedback, someone is listening. So seeing the Honor Magic8 Pro fix problems that I've noted with earlier models in its family feels really good.

With its latest phone, Honor has retained the Magic series' signature aggressive pricing, high-specced cameras, big display and top-tier performance and storage. But now the battery life is better than ever, and the Magic8 Pro gets seven years of full updates guaranteed from launch, plus one of the most generous collections of software features available on any Android phone.

It's just a shame that Honor still doesn't feel like stepping into the U.S. market, which would benefit immensely from another Android flagship player like this. But on the plus side, there's never been a better time to try to import one yourself or bug Honor's leadership to reconsider.

Honor Magic8 Pro review: Specs

Honor Magic8 Pro review: Price and availability

In the U.K., the Magic8 Pro costs £1,099, just like the previous generation did. That's cheap for a phone that competes with other big Pro or Ultra models, which tend to cost at least £100 more than that.

The Honor Magic 8 Pro is also available in Australia as of April 2026, priced at AU$1,999 for the 512GB / 12GB configuration, which is the only locally available model.

The big problem is that Honor still doesn't sell its phones through U.S. carriers and retailers, although the determined can ship one in via various international outlets. Just remember to check that the Magic8 Pro's supported mobile bands will work with your chosen carrier, or you may struggle to find good cell reception.

Honor Magic8 Pro review: Design and display

A curved screen with a big circular camera block on the back has been the signature of Honor's Magic series devices for several years, and the Magic8 Pro doesn't mess with that formula too much. That said, the display, while still "micro-curved," is much closer to the flat panels that basically all other phones have adopted over the past few years.

The color choices this time around are Sunrise Gold, Black and finally Sky Cyan — the color I have been testing. It's an extremely subtle blue, which I do like the look of. But I like my phone colors punchier — I have an orange iPhone after all — so it feels like Honor's hiding its light under a bushel for no good reason.

Adding more personality to the Magic8 Pro is the double front camera cutout, which it needs since this is one of the rare Android phones to support fully secure facial recognition unlocking. It's hard to say how much like Apple's Face ID it is, but in terms of speed and viewing angles, Honor seems to be on par with my iPhone 17 Pro Max.

Joining a recent trend in Chinese phones, the Magic8 Pro is certified three times for dust/water resistance. The IP68, IP69 and IP69K ratings translate to a dust-tight phone that can handle being submerged in water or shot with cold or hot water jets.

According to the specs, the Magic8 Pro's 6.7-inch OLED screen is capable of producing up to 6,000 nits of brightness with HDR content, or a more pedestrian 1,800 nits under normal circumstances. We haven't been able to do our battery of display tests on the Magic8 Pro, but what I can tell you is that while it's bright, Honor's phone is not as bright as the Pixel 10 Pro XL, which we have measured as the brightest phone we've ever tested.

In terms of color, the Magic8 Pro seems similarly vivid to the Pixel, even if it's not as bright. But that can vary thanks to Honor's usual treasure trove of eye comfort tech. The Magic8 Pro features up to 4320Hz PWM Dimming — a must-have for users who suffer from smartphone-induced headaches — as well as "Circular Polarized" light to make the display more comfortable to look at. You also have the ability to defocus the display to reduce eye strain.

More common options like motion sickness assistance or color and brightness adjustment to best match the time of day and current lighting are all present too, although the total benefit is hard to prove given the limited time I spent with the phone and how I don't particularly suffer with any of the issues these features are designed to help.

Honor Magic8 Pro review: Cameras

The Magic8 Pro's rear camera block contains 50MP main, 50MP ultrawide, and 200MP telephoto lenses, with a 50MP selfie cam found in the front notch. It's got the necessary flagship phone specs, but let's see if it's got flagship performance.

Versus the iPhone 17 Pro Max, the Honor Magic8 Pro has done far better at lighting this beach scene. I do like the warmth of the iPhone's image and what that does to the light rays, but it's a less pleasing image overall.

That applies to the 2x version of this image too. The rays are sharp in both shots but the color difference is still in the Honor's favor.

At night, the Honor cranks up the colors, which are in plentiful supply in this image of the elven castle at Alnwick's Lilidorei attraction. It's reasonable to say the Pixel 10 Pro XL still wins this comparison though, as the dark sections of the image actually look dark while the lit areas are still vivid.

The ultrawide camera of the Magic8 Pro is particularly wide, and also produces bright shots. We can see that clearly in this shot of a decorative sign post that the Honor's shot is wider and brighter than what the OnePlus 15 captured, as evidenced by the car that can only be seen in the Honor image, and the brighter branches behind the sign.

Honor claims its telephoto camera has the largest 200MP sensor on any production phone available. However, its 3.7x zoom is a little below par for current flagship phones.

As we see in the above shot along the beach against the Pixel 10 Pro XL, the Honor doesn't reach nearly as far. The Magic8 Pro's brightness is helpful, though, as you can see more of the marks in the sand, even if the brighter areas suffer as a result.

Stepping up to 10x zoom, things are a little different. The Magic8 Pro has more dramatic-looking HDR, while the Pixel treats the image more gently, although its take on the scene is softer-looking as a result.

Honor's image brightness is again on show in this zoom comparison with the OnePlus 15, which uses a similar 3.5x zoom for its telephoto camera. The supports of this long-gone pier are hard to make out in the OnePlus shot beyond the outline, while the Honor gives us much more textural detail.

Finishing up with a selfie face-off, I think I have found the Magic8 Pro's weakness. I really don't like how the camera treated the colors of my skin and hair, and its portrait effect is a little weak compared to the Pixel's.

On-board image editing is a big part of Honor's updates to the Magic8 Pro's camera offering. Once you've taken your images, you can try out AI-powered erasing, outpainting, upscaling, cutout tools and more. Perhaps the most unique is the Magic Color feature, which lets you quickly apply color grading templates by using the color of one image to adjust any other, or by using a series of preset or custom options.

Honor Magic8 Pro review: Performance

The Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5, assisted by 12GB RAM, drives the Honor Magic8 Pro. That's the same chip we expect most Android flagship phones to run in 2026, although we are seeing more and more 16GB RAM phones arrive to help users make the most of AI features and app multi-tasking.

This combo proved more than capable of running Destiny Rising at max graphics at 60fps, or high settings at 90fps, during my gaming testing. But let's check the formal benchmark figures for further clarity on this phone's performance.

And what do the numbers reveal? That the Magic8 Pro, despite using the same chipset as the OnePlus 15, is a little behind the OnePlus 15 on the Geekbench and 3DMark CPU and graphics benchmarks. However, it's a long way ahead of the Pixel 10 Pro XL, which runs on a Tensor G5 chipset not known for its performance muscle.

Honor doesn't give you a choice with storage on the Magic8 Pro — it's 512GB or nothing. That's quite all right though, since the already below-average price for this phone means you effectively save another £100 to £200 over rival devices which charge extra for this much capacity.

Honor Magic8 Pro review: Battery and charging

Battery life on the Magic8 Pro is a little complicated, so let's start with the easy part: charging.

The 100W wired charging on offer powers the Magic8 Pro battery from empty to 39% in 15 minutes, 70% in half-an-hour and 100% after 50 minutes. That's pretty speedy when you consider how large the battery is. Honor also included 80W wireless charging, which we were unable to test ourselves, but should be similarly rapid.

The Magic8 Pro model I tested is the global version, which uses a large 7,100 mAh battery. In my usual 3 hours of YouTube battery test, the phone drained by 11%; to put that number in context, the OnePlus 15 loses 12% on this test and that device has the best phone battery life of any we've tested.

Sadly, this isn't the battery most of you reading this would be able to use. Due to regulations, the Magic8 Pro has a 6,270 mAh battery in Europe, about 12% smaller than the cell in the global model. Without testing this version, I can't say for sure if the excellent results I got from my review unit would be matched by the model actually available for purchase.

Chances are the Honor Magic8 Pro still a long-lasting phone no matter which version you buy, but probably a little less so than you might expect.

Honor Magic8 Pro review: Software

Honor has joined the extra button bandwagon with its new AI button, located on the bottom right side. It's effectively a combination of an iPhone's Camera Control and Action button, allowing you to use various shortcuts with a short, long or double-press.

The AI button's main use is to offer up relevant AI services depending on what's on the Magic8 Pro screen, so you can activate the feature you need without having to go looking for it. The button is also capacitive, meaning it can also function as a zoom level control in the Camera app, if you prefer that to the on-screen dial.

Speaking of what's on screen, you'll notice that the Android 16-based MagicOS 10 software that runs things on the Magic8 Pro has a transparent interface design that you may find familiar. Fortunately, Honor has learned from Apple's early mistakes with iOS 26 by adding a prominent transparency adjustment slider to let you set things to your liking.

I must admit that I had low expectations for what I saw as a copy-cat interface when I installed the MagicOS 10 update on my review device. But I can't deny that it looks good, and between that and the UI's beautifully smooth animations, which objectively add nothing to the user experience but make navigation feel soft but precise, the Magic8 Pro does feel like a real treat to use.

I don't know what's been happening in the offices of Chinese phone companies over the past year or two, but integration with other operating systems, including Apple's, has become an apparent priority. That goes for the Honor Magic8 Pro too, which can share files with and pair nicely with with Macs, iPhones and Windows machines. You need an app installed on the non-Honor device to make it happen, but this was an unthinkable level of integration until recently.

Honor's finally fallen in line with the Android phone establishment and offers seven years of full Android updates with the Magic8 Pro. Now it matches Google and Samsung's flagship support, lifting a big limitation for Honor's top phones.

Honor Magic8 Pro review: AI features

The Magic8 Pro builds on previous Magic devices' AI tools, with features like Circle to Search, text summaries, writing tools and so on all returning. If you're a fan of Honor's in-house apps, or at least don't like Google's offerings, then you'll be happy to hear there is now Gemini integration for Honor apps as well as Google ones, letting you use Honor's built-in Camera and Clock apps with the chatbot.

Google's offering 3 months of AI Pro for free for Magic8 Pro owners too, giving you access to more Gemini services and 2TB of cloud storage for as long as you're subbed.

Honor's Deepfake Detection system is back and better than ever, too. The system can now work in video conference calls as well as one-on-one chats, capable of flagging multiple faces or voices as potential imitations.

One simple-sounding new feature that I was particularly interested in was the AI-powered automatic blurring of private information in screenshots. I often have to edit personal details out of screenshots when demonstrating things on a phone, so automating this would save me a fair amount of time.

I am happy to report that the blurring does work. But unfortunately, the button to activate the feature only appears when Honor's AI processing decides it should, and that seems to be app-dependent. For instance, I was able to get the tool to blur a profile picture and web links in WhatsApp, but nothing appeared when I took a screenshot of a profile from my contacts book containing multiple phone numbers and email addresses.

Within Honor's dedicated "Honor AI" app, you find three more options. One is AI Memories, which is Honor's answer to Pixel Screenshots or OnePlus' Plus Mind — a place to store screenshots and other scraps of notes and recordings that you can curate and refer to later with AI. It's a use of AI I somewhat like, so I'm happy to see Honor adopting the idea.

There's also a Photos Agent, which I assumed from the name would offer something similar but for image editing. But disappointingly, it's a series of preset enhancements and style-altering options. It's on par with what you get from Samsung or Google, rather than something unique, and certainly stretches the definition of an "agent".

The last one, and my favorite, is the Settings Agent. This lets you make changes to your phone's options with voice or text commands. It's not perfect, as for some queries, it'll just link you to the relevant page in the Settings app rather than adjusting it there and then, but for basic options it's quick and simple. It's just odd that the Honor AI app is the only place to find it, rather than it being baked into the Settings app itself.

Honor Magic8 Pro review: Verdict

The timing of the Magic8 Pro's global launch means the phone-buying public's attention will soon be stolen by the Galaxy S26 series, if Samsung's rumored launch window is anything to go by. But don't let that detract from the quality of the product we have here.

U.S. buyers will likely want to go for the OnePlus 15 or Google Pixel 10 Pro XL if you're after a big and capable Android flagship right now, assuming you don't want to wait and see what Samsung has to offer. But if the Magic8 Pro is an option on the table for you, then you'd be crazy not to consider it.

There’s no doubt that the best phones of the year included some impressive advancements in both hardware and software. This includes huge advancements around the growth of AI, with both Samsung and Google showcasing the potential for artificial intelligence.

Apple has, unfortunately, struggled a bit in this department, but it did completely revamp the design of the iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max. There's also the A19 chip series, which offered impressive improvements over past iterations.

2025 was also the year when foldable phones seemingly found their feet, with devices like the Galaxy Z Fold 7 and Google Pixel 10 Pro Fold offering marked improvements over prior releases. Not only that, but gaming phones have seemingly found their niche, with more RAM and power than ever before.

Even with all of that progress, there have been some issues with the latest generation of phones. For instance, thin phones haven't yet found an audience — we're looking at you, Galaxy S25 Edge and iPhone Air.

There's a lot of potential for phones in 2026, so I asked my colleagues about what they were hoping to see over the course of next year, as well as any concerns that they might have.

What are we hoping for in 2026?

Josh Render - When it comes to 2026, I am mostly looking forward to how companies build on some of the improvements we have already seen. While I might worry about certain hardware improvements, I am much more hopeful when I think about the future battery and chip releases that we see in 2026.

We have seen the power of the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 and Apple’s A19 chip, not to mention the massive silicon carbon battery that featured as part of the OnePlus 15. There's also the recent reveal of the Exynos 2600, which looks to be a marked improvement over the past Exynos releases. I hope that this year sees companies like Apple, Google and Samsung expand on this with new, more powerful options.

Philip Michaels - I don’t want to oversell it, but a lot is riding on the release of iOS 26.4 and the improvements to Siri that software update is supposed to bring. This is the rumored launch of Siri 2.0, a more intelligent and context-aware version of Apple’s on-device assistant that’s part of the Apple Intelligence push.

I’m not expecting a fully formed reboot of Siri when iOS 26.4 arrives, but I do want to see a pretty polished release considering how long we’ve been waiting for this particular update. (Remember, Apple promised it with iOS 18.) If it approaches what you can do with cross-app actions on Samsung’s Galaxy S phones, Apple will be in a good place, and if not, then we’re going to have to seriously consider whether Apple’s AI efforts are ever going to approach what you can do on an Android device.

Richard Priday - I'm not sure if it will happen as much as I want it to, but I am crossing my fingers that 2026 is the year that silicon-carbon batteries go mainstream. And by that, I mean finally appear in a phone made by three big companies — Samsung, Apple and Google.

While there are legitimate drawbacks with using silicon-carbon cells instead of lithium ones, the benefit to physical battery size and energy density outweighs these in my opinion. And the benefits are hard to ignore — just see how the OnePlus 15 performed in our battery test, lasting over 25 hours!

Switching suppliers and adjusting your designs obviously can't be done overnight, so I appreciate why companies that sell as many phones as Apple and Samsung can't turn on a dime and add silicon-carbon immediately to their batteries. But the technology has been around for a couple of years now. 2026 should be the year for these brands to take the leap.

John Velasco - The thing I’m most hopeful for is also the thing I’m worried about as well. For years now, I’ve praised Samsung DeX for helping to bridge that phone meets PC experience — and while it looks to take a big leap with foldables like the Galaxy Z TriFold — other phone makers need to follow suit.

Even though I’ve tried Android 16’s hidden desktop mode, Google has work to do before it gets to the same scope as Samsung DeX. But it needs to do way more than just rip off DeX, like being able to support all the web browser extensions I use and allowing for multiple users.

What are we worried about in 2026?

John Velasco - My fear about these desktop interfaces with phones is that manufacturers will hold them back from truly being replacements. Wouldn’t it be neat if you could ditch your laptop entirely and use your phone instead? While that’s the dream, I’m not confident that manufacturers will be so forthcoming because they do sell laptops and desktops. Knowing that there’s always the potential risk of revenue loss, it could be the reason why these desktop interfaces might continue to be scaled back.

I still dream of a day when I can just bring my phone and use it for work, much like on my computer, but companies like Apple, Samsung, Google, and others still want to sell you computers.

Philip Michaels - I’d be lying if I didn’t say I was concerned about smartphone prices, which have more or less held steady in 2025 despite uncertainty over tariffs and rising component costs. That said, we’ve seen some odd pricing decisions — Apple and Samsung both charge a lot for the iPhone Air and Galaxy S25 Edge respectively, even though those phones merely distinguish themselves with a thinner design and arguably offer fewer capabilities than the lower-cost iPhone 17 and Galaxy S25 models. And don’t get me started on the Galaxy Z Fold, which seems to increase in price with each new iteration.

I worry that smartphone makers are testing the upper limits of what people are willing to pay for a premium phone and that’s going to continue in 2026, with higher component prices used as a justification to charge more for less. Add to that a major RAM shortage, and you have the right conditions for some pretty severe price hikes.

Richard Priday - I suspect 2026 is going to be another year where the majority of smartphone manufacturers focus on AI features for their upgrades. And I just can't be enthusiastic about that.

Maybe the new Siri will be as revolutionary as Apple promised it would be a year and a half ago, and Gemini on Android will get new abilities. But ultimately it feels like we're not getting anything new from the AI boom on phones, just the rearrangement of the same basic abilities in slightly new contexts - a pretty good summarization of genAI in general, really.

It seems to me that most smartphone buyers still want the smartphone basics - great cameras, long battery life and a good price - more than anything that LLMs can potentially offer them. But I still worry that big wins in these areas for 2026's biggest phone launches will be few and far between.

Josh Render - As I said at the start, I have some concerns when it comes to certain hardware aspects for smartphones in 2026. Many of these worries have been exacerbated by the rumors for upcoming flagships. For instance, the Galaxy S26 will allegedly feature much of the same hardware as the Galaxy S25 series.

If that wasn't enough, I'm honestly worried about Apple's foray into the foldable market. While I do not doubt that Apple can release a great foldable phone, I don't know if the iPhone Fold will be that device, especially for the rumored price of $2,400. And the news that the regular iPhone 18 might not even appear until 2027 is concerning to me as a consumer.

What are you hoping (or dreading) for in 2026?

These are all of our worries and hopes when it comes to 2026, but we also want to hear from you. Let us know what you're thinking about when it comes to 2026. For instance, are you planning to upgrade your phone, or are you waiting until 2027? Are you excited for new hardware, or would you rather see more focus on AI in the new year?

Let us know in the comments below, and we wish you a happy New Year!

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The Honor Magic V5 launched under a cloud after multiple sources challenged the company's claim that its new folding phone was the thinnest in the world. And that kind of misses the point about the Magic V5.

While it's interesting to see the discrepancy in the figures, a phone's size is only a small part of a smartphone's experience. And luckily for Honor, the Magic V5 delivers way more than a thin frame.

Its light design hides two large and bright displays, a gigantic battery and some capable cameras. Plus, the Magic V5 offers strong overall value for money— hard for a foldable device to manage.

It's a shame that Honor's going up against the Google Pixel 10 Pro Fold and the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 7 — two of the strongest foldable phones we've ever seen. It also doesn't help that these phones are readily available in parts of the world where Honor does not sell phones.

But still, the Magic V5 remains a phone that anyone considering a foldable device should check out if they can. The price of the Magic V5 alone makes it stand out before you even consider its unique and capable features. So let's move on from the slimness conversation, as I give you the skinny in this Magic V5 review.

Honor Magic V5: Specs

Honor Magic V5: Price and availability

On sale since late August, the list price for the lone 16GB/512GB version of the Magic V5 is £1,699. But between coupons, discounts and special offers, you can likely get it for even less.

Even at full price and with no added bonuses, the Magic V5 is still cheaper than the Galaxy Z Fold 7 ($1,999 in the U.S. and £1,799 in the UK) and Pixel 10 Pro Fold ($1,799 and £1,749), even before accounting for the fact that the Samsung and Google phones start with half as much storage in their base models. You may find it harder to get the Magic V5 from a carrier with a contract though, should you need a SIM along with your new foldable.

Honor Magic V5: Design

Prior to launch, Honor made a lot of noise about how the Magic V5 is the world's thinnest foldable, both folded and unfolded. We couldn't back that up when we performed our own measurements, but whether the Magic V5 is a record-holder or not is ultimately irrelevant to the phone's quality and suitability for a potential buyer.

It is a slim and light phone to be sure, managing the admirable feat of feeling natural to handle whether open or close. And the 217-gram weight, which is slightly greater than that of the 215-gram Z Fold 7, is not really noticeable unless you hold the phone closed and at an extreme angle where the large rear camera block starts to overbalance.

The three available colorways — Ivory White, Dawn Gold and Black — cover all the essential bases of discreet and eye-catching. But if you want the thinnest and lightest possible Magic V5, only the white offers the advertised specs, with the other two models measuring a little thicker and heavier due to their finishes.

To keep your valuable foldable intact, Honor uses Super Armored Inner Screen and Anti-scratch Nano-Crystal Shield materials for the Magic V5's displays, plus carbon fiber reinforcement beneath the inner screen to avoid damage. The phone is also rated IP58 and IP59 against water and dust intrusion, offering better dust proofing than the Z Fold 7, while trailing the IP68-rated Pixel 10 Pro Fold.

And if that wasn't enough protection, Honor has also introduced AI-Powered Foreign Object Detection to tell you if you've accidentally closed something between the two halves of the inner display, even if it's the size of a grain of sand. That said, when testing with a piece of paper inserted into the phone, I never got this warning to work.

Honor Magic V5: Displays

The Honor Magic V5 screens all these safety features are looking after are a 7.95-inch inner panel, and a 6.43-inch outer one. Both feature up to a 120Hz refresh rate while also offering Magic-Pen stylus support — notable given that Samsung gave up on S Pen compatibility with the Z Fold 7.

Honor's own testing claims that both of the Magic V5's displays are capable of a 5,000-nit peak brightness. We were not able to test the precise figure ourselves, but to my eye, the Magic V5 screen is definitely brighter than the Galaxy Z Fold 7, though not quite as bright as the extremely vivid Pixel 10 Pro Fold, which hit 2,566 nits in our lab.

In terms of the ever-present crease that foldable displays all have down their center line, the Magic V5's is quite well concealed, with Honor going for a deep but narrow profile. It's similar to the look of the Galaxy Z Fold 7, while the Pixel 10 Pro Fold's crease is much wider and more noticeable when light glints off of the screen.

Eye comfort features are again a focus of Honor's, offering the Magic V5 with various color-altering and brightness-adjusting systems. Most important perhaps is the 4320Hz PWM dimming, which is a crucial feature for users who find they get frequent headaches when using phones.

Honor Magic V5: Cameras

Honor knows how to pack megapixels into a phone. The Magic V5 contains a 50MP main camera and 50MP ultrawide, along with a 64MP 3x telephoto camera on the back. Meanwhile, 20MP selfie cameras grace the inner and outer displays.

Let's check out some samples, the first of which is of a public art display. Taken with the main cameras of the Magic V5 and the Galaxy Z Fold 7, this comparison shows how the Honor camera has washed out the brightest spots of its photo.

The Galaxy Z Fold 7 has nailed the highlights, and provided more detail from the darker spots of the photo, where the Honor has made things look especially dark.

In this close-up of a coffee with the Pixel 10 Pro Fold against Honor's phone, the Magic V5 again is overly bright, perhaps because of the indoor lighting. The image has lost a lot of detail as a result, while the Pixel keeps everything shap, albeit a little less exciting-looking.

At night against the Pixel, looking up at the Shard, the Honor's image is brighter all around. But both images have strong detail, meaning picking a favorite ends up as a matter of taste.

Back with the Galaxy Z Fold 7, but still in the dark at Liverpool Street station, we have further proof that Honor's phone shoots at its best in the dark. The Magic V5's shot is again the brighter, but still keeping the brightest parts of the image in check, like the lamps. The Z Fold 7's image is moodier, but its darker treatment of the scene sacrifices detail.

Leaving the main camera and moving to the ultrawide lens, we have the above street scene. Through the Honor's camera, we have a cooler scene, with a washed-out sky. The brighter tone helps make the hedges, trees and lamppost more visible, but it's not as balanced as the Z Fold 7 image.

Using the 3x telephoto cameras of the Magic V5 and the Galaxy Z Fold 7, we have this shot of a street lamp. The Magic V5 has drawn the color and brightness out of the shot, although to an unnatural degree. I feel the Galaxy Z Fold 7 has given a more honest shot, but not necessarily a better-looking one.

At 6x, the color difference is lessened, although that seems to be from the Galaxy Z Fold 7 boosting its color rather than the Magic V5 changing much. The higher resolution of the Honor's telephoto camera helps out with detail, giving the edges of the lamp a sharper look.

As always, we finish with a selfie comparison. Since the Honor uses two identical front-facing cameras, this shot shows what you'll get whether you have the phone open or closed. As we've seen in several of the other photos in this comparison, the brightness of the Honor shot results in a cooler color temperature compared to the Z Fold.

Honor Magic V5: Performance

Honor installed the Snapdragon 8 Elite in the Magic V5, the natural choice for a flagship Android phone in 2025. Previous tests on phones with this chip have proven it's more than capable of taking on the Tensor G5 used by the Pixel Fold, while being slightly slower than the tuned-up "For Galaxy" version of the Snapdragon chip used by Samsung.

The Magic V5's performance is similar, if not ahead of, its two main rivals. But what was odd was that the Magic V5 underperformed in the Geekbench CPU benchmark until I enabled performance mode, something I didn't need to do for the 3DMark graphics test. This is perhaps a method of conserving battery unless the user demands full power, but it did leave me scratching my head for a little while.

Numbers aside, the Magic V5 is just as capable of playing the best mobile games as any other flagship phone. Destiny Rising was smooth and beautiful to play, whether on the outer display or the inner one, although I still don't like how FPS games play on square screens.

The Magic V5 comes with 16GB of RAM, the same quantity as the Pixel 10 Pro Fold, and more than all but the most expensive 1TB edition of the Galaxy Z Fold 7. And at 512GB, the Honor foldable packs a lot more storage while still costing less than both.

Honor Magic V5: Battery and charging

The Magic V5's 5,820 mAh battery capacity makes it the top foldable in the world for battery size, although the Magic V5 sold in China gets a 6,100 mAh cell. Honor managed this by using silicon-carbon construction to fit more capacity in a limited space, beating Samsung or Google's offerings by a significant margin.

In my unofficial battery test, where I have phones stream YouTube video over Wi-Fi with the display set at 50% brightness, the Honor drained 25% after 3 hours of inner screen playback; the Samsung and Google foldables lost 20% each. This could be the fault of the Magic V5's 50% brightness being brighter and more power-hungry than the 50% of the other two phones. Either way, it goes to show you can't use a milliamp-hour figure to understand battery life alone.

The 66W wired and 50W wireless charging options available to the Magic V5 make it faster to recharge than its competitors, apparently hitting 50% full after 16 minutes and 100% in 43 minutes. Unfortunately, Honor doesn't include a charger in the box any more so we haven't been able to verify this claim.

Honor Magic V5: Software and special features

Currently the Magic V5 runs on Android 15, in the form of MagicOS 9. While it's yet to receive an Android 16 update, there's still plenty of interesting features to see.

For starters, there's the new Multi-Flex system. I've been critical of previous Honor foldables for lacking flexibility with their multi-app layout offerings so I'm glad to finally see the Magic V5 offer up support for to three apps in split screen, up from two on the Magic V3.

It's not quite as flexible as OnePlus and Oppo's Open Canvas system which we've seen on the OnePlus Open, as you can only order apps on the Magic V5 in a horizontal or vertical row, like a deck of cards. But you can change their size and order freely, and open a fourth app as an overlay, giving you plenty of opportunity to set up a cluster of apps you want to work between.

Also included in the Magic V5's AI arsenal are Google's Gemini and Circle to Search tools, an AI Call Translation option for real-time interpretation, Magic Portal to help suggest relevant apps to open when you've selected text or images and Magic Capsule to keep ongoing app activities visible.

Honor recognizes the danger of AI tools as well as their benefits, which is why it also includes a Deepfake Detection feature on its most recent phones. The system relies on a video feed, so it won't protect you from audio-based scams, but I was impressed to see that the system was able to tell a still image of me was real; an AI-generated profile picture sent by TG's AI Editor, Alex Hughes, did get flagged as a fake.

Honor Magic V5 owners can now easily share their files and photos with iPhones via an iOS or Mac app. It puts the burden on your Apple-bound friends, but it works while keeping special file types, like Live Photos, intact. It's also much simpler than trying to negotiate email and message attachments or cloud storage links.

Honor has also upped its game with software support, promising seven years of updates in the U.K. and E.U. for the Magic V5 to match the standard set by Samsung and Google.

Honor Magic V5 review: Verdict

After reviewing the Honor Magic V5 in full, I'm glad to find that it's a foldable worthy of your hard-earned cash even after the fuss around its size. The lower price compared to Samsung and Google phones is a big plus, but the Magic V5 screens and software offer competitive edges, too. The camera performance didn't particularly excite me but perhaps the Magic V5's photos above were more to your taste than those of the other phones.

Anyone in the U.S. who isn't willing to jump through hoops to get a Magic V5 can still go for a Galaxy Z Fold 7 or Pixel 10 Pro Fold and be quite happy. But if you do live somewhere where Honor sells the Magic V5, it should be given equal consideration alongside Samsung and Google's offerings. Even after some major upgrades by the competition — especially in Samsung's case — the Magic V5 refuses to be ignored.

You've not seen anything like the Honor Robot Phone before, but we can't tell yet if that's a good thing.

Honor just announced its new concept phone at a Beijing event, but the device won't get a full debut until MWC 2026 in Barcelona. In essence, it's a phone with a camera gimbal that slots into the back of the phone under a sliding panel, but can rotate all the way out to the front when needed.

The gimbal will be the key to enabling "AI-powered multi-modal intelligence, robotic functionality, and advanced handheld imaging capabilities," as Honor describes them. It also identifies this phone as "an emotional companion that senses, adapts, and evolves autonomously like a robot, enriching its users’ lives with love, joy, and wisdom."

The YouTube video above shows how this might work, although we can't say how much creative license Honor has taken when showing what this phone can do. Between the family animation-style music and little voice lines given to the "robot", it's definitely focused more on painting us a picture than explaining concrete features and hardware.

The page on Honor's global website doesn't explain much more. There's also a dedicated r/HONORROBOTPHONES subreddit you can join, except at the time of writing, the community's currently banned for an unknown reason.

All part of the plan

Honor calls the Robot Phone a key future part of its "Alpha Plan," the company's outline for evolving into a more AI-focused company. And the Magic8 Pro, which debuted at the same event, is similarly trained on this vision.

The Magic8 Pro looks like a more standard flagship Android phone but is according to Honor a "Self-Evolving AI Smartphone", thanks to a YOYO Agent promising to automate thousands of tasks. While it's not clear whether these capabilities will make it to the global version of the phone, we will still hopefully benefit from the Magic8Pro's 200MP telephoto camera and large 7,200 mAh battery with 120W charging.

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So the Honor MagicBook Art 14 just got announced, and I’ve been testing it for a few weeks. However, looking at our audience stats, roughly 75% of you lovely people won’t even be able to buy it — given the fact it's not being sold in the U.S... Well, technically it's not, but more on that in a second.

I won’t go hard on the reasons why, as it’s a complex situation. Instead, I’ll just mention that Huawei was cut off from using chipsets from the likes of Qualcomm and Intel by the U.S. Government, and that while Honor was set up as a spin-off company to dodge these bans, the public perception is still there.

Instead, I want to talk about a laptop you can buy — the M4 MacBook Air — and what Apple should be taking note of from this overseas Air killer. Because there are five key changes that the Cupertino crew should make to its ultra-thin notebook, in order to challenge what the MagicBook Art 14 offers.

Give me OLED

Let’s start with the obvious — the laptop market has slowly but surely started shifting towards OLED, and it's turned me into a display snob. The inky contrast ratio and the flash flood of color, all of it really brings anything you’re working on/watching to life.

And Honor is packing a real monster here — a 14.6-inch OLED touch display that reaches a peak brightness of 1,600 nits. It’s super crispy at 3,120 x 2,080 pixels, packs a 120Hz refresh rate and has super advanced flicker-free dimming that ensures it won’t strain your eyes.

That’s not to say the MacBook Air’s 13.6-inch Liquid Retina LED screen is bad, but it is far outshone here. Given how mesmerizing the Tandem OLED panel is on the M4 iPad Pro, seeing OLED make it to the Air would be the number one item on my checklist.

Ditch the notch

You may also notice that the screen has tiny bezels — like, really tiny bezels without a notch needed for the webcam. This is because the 1080p webcam is actually not housed above the screen, but rather on an additional module that connects magnetically atop the display.

This eliminates any notch-based distractions and allows for a fully uninterrupted 3:2 aspect ratio screen in this smaller body, which is a perfect size for getting stuff done.

More ports, please!

I know, I know. Asking for more ports on an Apple computer is kind of like asking a cat to do your taxes — technically possible, but you know it’s not happening. And neither would I ask for USB-A, as someone who has moved fully into the USB-C crew.

But that HDMI port has come in clutch on the MagicBook Art 14, just as it does on my MacBook Pro. And Honor has managed to do it on a laptop that is barely 0.1 inches thicker. Please, Apple, let me ditch my dongle life with the next Air.

Surface-level love

This is split into two parts. First, a little part of me misses the wedge shape of the original MacBook Air — something I was happy to have back with the new MagicBook Art 14. I know there are levels to Apple’s decision, like more room for battery.

But there’s just something about that improved thinness heading towards the front that just makes it feel nicer to pick up and carry.

And second is the material actually used. The machined magnesium alloy feels so great to hold in your hands. Moving your fingers across it almost feels like you’re touching a piece of paper, and it's fingerprint-resistant. Contrast that to the MacBook Air, which does look seriously premium with its aluminum unibody, but just feels a little dated in its aesthetic, and to the touch, it’s a pretty standard slab of metal.

Sometimes, making something feel new is literally in the feel of the gadget itself. A material change would be the answer to that.

An ocean of a touchpad

I stand by my opinion that MacBooks have some of the best trackpads you can use. That haptic engine has been tuned to give you a satisfying snap to every tap, and the large, smooth surface is great for both sweeping multitouch gestures and small precision movements.

But Honor is crashing the party. Its touchpad is huge, feels awesome to use, and also has built-in haptics to simulate crispy clicks. In fact, it comes all the way down to the edge of the laptop, and on top of that, they’ve added edge gestures that have haptic responses all of their own.

You can feel the brightness going up and down in clicks as you move your finger up and down the left side, same with volume on the right, or scrubbing video across the top.

Not without its flaws

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When the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 7 launched, there were plenty of changes to admire in the company's vastly upgraded device and one of the best foldable phones. But it's arrival also changed something else — people's perception of a rival foldable that had been claiming to be the thinnest of the two.

Earlier in July, the Honor Magic V5 launched, proclaiming that it was the world’s thinnest foldable phone. The Galaxy Z Fold 7 then launched later in the month, officially measuring slightly thicker and thus allowing Honor to keep the title.

But then, users like tech leaker Ice Universe got their hands on both phones and started measuring. And they found different numbers to the published ones, numbers that seemed to prove the Galaxy Z Fold 7 is actually the thinner phone.

With Honor trying to reassert its claim, and Samsung happily accepting that it’s accidentally made the world’s thinnest foldable phone, it’s hard to know what to believe.

So in the interest of trying to settle the matter, I’ve spoken to both Honor and Samsung, and taken my own measurements with my own samples of the two phones in question.

A measured response

As a baseline, let's look at the official claims for the thickness of these two phones when folded. The unfolded measurements are not under dispute here, and are arguably less important anyway since you won't be carrying a foldable around while unfolded the vast majority of the time.

Also note that these measurements revolve around specifically the Ivory White Magic V5. The other colors of the Magic V5 are thicker due to slightly different back panel designs.

Compare those to Ice Universe's measurements in the same table: the Magic V5 is 0.15mm thicker according to his calipers, while the Galaxy Z Fold 7 is 0.11mm thinner than claimed. Obviously, something is amiss here, and Honor was quick to respond with possible explanations.

As part of its statement to me and other tech outlets, Honor noted that even mass-produced products like smartphones can have small manufacturing variances. But this isn't a unique problem to Honor, and could even work in its favor as well as against it.

So let's instead focus on the two other reasons why the official numbers and Ice Universe's may not match.

The first is that Honor’s official measurements come from a Magic V5 device with no screen protector. The Magic V5, like all of Honor’s phones, ships with a pre-applied plastic film on its outer screen. This courtesy puts Honor at a thickness disadvantage compared to the Galaxy Z Fold 7, which has no pre-applied protector. It's hard to see in IU's images if the Magic V5 has a screen protector on or not, but I made sure to take the film off of my device before measuring.

The second issue is the precise way in which Honor took its measurement. In documentation I’ve seen, the recommended measurement method involves placing the calipers over the phone from the hinged side to cover the Honor logo, and with “appropriate thumb pressure” on the bottom jaw.

I don’t know if there’s some secret advantage gained by measuring at this point, but having a nice flat canvas for the calipers to grip is certainly helpful. What's more confusing is how the images Honor has published of its lab testing do not show this method being used.

So with those facts in mind, I got measuring. I’ll state up front that my calipers, while from the reputable brand iFixit, are perhaps not as accurate as more expensive models, such as the ones phone companies like Honor use for their official specs measurements.

Nonetheless, from other measurements I’ve made with these calipers, I am confident that they are at least 99% accurate, and are at the very least capable of showing a size difference between our two foldables.

In the thick of it

I measured the two phones with the method given by Honor — it’s only fair, after all. The Galaxy Z Fold 7 doesn’t have a logo on the back to help judge its midpoint, but I made the best approximation I could, given its similar height and width to the Magic V5.

My numbers are 0.08mm off the official figures for Samsung, and 0.5mm off for the Honor, making the Galaxy Z Fold 7 the thinner phone.

I don't know what "appropriate thumb pressure" means precisely in Honor's statement, but it's an important detail. Putting pressure on the calipers allows you to get a smaller measurement as the object you're measuring flexes slightly, which applies all the more with foldable phones as there are two halves of the phone, plus the hinge, that can be squeezed tighter.

Honor’s official images of its size test don’t appear to show the calipers under strain, with them only being held by one hand from the bottom of the ruler section. But given that calipers can be locked into place with the small screw on top of the display, we can’t know for certain if there was any squeezing or not pre-photo.

Annoyingly, I don’t have any method of measuring or double-checking how much force I placed on the calipers to get the following measurements. The best I can do is describe the amount of force I applied, which I would call a press firm enough to leave a clean fingerprint in a thin piece of putty, or push open a door with just one thumb.

Here, we finally hit Honor's promised 8.8mm figure, with a final last-minute measurement in fact going past the promised figure (though sadly off-camera). But any celebrations that Honor may now be planning will be cut short, as doing the same on the Samsung makes it sleeker yet again, a whole 0.3mm thinner than the official specs and 0.18mm thinner than the Magic V5.

As we discussed before, these results could be due purely to the construction of the Magic V5 unit I had, but I suspect if it’s happened to both my and Ice Universe’s devices, it’ll happen to many others.

Before putting the phones away, I contacted Samsung, both to ask for its stance on the situation and for its official measuring standards for its devices, so we might compare the two foldables' size on its terms too. The company declined to comment.

Splitting hairs

Despite the apparently conclusive evidence that the Magic V5 is not actually the thinnest book-style folding phone around, Honor seems to be sticking to its guns, and its official measurements. But now that I've seen the proof for myself that this claim is either inaccurate or comes with big caveats, I don't know why Honor's trying to power through like this.

A device's thinness is an impressive and easy-to-grasp number, so I get why companies of all kinds like to talk about it in their marketing. But we are talking about the difference of about 40 micrometers - literally a couple hairs' thickness.

There is so much more that Honor could sell the Magic V5 to people with beyond thinness. For instance, the V5's higher-res 50MP main and ultrawide cameras, its 64MP 3x telephoto camera, its huge 5,580 mAh battery or the faster 66W wired and 50W wireless charging standards. And if we're talking about deal breakers, the fact Honor doesn't sell in countries like the U.S. is going to be much more of a problem than its possibly imprecise measurements.

As the global launch of the Magic V5 approaches, and we get closer to being able to fully review the phone, my anticipation isn't diminished by seeing it's slightly larger than the equivalent Samsung.

As long as Honor doesn't make any other uncertain claims about the Magic V5's capabilities, it still stands a chance of making one of the best foldable phones around, and in ways that a rival phone maker can't just replicate or better immediately after.

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Update (7/17/25): Honor sent a response refuting some of the claims.

Last year when Honor released its Magic V3 foldable phone it took home the honor of being the thinnest foldable on the market at 9.2mm closed and 4.34mm unfolded.

This year Honor is claiming that the Magic V5 is the "world's slimmest foldable," but a recent comparison video between the V5 and Samsung's Galaxy Z Fold 7 seems to show that the newest Fold is microns thinner.

We unfortunately can't get the Honor Magic V5 in the U.S., but Honor's marketing materials claim that the Ivory White color way is 8.8mm when folded, which is 0.1mm thinner than Samsung's Z Fold 7 measuring in at 8.9mm.

A recent video from regular leaker Ice Universe popped up on X this week that shows the Magic V5 side-by-side with the Galaxy Z Fold 7. At first glance, the two devices look about the same thickness, though .1mm isn't that great a difference, but does it make the Z Fold 7 one of the best foldable phones?

However, a card placed on top of the phones appears to show that Honor's device is slightly taller than Samsung's. They further emphasized this by putting a ping pong ball on the card with the tilt going toward the Z Fold 7.

At this point, we're splitting micrometers difference here.

They do have another comparison video that includes the Xiaomi MIX Fold 5, vivo X Fold 5 and the OPPO Find N5, which Honor's device seems more of a match.

Let's get some caveats out of the way here.

Caveats galore

One, Ice Universe is a regular, and seemingly only, leaker of Samsung products, specifically its phones. So there could be some bias there.

Two, with no wider shot or level on the table, it's not clear if the surface is actually even enough for a fair test.

In a comment to another X user they claimed, "My test is very rigorous. I switched the position of my mobile phone, and I have ruled out the uneven desktop. You can get the correct conclusion no matter what, even without a ruler."

To be fair, they did post a follow up with a digital ruler that appears to show the Magic V5 measuring at 8.95mm and the Z Fold 7 at 8.79mm.

Lastly, according to Honor's own metrics the 8.8mm measurement only applies to the Ivory White variant and that other colors may be thicker. Though Ice Universe does claim they tested the "white version."

"Data comes from the HONOR Lab. 8.8mm refers to the thickness of the Ivory White model in the folded state," Honor's website says. "The actual data may vary depending on configurations, manufacturing processes and measurement methods."

Honor responds

An Honor spokesperson reached out to Tom's Guide saying that some of the information presented as "inaccurate."

They did confirm the Ivory White variant measures 8.8mm when folded, while also noting that "actual measurements can vary slightly based on configurations, manufacturing processes, and measurement techniques." The same language on the Honor website.

Additionally, we were told that the overall thickness does not include "the inner and outer screen protective films or the raised camera bump" which they said was a standard measurement practice. "Our thickness measurements follow standardized lab testing methods."

We were provided an image showing a digital ruler with an 8.8mm rating.

For what it's worth, one of my colleagues took some measurements of the Z Fold 7 and Magic V5 and found it to be thicker than Samsung's foldable both open and folded, so we're not exactly clear how Honor is getting the numbers it does.

Thin as thin does

We're not going to cast aspersions on Honor about whether or not they're lying. At best it's stretching the truth, since they go out of the way to caveat their own hype, but it does seem like Samsung may hold the thinness crown for now.

Though when you're measuring at micrometers, outside of marketing, is there really a difference?

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Everyone loves a good David vs. Goliath match-up, and thanks to the newly launched Honor 400 Pro, we have the opportunity to have a camera shootout where this mid-priced phone goes up against the toughest opponent the smartphone world can muster.

At £700, the Honor 400 Pro is roughly equivalent to Samsung's Galaxy S24 FE, which sells for $649/£649/AU$1,100. But to really give the 400 Pro a challenge, I instead opted to bring the $1,299 / £1,249 / AU$2,150 Galaxy S25 Ultra, Samsung's top phone for photography right now, and our top pick of the best camera phones you can buy today.

This isn't as weird a comparison as you may think. The Honor 400 Pro has a very similar camera loadout to the Galaxy S25 Ultra, with a 200MP main camera, 50MP 3x optical zoom camera, 12MP ultrawide camera and 50MP selfie camera. While the Honor 400 Pro lacks a second telephoto camera like the S25 Ultra, these are still remarkably similar specs for a phone almost half the price.

More to explore with the Honor 400 series, and we'll go through those in a review at a later date. But right now, let's see how much of a fight it puts up against a more expensive and better-equipped component.

Main Camera

It's a strange start with this shot of the entrance to a brick building. The Honor 400 Pro's image is weirdly bright, even after me picking out one of the darkest shots of the ones I took.

It doesn't degrade the image's level of detail, but compared to the more natural-looking Galaxy S25 Ultra, it looks off. We don't see this kind of color processing in the Honor 400 Pro's other photos, so it's either a fluke or something to do with the 200MP main camera specifically. Either way, the Honor's tripped over and given Samsung an easy win.

Winner: Galaxy S25 Ultra

Ultrawide

In this shot of a church and its yard, and putting the difference in zoom level aside, we have two good images to look at this time. So far, so good.

The Samsung take on the scene is more saturated, whereas the Honor has focused on brightness. Given the state of the weather on the day I took these photos, the Honor's view of the scene is much more honest, while also showing off the old stonework at its best.

Winner: Honor 400 Pro

3x Zoom

This first of two telephoto tests is at a zoom level where both phones get to use a dedicated zoom camera. But having the right lens is only the start.

Pointing the phones at this town sign, the Honor has more color and more detail. While the Samsung’s image looks brighter, the sign itself is darker and quite grainy, which is not what you need in a photo like this.

Winner: Honor 400 Pro

5x/6x Zoom

Here's the place where the two phones’ camera set-ups differ. The Galaxy S25 Ultra has a dedicated 50MP 5x telephoto camera, whereas the Honor 400 Pro uses its 3x camera with some digital zoom to create a lossless 6x image.

This snapshot of a cat I happened to pass on my travels is roughly the same level of detail in both phones' shots, although you can see more in the S25 Ultra's version, likely because of the native zoom level. But it's hard to see the difference unless you zoom in further, making the Galaxy S25 Ultra's win only a slim one.

Winner: Galaxy S25 Ultra

Selfie

We wrap things up with a selfie-off. And it’s immediately obvious that the Galaxy S25 Ultra’s image is brighter, helping rescue the darker parts of the image from obscurity, while the Honor 400 Pro leaves them in shadow.

Honor's selfie camera output is a slightly higher resolution than the Samsung’s, with the option to go even higher if you want more detail. But as it stands, this image is weaker in terms of contrast, making fine elements like my hair harder to differentiate from my skin in places.

Winner: Galaxy S25 Ultra

Verdict

And so, Samsung remains control of the top spot on our best camera phones guide. But I didn't put it up against the Honor 400 Pro thinking it would lose. I wanted to see how wide the margin of quality was, and we've seen it's not as large as you'd expect.

The Galaxy S25 Ultra is a smarter pick for most photography-focused users, both practically because of its greater availability and in terms of its overall shot quality. But the Honor 400 Pro’s cameras keeping up and even beating the Samsung in places is no mean feat.

While too expensive to be considered for our best cheap phones guide, the Honor 400 Pro may have a claim to being one of the best value phones of the year, sitting alongside devices such as the OnePlus 13R and the Google Pixel 9a. We'll let you know for sure after further testing, but right now Honor deserves a pat on the back for going five rounds in the ring with the Galaxy S25 Ultra — and coming out alive.

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Three months in, and it’s clear that 2025 is going to be the year of the ultra-thin phone.

Rumors of the iPhone 17 Air have been kicking around since last year with a release expected in September, and Samsung used its January Unpacked event to tease its own take on the format with the Galaxy S25 Edge. The trend has even tempted lesser-known brands, with the Tecno Spark Slim turning heads at last week’s MWC in Barcelona.

Now, according to the well-established leaker Digital Chat Station, it seems we have another manufacturer to add to the list: Honor.

In a post on Weibo, the leaker writes that the company is creating a “slim ultra-thin new machine.” It’s in a “newly created folder,” which as well as highlighting the limitations of machine translation, seems to suggest that this is in the early stages of development.

A bit at the start of the text, which mentions a 6.3-inch small screen flagship, could refer to a different device or be the same one. Here’s the full machine-translated text in all its glory so you can make up your own mind:

“Yaozi 6.3-inch small screen flagship machine polishing, Slim ultra-thin new machine has been newly created folder”

Technically even Honor isn’t mentioned directly, but 9to5Google points out that “Yaozi” seems to date back to the Chinese word for “glory” suggesting we are talking about the same company.

It’s exciting to think about what Honor’s contribution might look like to the ultra-thin race. The company has some experience making impossibly thin devices with its excellent foldable, the Honor Magic V3, which is just 4.35mm thick when unfolded.

It’s a great product too — in fact, it was our Assistant Phones Editor’s favorite handset of 2024.

But a bigger question remains unanswered. Does anybody actually want the style over substance that ultra-thin phones seem to provide?

Where’s the demand for ultra-thin phones?

The race to make ultra-thin phones has seemingly come from nowhere, and it’s not clear yet whether consumer demand will match the industry’s sudden desire to build them en masse.

The assumption seems to be that aesthetics will appeal to consumers in a world of lookalike smartphones, but it’s not yet clear whether consumers will enjoy the sacrifices required to make the design change. The iPhone 17 Air will reportedly only have one rear camera lens, and it seems likely that all ultra-thin phones will suffer in terms of battery life compared to their thicker rivals even with plans to mitigate the worst of it.

Although it’s extremely unscientific, when revealing key specifications of the Galaxy S25 Edge yesterday, the leaker Ice Universe posted a poll asking whether his followers would opt for the ultra-thin over the existing Galaxy S25 Plus assuming a similar price. By 52.5% to 47.5%, they chose the S25 Plus, unwilling to sacrifice battery life and a camera lens for a thinner frame.

Only 4,822 people voted, and an X audience of those who follow a smartphone leaker isn’t exactly a representative sample of the world at large. Nonetheless, it does suggest that just making phones thinner may not be the thing to kickstart slowing global smartphone sales, no matter how much companies might wish it were.

I love sleeping. I love it so much that I could sleep 13 hours straight on a random Saturday — something even my partner has found surprising. But that doesn't mean I've always had a healthy relationship with sleep. For nearly a decade now, I've struggled with either sleeping too little or sleeping too much, so much so that this prompted me to do a long-form feature when I was doing my master's.

As part of my role as reviews writer, I review some of the best smartwatches. And you know what I didn't think of? Actually paying attention to the sleep tracking feature and reading up more about the various parameters it measures. With the launch of the new Honor Watch 5 Ultra, I decided I would track my sleep and understand what it meant for my general well-being.

And boy was I surprised by what I found! I knew I wasn't sleeping the best but I had no idea I wasn't getting adequate deep sleep or REM; no wonder it takes three coffees before noon to get me to function properly. But that's not all. Let me show you everything the Watch 5 Ultra showed me, and how it's helped me change some pre-sleep habits.

The deep end

The Honor Watch 5 Ultra, like other good smartwatches, tracks your sleep throughout the night, using its array of sensors. This means that it mostly knows when you're in light and deep sleep, and dreaming in REM. The Honor Health app gives you a detailed analysis in the morning, where it tells you how much sleep you got in reference to what's considered normal. And let me tell you, I've only just discovered I haven't been getting enough deep sleep.

What is deep sleep anyway? It's a restorative sleep stage that helps with memory, tissue repair, and immune system strength. According to Dr. Ruchir Patel of The Insomnia and Sleep Institute of Arizona, adults need to spend at least 10-15% of their sleep time in deep sleep.

According to the Watch 5 Ultra, the least amount of deep sleep I've gotten is 7% and the most is 20%, but it cites 20-60% required so more often than not, it would tell me I hadn't had enough deep sleep. Now, this is true for most days but not all. Sleep trackers, according to Oxford Neuroscience, are only accurate 78% of the time, so I took this with a pinch of salt.

While the Watch 5 Ultra may not be 100% accurate, at least it has prompted me into researching about sleep — something I hadn't thought of doing before.

Too much, too little

Sleeping too little, of course, hampers your ability to function properly the next day. But did you know that sleeping too much can have the same effect? Despite my partner having mentioned this on numerous occasions, I didn't actually believe it. It was only after my Honor Watch 5 Ultra had informed me that I'd slept too much that I looked into it properly.

Sleeping too much can disrupt your internal clock and increase the risk of chronic illnesses. If you sleep for more than nine hours in a 24-hour period, that's considered oversleeping. Based on how much light, deep sleep and REM you get, the Watch 5 Ultra gives you a sleep score, and it also tells you your bedtime pattern.

According to the smartwatch, my bedtime pattern is irregular, which isn't surprising. I thought back to remember any factors that may have affected it: going out with coworkers for a drink after work, waiting up for my partner to come back from her late shift, spending too much time on Reddit. It all added up.

The Watch 5 Ultra has taught me that I must be more mindful of when I go to bed, and it's something I want to do this year for sure.

It's all related

Seeing how poorly I was sleeping, I thought I'd take a look at some of the other stats the Honor Watch 5 Ultra collects, such as stress monitoring. When enabled, the smartwatch will track your stress throughout the day and even suggest breathing/meditation techniques that can help relieve stress.

I scrolled through my stress graphs and compared them against the sleep graphs of when I'd either not gotten good quality sleep or was told I didn't spend much time in deep sleep.

And I did find a pattern I'm hoping to read up more about soon: my stress levels were between medium and high right before I'd fallen asleep. Maybe I was anxious? Going down a rabbit hole of bad thoughts? You can see the comparisons above.

Rome wasn't built in a day and I can't fix my bad habits overnight. It'll take some time to eliminate stress triggers and cut out habits like spending way too much time on my phone before catching my ZZZs.

But at least the Watch 5 Ultra has helped me understand the things I do need to change, so it's a start. The first step to change is awareness, isn't it?

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At one point, the Honor Magic V3 was the thinnest book-style foldable, but it lost that spot. Now the Honor Magic V4 is looking to become the most powerful foldable phone, putting the upcoming Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 7 on notice.

The leak comes from Digital Chat Station on Weibo and suggests that the upcoming foldable phone's specs are nothing short of impressive. It's said to have Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8 Elite SoC with seven cores found in the Oppo Find N5.

Perhaps most impressive are the leaked camera specs. There's slated to be a 50MP primary lens with a 1/1.5" sensor and a 200MP periscope telephoto with 3x optical zoom. Getting 3X zoom with that high resolution could be enormous, allowing users to capture distant subjects from further away.

To put the camera into perspective, the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6 falls short with its 50MP, 12MP and 10MP shooters. Samsung offers a 200MP sensor on the Galaxy S25 Ultra, so the company could push the cameras further on the Z Fold 7, but we'll have to wait to learn more.

The screens also sound impressive, with a massive 8-inch internal screen with a 2K resolution and a 120Hz refresh rate. The external display is rumored to be 6.45 inches and 120Hz, which also sounds impressive.

Despite the massive screen, the phone will allegedly be less than 9mm thick, which aligns it with the svelte Oppo Find N5.

Finally, the leak says the massive foldable will have wireless charging and satellite connectivity. Like other foldable phones, it will reportedly be IPX8 rated for water resistance.

Honor Magic V4 vs Galaxy Z Fold 7: What we know so far

Comparing the cameras, we expect the Galaxy Z Fold 7 to retain the same 50MP main, 12MP ultrawide, 10MP 3x telephoto, 10MP front selfie, and 4MP under-display inner selfie camera as the Galaxy Z Fold 6, which would put it well behind the Honor Magic V4's rumored 200MP sensor.

Processors could be the same, with the Snapdragon 8 Elite chip rumored to be inside the Galaxy Z Fold 7, the same allegedly powering the Honor phone.

Interestingly, the latest leaks suggest the Z Fold 7 might have almost no crease, which could be a big deal for foldable phones.

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AI is everywhere at MWC 2025, as it has been in the tech space as a whole for the past two years. But Honor's new embrace of this technology with its Alpha Plan is another level of preparation for future developments and upcoming devices.

For one, Honor is now no longer a smartphone-focused company but an "AI device ecosystem company," a change of direction driven by the company's new CEO, James Li, who was clear about how he sees AI as a force on device development as dramatic as the introduction of the internet.

Smartphones are still going to be important for the company, Li explained, but the focus will now be on building an "intelligent phone" with help from Qualcomm and Google. this will utilize new hardware to offer AI features with multimodal, personalized and autonomous abilities.

This is then intended to lead to an intelligent ecosystem, with AI added to more devices, like AR/VR devices, automobiles and other vehicles, and robots. All of this will then apparently culminate in an intelligent world that will unite "carbon-based life with silicon-based intelligence." Lofty goals indeed.

Honor's AI today

To demonstrate what it's capable of today with AI, Honor demoed its currently China-only mobile AI agent, made with Google and Qualcomm's help.

In the pre-recorded demo, the user made a request for a local restaurant booking within half an hour’s travel. The AI could do this while also checking existing appointments in Honor Calendar, traffic conditions and the user’s typical eating habits to figure out which restaurant to pick and when to book.

This will apparently be offered on devices outside China in future, but no timeline has been announced.

The Alpha Plan also features AiMAGE (pronounced “aim-age”), a new name for Honor's photography tech. This uses both on-device and cloud AI models to help sharpen images based on its training data, especially zoomed-in portrait or telephoto shots. The tech can be applied to existing photos with an AI Upscale tool as well, which will come to the Honor Magic7 series in March.

Honor also boasted about its all-ecosystem file sharing tool, letting you send files to Android and iOS devices equally as easily. A 1GB video can apparently be sent to many other phone brands, including iPhones, in just a matter of seconds. With a PC/Mac version on the way too, this could be another step towards bridging the divide between different brands of phone users. But we'll have to see when it goes live.

AI Deepfake detection is something Honor's shown off before, but that doesn't make it any less useful. The ability for a device to flag suspicious video could prove invaluable for neutralizing scammers, so we look forward to trying it out away from the Honor demo area when it comes to flagship Honor phones "soon."

Cooperation with industry partners is a big part of the Alpha Plan, but Honor wants that to increase as AI continues to develop. James Li openly called for other companies to collaborate, and promised that Honor will invest over $10 billion over five years to create an "open, co-created, value-sharing AI device ecosystem" with its partners.

What's all this about trees?

A number of other companies joined Honor's James Li on stage to light a tree, which is a peculiar bit of theatre even for a keynote presentation. The meaning is simple to grasp though: collaboration between the hardware partners at the roots of the tree, and the applications at the tips of the branches will result in the delicious fruit of an AI-powered ecosystem.

As well as its Alpha Plan, Honor announced it will now provide its flagship phones with seven years of Android updates like Samsung and Google. There were also some new devices, like the Honor Watch 5 Ultra, Honor MagicBook Pro 14, Honor Pad V9, and Honor Earbuds Open.

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The Honor Pad 9 was an Android tablet disguised as an iPad. MagicOS offers the same levels of “it just works” smoothness to the UI, but drawbacks in performance and the speakers stopped just short of pipping the lower-end iPad 10th Gen to the post — not to mention the huge app store.

Well, one year later, and the Honor Pad V9 takes its performance to a new level, the battery is way bigger, the speakers are better, and MagicOS just got a dose of AI. Packed into a new slim, sleek chassis with an improved display, I believe the Cupertino crew has just met its match. Put simply, it’s one of the best Android tablets you can buy.

That’s not to say it’s overcome all the obstacles to get to Apple. Android is still behind iPadOS in terms of app market, and the cameras remain unchanged from the potatoes you got on the Pad 9.

But in where it matters — getting stuff done, playing games and binge watching to your heart’s content — this is a stellar option. Alongside this, Kids Space managed to keep my nephew entertained for so long. Provided you get a durable case (he’s rather clumsy), this is also a shout for one of the best kids tablets you can snag.

Honor Pad 9: Cheat Sheet

• What is it? This is a mid-range Android tablet.
• Who’s it for? This tablet is ideal for binge watchers and families looking to entertain their kids on-the-go.
• What is the price? The price is yet to be confirmed, but based on leaks, we’re predicting a £299 price tag.
• How does this compare to an iPad? The closest competition is the 10th Gen iPad, and on pure hardware, Honor Pad V9 beats it comfortably with a gorgeous display, strong internals and impressive speakers — alongside a smooth UI that matches iPadOS.
• Anything I didn’t like? Android is still a bit of a desert when it comes to the full suite of iPad apps you can download, and the cameras are a bit naff.

Honor Pad V9: Specs

Honor Pad V9: The ups

With important gains made in key areas, there’s a lot to love about the Honor Pad V9 — all of which became obvious over my month with it.

Sleek and stylish

Yes, the display is technically smaller than the 12.1-inch panel you got in the Pad 9. But what you get for that mesmerizing-yet-smaller 11.5-inch screen (more on that later) is a smaller, slimmer and lighter design that feels unmistakably premium in the hand.

The aluminum shell feels great with a nice even weight distribution to not cause any obvious fatigue when holding in one hand, and the NIL Nano-topography process ensures a (mostly) fingerprint-free screen. It works by adding a textured surface that’s so fine it can only be seen through a microscope.

You won’t be able to feel it — the display glass feels nice and smooth to navigate around. But this industry-first process for tablet glass does make it surprisingly resistant to your typical finger smudges.

Now, one key thing that comes with making your devices even thinner is something that I’m sure will summon JerryRigEverything like Beetlejuice if I say it three times — does it bend?

The answer, fortunately, is no. With enough strength, you can see the tiniest milli-degree curve but it doesn’t stick around. The bend resistance here is strong enough to give you a resounding confidence in its durability.

Nice on the eyes

By default, if ever I have shows to binge watch on my train journeys down to London, I grab my MacBook Pro. But now, the Honor Pad V9 has officially taken over — thanks to its drop dead gorgeous 11.5-inch display.

Moving from the 16:10 of Pad 9 to a 3:2 aspect ratio makes this feel like a great slab to use in both portrait and landscape. And that 2800 x 1840-pixel resolution is super crispy for text and graphics — all running at a silky smooth 144Hz refresh rate.

I get it. You saw “IPS LCD” in the specs and probably had a moment of doubt. IPS panels aren’t exactly known for their eye-popping vibrancy, and given this tablet’s lower price, it’s fair to question its display quality. But those concerns vanish the moment you lay eyes on the screen.

Case in point: watching my partner’s latest obsession, Entergalactic, Kid Cudi’s stunningly animated love story. The resolution handles every intricate detail with precision, while the color and contrast deliver a dazzling rush of vibrancy that keeps every frame alive.

MagicOS gets a lot more AI fun

MagicOS 9.0 — built on Android 15 — grows on what we’ve seen so far from what I believe to be the smoothest tablet OS in the Android ecosystem with some extra AI smarts.

First off, the Magic Lock screen brings a ton of customized wallpapers and color tweaking to get just the right aesthetic for you. Second, the 3D Avatar may be a bit of a gimmick, but it’s definitely fun to see your AI-generated figurine and customize it to your liking.

And finally, on the more useful side of things, Honor Notes has been enriched with AI. Beyond searching, pinning and categorizing your notes, there’s math formula recognition, handwriting beautification (great for my chicken scratch writing), and even voice-to-text capabilities — even being able to translate and transcribe video meetings in real time.

These are great little additions, which underpin the fundamental smoothness and logical nature of navigation.

All the multi-finger gestures make multitasking effortless, swiping in from edges of the screen do exactly what you expect it to do in zipping around the OS, and the interconnection of different devices via Honor Connect screams “it just works” in a way that would make Apple sweat.

Better performance and battery life

The Honor Pad 9’s main thorn in the paw was the Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 chipset not offering much in the way of performance. Switching to MediaTek Dimensity 8350 Elite has helped with that somewhat.

Don’t get me wrong, you’re not getting pro tablet levels of performance, but you’re getting more than enough for all the casual uses of a cheaper tablet. Zipping between apps came with no slowdown and games run at respectable 60 FPS with decently sharp graphical fidelity.

Pair that with a chunky 10,100 mAh battery with a high energy density ensures a good, long runtime. I ran a test of online video streaming last year, and the Pad 9 hit 11 hours and 26 minutes. With Pad V9, you’re looking more at a massive 16:07. That’s an impressive gain that puts it safely into worry-free battery life territory.

Oh, and if the battery does drain, you can charge it back to full in just under 30 minutes.

Honor Pad 9: The downs

Honestly, the only real downside to the Honor Pad V9 now (outside of the whole Android tablet app selection issue) is a simple one.

Cameras are not good

I’ll start by saying the obvious — don’t use your tablet to take pictures. Your smartphone will almost always take far superior photos. But for those impromptu video calls or the rare moment when the Honor Pad 9 is your only option, the camera setup is serviceable, though far from impressive.

The 8MP front camera works well enough for the occasional WhatsApp chat, but expect noticeable noise in dimly lit areas. Around the back, the 13MP main sensor produces images with less grain, but at the cost of fine details and rich color accuracy, leaving shots looking somewhat flat and lacking sharpness.

Honor Pad V9: Verdict

The Honor Pad V9 takes mostly everything the company learnt from the previous Pad 9, and fixes it. It’s easily one of the best Android tablets I’ve used in recent memory, and a serious contender for the iPad’s crown.

Important improvements to performance and the display make this a top notch binge watching device with the battery life to boot, and the sharpened AI features provide a helping hand that doesn’t feel overbearing or gimmicky.

Put simply, if you’re in the market for an Android tablet, this should be on your list.

As an Android user and someone who likes keeping an eye on their sleep patterns, I consider having one of the best Android smartwatches essential. And with the Honor Watch 5 Ultra, which joined Honor’s lineup of smartwatches at MWC 2025, we might have the brand’s best contender for a spot on this guide yet.

Featuring comprehensive and accurate sleep and fitness tracking, the Watch 5 Ultra packs a serious punch. Not only can you view in-depth details about how you slept the previous night or how your workout fared, you can also undertake free training courses and do meditation exercises.

The smartwatch sports a sleek, comfortable design too, with a bright AMOLED display. The cherry on top of the cake? Up to 15 days of battery life — some of the best we’ve seen, setting it apart from its main competitors like Google and OnePlus.

So, should you buy it? Yes. Why? Read my full Honor Watch 5 Ultra review to find out.

Honor Watch 5 Ultra review: Cheat sheet

• What is it? Honor’s latest smartwatch with an octagonal design
• Who is it for? Both Android and iPhone users
• How much does it cost? The Honor Watch 5 Ultra has a starting price of €279
• What do we like? The sleek and comfortable design, bright AMOLED display, comprehensive sleep and fitness tracking, and up to 15 days of battery life
• What don’t we like? There aren’t any different size options, and it can’t detect conditions like sleep apnea which some other watches can

Honor Watch 5 Ultra review: Specs

Honor Watch 5 Ultra review: Price & availability

Announced during a keynote address at MWC 2025 in Barcelona, Spain on 2 March, the Honor Watch 5 Ultra joins the tech giant’s lineup of smartwatches with a retail price of €279. You’ll be able to buy either a black or brown model, with a black fluoroelastomer (synthetic rubber) or brown leather strap respectively.

At the time of writing, Honor hadn't confirmed when the Watch 5 Ultra would be available to purchase in Europe and other parts of the world. I will update this review as soon as that information is released.

The Watch 5 Ultra’s retail price is similar to that of the OnePlus Watch 3 ($329), the Samsung Galaxy Watch 7 ($299) and the Fossil Gen 5 ($295). But the Watch 5 Ultra is closest to the OnePlus and Samsung watches, in both features and our rating.

The Watch 5 Ultra will, of course, work best when paired with a phone of the same brand, like the Honor Magic7 Pro, but the watch is compatible with Android 9.0 and iOS 13.0 or higher models too. And it works like a charm on other Android devices, as you’ll soon see.

Honor Watch 5 Ultra review: Design & comfort

The new Honor Watch 5 Ultra is one of the best-looking and most practical smartwatches I’ve had the pleasure of using. Unlike the standard Honor Watch 5 which sports a rectangular screen, the Watch 5 Ultra has a domed octagonal shape which, in my opinion, looks better and classier.

The bezel is made with a grade 5 titanium case and is safeguarded by sapphire crystal. This means the watch is rugged and can withstand scratches, tumbles and endure daily use — and boy is that true. In my role as reviews writer, I need to carry big boxes back and forth from the photography studio, and that means I will more often than not hit my hand against walls and doors as I go. In my week of testing the Watch 5 Ultra, I grazed the watch against rough surfaces a fair few times, and I can’t see a single scratch on it. As rugged smartwatches go, the Watch 5 Ultra is up there with the best.

As I already mentioned, you can get either a fluoro or leather strap. My review unit came with the black fluoro strap which I found comfortable to wear. It has a soft texture on the inside where the watch sits against your skin, with a ridged pattern on the outside for style.

The Watch 5 Ultra measures 1.82 x 1.82 x 0.44 inches, and it sits comfortably on my wrist. It’s not a very heavy watch either, weighing just 1.82oz (without strap), so my hand never felt weighed down. There were moments when I didn’t even realize I had the watch on my wrist, like when I was sleeping or showering.

On that note, the Watch 5 Ultra has an IP68 water- and dust-resistance rating and a resistance to up to 5ATM (water resistant to up to 50m in depth for 10 minutes). This is the same IP-rating as the OnePlus Watch 3 and the Google Pixel Watch 3 ($349). Showering with it was no problem and neither was dunking it into a kitchen sink filled with water. Obviously it isn’t advisable you shower with the watch regularly, though, as soap and steam can degrade the water resistance over time.

Honor Watch 5 Ultra review: Display & touchscreen

Now, let’s talk about the Honor Watch 5 Ultra’s 1.5-inch AMOLED display. This touchscreen is fantastic, bright and detailed, and you can adjust the brightness manually or set it to auto (which I did). The pricier Coros Vertix 2S ($699) is one of my favorite smartwatches but one of my gripes with it is that its LCD screen’s brightness could not be adjusted and it was very dull. Thankfully, this isn't an issue with the Watch 5 Ultra.

With a refresh rate of 60Hz, the touchscreen was extremely responsive in my testing. Every touch registers instantly, and the screen is big enough that I could clearly read what it said in all lighting conditions — whether I was in a dark room or in bright sunlight, I knew what the Watch 5 Ultra was displaying.

Via the Honor Health app — available for free on iOS and Android — you can customize the display to your heart’s content. There are tens of thousands of watchfaces to choose from in analog and digital designs, and you can customize the way the clock looks, if you want the icons to be displayed as a grid or list, and more. Van Gogh’s Starry Night is my favorite artwork, so I was pleased there was an iteration of it available as a watchface.

There are also two physical buttons on the Watch 5 Ultra’s dial. The first is a crown, which gives decent haptic feedback when rotated. The second button is, by default, programmed to jump to the workout page so that you can quickly start tracking your run, for instance.

Honor Watch 5 Ultra review: Health features

The Honor Watch 5 Ultra has a plethora of health tracking features for nearly every situation you could think of. I tested a beta version of the Honor Health app on my Google Pixel 7 Pro, and pairing the watch with my phone was straightforward. Once I’d given the smartwatch all the necessary permissions, I was ready to start using the health features. Honor recommends wearing the watch higher than your wristbone and keeping a finger’s distance between the Watch 5 Ultra and your skin.

As on most other modern smartwatches, the Watch 5 Ultra uses an array of sensors to monitor things like your heart rate, blood oxygen level and wrist temperature. It also tracks your stress levels as well as your heart rate throughout the day (if you allow it to).

The app creates handy colorful graphs and gives you insight into things like your stress range. There are also a few breathing exercises you can do via instructions in the app to relieve stress. I found the stress tracking accurate and helpful as I could view the data and try to pinpoint the source of the stress — and hopefully eliminate or reduce it.

Another feature I find extremely useful is the Sedentary Alert. When enabled, it tells you to stand up and stretch if you’ve been sitting in one spot for more than an hour. I have a desk job and I will often go hours sitting in one position, so having a reminder is useful and gives me an excuse to go downstairs to get myself a glass of water, for example.

Sleep tracking

Full disclosure: I have had poor sleep for the last eight years or so, so being able to track my sleep is very important to me. Wearing the Watch 5 Ultra to sleep every night during testing truly revealed the extent of my sleep issues. First of all, the watch will automatically mute all notifications and stop waking up when it’s lifted at the time you choose. It will then track your sleep throughout the night and give you your sleep score in the morning which it determines by tracking the four stages: when you were awake, in light sleep, deep sleep and REM.

I now look forward to analyzing my sleep graph in the morning and to try and identify factors that may have contributed to my low sleep score. For instance, I drank alcohol on one of the nights which in turn led to me going to bed late and not sleeping very well. The Honor Health app suggested that I should try going to bed by 11PM the next night to ensure better sleep — and I like these suggestions. I also like that you can enable Record Sleep where the watch will record you sleep talking or snoring. You can listen to pre-programmed meditative sleep music and do breathing exercises too.

It’ll take time for me to fix my sleep schedule, but I’m hopeful the Watch 5 Ultra will play a crucial role here. If anything, I’m determined to get more REM and deep sleep just to get a better sleep score and not see as much red in my graph.

It’s important to note that the Watch 5 Ultra doesn't offer detection for things like sleep apnea, which the Samsung Galaxy Watch 7 and the Apple Watch Series 9 ($399) do. There’s no crash or fall detection either, which I believe is an important safety feature, and is available on both the Apple and Galaxy watches.

Fitness tracking

Whether you work out indoors or outdoors, the Watch 5 Ultra is capable of tracking over 100 activities — running, triathlons, snowboarding, hiking, rope skipping, and more. You can also track activities like dancing (ballet, Latin, street, etc.), hula hooping, laser tag, motor racing, and others. You can track darts too, so I will definitely be logging that next time my partner and I go out to play.

I wore the Watch 5 Ultra to track a hike, and I was impressed by the stats it offered. The watch will tell you your average stride frequency, length and speed, cumulative descent, anaerobic and aerobic endurance, detailed pace graph, and more.

There are also loads of free training courses with videos if you want to, say, improve athleticism, relieve stress, improve your posture, or gain muscle. Overall, the Watch 5 Ultra is great at keeping up with your activities.

Honor Watch 5 Ultra review: Smartwatch features

Aside from the plethora of health features, the Honor Watch 5 Ultra boasts lots of smartwatch features too. Pressing the crown takes you to the main menu where you’ll find apps like messages and calls (as long as you have an eSim enabled via the app), workout records, weather, maps, and more.

The Watch 5 Ultra’s GPS works extremely well so using maps to navigate my way around streets was a breeze. This way, you can retrace your steps and accurately track your outdoor workouts too.

When you receive a notification on your phone, it immediately pops up on the Watch 5 Ultra without any noticeable delays. This was one feature I missed in the Coros Vertix 2S which is a fantastic smartwatch in its own right, but wouldn’t receive notifications from my phone.

Honor Watch 5 Ultra review: Battery life

The Honor Watch 5 Ultra is fitted with a rechargeable 480mAh battery, which is the same as the one in the Watch 5. Honor claims a single charge should last you up to 15 days, but this depends on usage conditions and the smart features you’re using.

To put this to the test, I first charged the Watch 5 Ultra to 100% with the included magnetic charging base, which took just under 90 minutes — similar to the OnePlus Watch 3. My methodology involved me wearing the watch 24 hours a day for five days, using sleep tracking and receiving notifications from my phone. After five days, the battery dipped to 72%, which is excellent.

In comparison, the pricier Apple Watch Series 9 has an 18-hour battery life. The OnePlus Watch 3 can last up to five days, while the Samsung Galaxy Watch 7 lasts just under 24 hours.

The Watch 5 Ultra also supports reverse charging. If you’re an Honor smartphone user and own the Magic5 Pro, Magic6 Pro or Magic7 Pro, you can see any of these to charge the Watch 5 Ultra by simply placing the watch on your phone’s back — nifty! You can use any wireless charger with the watch too.

Honor Watch 5 Ultra review: Should you buy it?

As Android smartwatches go, the Honor Watch 5 Ultra is up there with the crème de la crème. Honor’s latest smartwatch is compatible with Android 9.0 and iOS 13.0 and higher, and it works like a charm.

It looks stunning with its titanium bezel and its bright AMOLED display makes reading text on screen much easier. The Watch 5 Ultra’s prowess lies in its ability to accurately track over 100 indoor and outdoor activities, give you insight into your sleep and even record your snoring.

While it can’t detect disturbances like sleep apnea, doesn’t feature fall detection and there’s only one size available, the Watch 5 Ultra hasn’t given me a lot else to complain about. Even paired with my non-Honor Android phone, this is one watch I’m not willing to part with easily.

Honor makes some excellent Android phones, but it's been behind Samsung and Google in terms of updates. That's about to change.

As announced at its MWC 2025 keynote, Honor is bringing seven full years of updates to its Magic series devices, including regular flagship phones like the Magic7 Pro and foldables (although the current Magic V3 will miss out on this new policy). That makes it the third Android phone maker to do so, after Google and Samsung.

This is part of Honor's newly-announced "Alpha Plan," the company's new mantra for being an AI ecosystem company over a device-focused one. The plan makes several changes to Honor's previous focuses.

That includes big new investments and enhanced collaboration with Google and chipmaker Qualcomm, an AI Connect suite for sharing files between Android and iOS and new AI-powered imaging and safety tools. It's not clear exactly how this will play out yet, but it sounds like Honor's phones will be part of the plan going forward for some time.

Making Magic futureproof

Longer software support helps keep otherwise fully-functional devices going for longer, hopefully preventing some unnecessary or wasteful upgrades. Other Android brands offer between two and five years for their flagship products, which shows just how far this newly-minted trio of phone makers is in the lead.

There are still questions as to if offering this much support is a meaningful benefit though. Last year, the CEO of Android phone brand OnePlus argued that there's no guarantee that your phone will be capable of handling things smoothly by the time its seventh software upgrade arrives, so promising so many updates is perhaps irrelevant.

Interestingly, Honor's new policy refers to seven years of Android updates, unlike Samsung which has switched to talking about seven generations of Android support.

Even with rumors that Android 16 is coming earlier than expected this year, we should still only see a new version of Android every year. But if Google decides to pick up the pace again, perhaps that will lead to Honor offering a longer update cycle.

Honor didn't have any new phones to show off today, but the Magic7 Pro and Magic V3 remain great devices to pick up if they're sold where you live. Instead, Honor's hardware focus was on the rest of its ecosystem, with a new Honor Tab V9 tablet, Honor Watch 5 Ultra smartwatch and Honor Earbuds Open.

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Every January, Americans rightfully celebrate the life and legacy of civil rights leader, political philosopher and Baptist minister Martin Luther King., Jr. every year. While there are many ways you can pay tribute to the memory and mission of the Nobel Peace Prize-winning activist — from reading collections of his famous sermons to rewatching those iconic and galvanizing speeches — our favorite form of commemoration is watching movies about and featuring the American icon. From engaging documentaries to inspiring biopics, here are five MLK-focused movies to watch this weekend.

'Selma'

Starring a shrewd and stirring David Oyelowo ("Silo," "Lawmen: Bass Reeves") as Martin Luther King, Jr., this Oscar-winning 2014 historical drama from director Ava DuVernay chronicles the dangerous protest marches from Selma, Alabama to the state capital of Montgomery, in an effort to combat racial injustice and secure voting rights for Black Americans in 1965.

With Oyelowo joined by equally fine actors, including Tom Wilkinson as President Lyndon B. Johnson, Tim Roth as George Wallace, Carmen Ejogo as Coretta Scott King, and Common as James Bevel, "Selma" is a tumultuous true story that's far more affecting than any ordinary history lesson.
►Watch on Paramount Plus

'King in the Wilderness'

You've no doubt seen countless historical footage of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. over the decades, but you can better get to know the man behind the movement in this Emmy-winning 2018 HBO documentary, which follows the visionary leader in the final two years of his life via never-before-seen footage and interviews with those closest to King.

As the film spans key moments in King's life — from the Chicago Freedom Movement to the Poor People's Campaign, from the "Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence" speech to his "I've Been to the Mountaintop" address, and all the way through the activist's assassination and funeral — you'll hear testimony from his professional colleagues and personal confidants, including John Lewis, Bernard Lafayette, Diane Nash, Joan Baez, Jesse Jackson, Dorothy Cotton and more.
►Watch on Max

'I am MLK, Jr.'

The impact of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s activism is still reverberating through American politics and culture to this day, an enduring significance that's thoughtfully captured in this 2018 doc directed by John Barbisan and Michael Hamilton.

Along with original recordings of King and firsthand insights from fellow civil rights-era comrades like Andrew Young and Al Sharpton, the 95-minute film features dialogues with a wide array of contemporary writers, political activists, sports stars and media pundits including Van Jones, Carmelo Anthony, Nick Cannon and Shaun King, showing the sheer scope of King's legacy and acting as a necessary reminder that the plight of his fellow Black Americans continues on today.
►Watch on The CW

'The Rosa Parks Story'

Though King is a singular figure in the nation's history, the civil rights movement was, of course, a collaborative and communal effort from countless brave Americans. One such individual was "the mother of the freedom movement" Rosa Parks, an Alabama woman known for her act of peaceful defiance against racial bus segregation.

From writer Paris Qualles and director Julie Dash, this NAACP Image Awards-winning TV movie sees Oscar winner Angela Bassett ("Zero Day," "Black Panther: Wakanda Forever") as Parks, with Dexter Scott King as Martin Luther King, Jr. and Cicely Tyson as Leona McCauley, Rosa's mother. The drama spans Park's youth as a private school student to her public rebellion against racism and segregation — Rosa's arrest for refusing to give up her bus seat for a white passenger prompted the 1955 Montgomery Bus Boycott, which was led by King.
►Watch on Peacock

'Eyes on the Prize'

A 14-part landmark documentary about the 20th-century civil rights movement in the United States obviously wouldn't be complete without considerable coverage of Martin Luther King, Jr.

Produced by Blackside, "Eyes on the Prize" — which took home six Emmy Awards and a Peabody Award, as well as an Oscar nomination for Best Documentary Feature — provides a comprehensive examination of the events comprising the American civil rights movement. In addition to spotlighting famous figures from Malcolm X to Muhammad Ali, multiple segments follow King's activism during the Montgomery Bus Boycott of 1955, the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and beyond.
►Watch on Max

Arriving a little ahead of expected schedule, the Honor Magic7 Pro drops at a busy time in smartphone world. But as with any good magic trick, it arrives with some flair.

When it comes to specs, the Magic7 Pro more than delivers the goods, especially with its cameras and display. Honor has also managed to squeeze a lot of potential out of the phonoe's chipset, while delivering a lower price for the Magic7 Pro than you might think.

But there are some weak spots — a short upgrade schedule and disappointing battery life compared to the previous model, chief among them. Add in the fact that Honor phones are harder to buy in places like the U.S., and it's hard for the Magic7 Pro to stand out in a crowded field of Android phones right now. The Galaxy S24 Ultra, OnePlus 13 and Google Pixel 9 Pro XL are all excellent options for Android users, and we're also eagerly awaiting the Galaxy S25 Ultra to launch in what should be only a few days' time as of this writing.

For that reason, it's hard to recommend buying this new Honor flagship right now. But when the dust settles after this early glut of new premium Android phones, you may want to return to this Honor Magic7 Pro review and see how it compares to the best Android phones landing in early 2025. Because somewhere in its big box of features could be the one that'll make a big difference to you.

Honor Magic7 Pro review: Specs

Honor Magic7 Pro review: Price and availability

The Magic7 Pro is currently up for discounted early-bird orders, with regular sales opening on January 21. At full price, you'll pay £1,099 for the 12GB RAM/512GB version of the Magic7 Pro, the only one that's going on sale on the global market. Or more accurately, the global market other than the U.S., where you'll need to find a third-party retailer willing to ship a Magic7 Pro to you, as it won't be on sale at any U.S.-based carrier or electronics store.

That £1,099 price puts the Honor Magic7 Pro between the Galaxy S24 Plus and Galaxy S24 Ultra (and likely their Galaxy S25 counterparts), and in line with the cost of a Google Pixel 9 Pro XL. The Magic7 Pro costs quite a bit more than a OnePlus 13, which matches these phones on the specs but is available for £200 less.

Honor Magic7 Pro review: Design and display

Honor has given the Magic7 Pro an iPhone-style pill-shaped cutout for its selfie camera and auxiliary sensors. This enables additional features and also helps give the phone a more distinct front design than other Android flagships, along with the quad-curved screen.

Meanwhile on the back, the cameras sit in a metal-clad black squircle (yes that's a real word), with only the Honor logo decorating the rest of the phone for an extra-minimalist look.

Like many of its rivals, the Magic7 Pro uses a large 6.8-inch display with a 1 - 120Hz refresh rate. Honor tries to differentiate things with its eye care tech. That includes returning features like a 4320Hz PWM dimming rate to minimize eye strain by reducing screen flickering, something other brands like OnePlus are now adopting.

But Honor is also pushing ahead with new screen features like Circular Polarized Display. This addition supposedly helps the display better mimic natural light, while a AI Defocus Display feature subtly blurs and unblurs the display to keep your eyes active.

All these technologies are backed up by Honor's own research, but as someone who doesn't face eye strain problems (as long as I wear my glasses, that is) it's hard to know if these features make much of a difference.

At its maximum settings, the Magic7 Pro hits 5,000 nits of brightness according to Honor's claims. We didn't have the opportunity to send the phone to our labs to verify this, but I did compare the Magic7 Pro side by side with its main rivals. To my eye, the Honor at max brightness looks at least as bright as the OnePlus 13, even if it's not up to the eye-searingly bright maximum of the Pixel 9 Pro XL. And while the Galaxy S24 Ultra was quite a way behind all the other competitors here, Samsung's phone still has a unique advantage with its anti-glare coating.

Durability shouldn't be a problem with the Magic7 Pro, with Honor claiming its NanoCrystal Shield display makes the screen 10 times tougher than regular glass. The phone is also rated IP68 and IP69 for water and dust resistance, matching the OnePlus 13's durability ratings. So have no fear taking this phone out into stormy weather or even dropping it in a few meters of water.

Speakers aren't most people's priority on a smartphone, but Honor is catering for that niche all the same with its new Surround Subwoofer speakers. These feature a larger speaker cavity to help bring out the low notes of whatever you're playing, and boy does it even. Even at 50% of max volume, the bassline of Thundercat's "Dragonball Durag" caused the table I was testing the phone on to noticeably vibrate when I touched it.

That said, this focus on bass doesn't come at the expense of the other end of the frequency graph. Even though the iPhone 16 Pro Max captures elements like the hi-hats or Thundercat's falsetto more clearly, the Magic7 Pro still does a good job of keeping the sound balanced despite its subwoofer tech.

For the Magic7 Pro, the color selection includes either grey, blue or black (the version you see here). Sadly in the U.K., the blue edition isn't being sold, limiting your choice to the two plainer tones. Fortunately, the matte-textured black version does still look smart, and the grey version actually comes with a swirly pattern that makes it look like a billowing silk sheet.

Honor Magic7 Pro review: Cameras

Honor has stuck to the same basic camera sensor arrangement as last year: 50MP sensors for the main, ultrawide and selfie cameras, but a 200MP 3x telephoto camera instead of a 180MP one. That's a lot of megapixels to be working with.

But let's see what the samples show rather than just the specs, starting as always with the main camera, and beginning with the Google Pixel 9 Pro XL as our comparison phone.

Shooting a statue in Hyde Park's Italian Gardens, the Pixel produced a far brighter image, especially of the sculpture itself and with good color, too. The Honor's image has a good sense of drama with its exaggerated lighting, but I wish it showed more detail.

Moving to a night mode shot of Paddington Central, it's the Honor that has the richer colors this time, while the Pixel shot looks a little brighter.

In a different comparison against the iPhone 16 Pro Max looking up a path in Hyde Park, the Honor's gone to extremes to stop the sky from getting blown out. In exchange, the rest of the shot's very dark, whereas the iPhone's stuck a balance between the two ends of the scene's dynamic range for a much more pleasing image.

One last thing to cover with the Magic7 Pro's main camera is its adjustable aperture, accessible in Pro camera mode. This lets you switch between f/2.0 and f/1.4, giving you a deeper or shallower field of view (the in-focus part of the photo) as you like.

Leaving the main camera behind, we now go to the 50MP ultrawide camera, which I compared against the Pixel 9 Pro XL with this shot of Queen Anne's Alcove. The Honor shot is warmer, and with more intense colors, while the Pixel shot looks more natural. The Google image is darker, though, which makes it harder to see the shadows of the shot.

Next, the 200MP telephoto with 3x optical zoom, 6x lossless hybrid zoom and a 100x maximum zoom. For fun, let's start with the max magnification shot.

Above 10x, Honor's AI Super Zoom system kicks in to sharpen up the resulting images. This sample of a street sign (you can see how far away I actually am in the preview in the top right corner) shows how well this can work, aside from one of the letters being interpreted incorrectly.

You'd still be better off just walking closer to the sign in this case, but when you have no choice where to stand in relation to something you want to snap, AI Super Zoom does work somewhat.

But let's do a zoom range comparison now with the OnePlus 13, which uses a similar 3x optical/6x lossless telephoto camera system. At 3x, the fountain is blurrier on Honor, while sharper and brighter on the OnePlus.

At 6x, neither phone does a particularly good job of capturing the water droplets. In terms of color though, the Honor has given us a flatter-looking shot, while the OnePlus has gone in for brightness.

We will wrap this up with a selfie camera portrait mode shot. In Honor's case, the phone is using algorithms developed with French photography studio Harcourt.

This comparison, again against the Pixel 9 Pro XL, shows that Honor's gone for quite an exaggerated look, rather than the more natural, brighter approach of the Pixel. Like the rest of the shots we've tested, the Magic7 Pro's images are not bad — far from it in fact. But they're different enough from its rivals to be noticeable, and sometimes not for the best reasons.

Honor Magic7 Pro review: Performance

The Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset inside the Magic7 Pro puts it on the same level as other 2025 Android flagship phones released so far — at least on paper. But phone makers can still choose how hard to push the chip, leading to performance differences.

The Magic7 Pro isn't the outright best performing phone we've tested, but it's one of the best. It outdoes every other phone we've tested to date on 3DMark GPU benchmarks, and it's close to the top on the CPU Geekbench tests, even with the ROG Phone 9 Pro using its high-performance X mode. The only area in which the Magic7 Pro didn't score well was the Adobe Premiere Rush test, where it was pretty slow to turn a 4K video into a 1080p one.

The phone's hidden power translates into the real world too. I was able to play Ex Astris, a demanding mobile RPG, smoothly and without stuttering, even at maximum settings at 60fps. I've not managed to get that kind of performance on any other Android phone at the time of writing.

The Magic7Pro's single available memory spec of 12GB RAM and 512GB of storage means you don’t get the option of a cheaper version or one with more storage. But I’m okay with that, since that's a lot of memory for the price. The basic spec of other phones only come with 256GB of storage space, with 12GB RAM common but not guaranteed by all brands.

Honor Magic7 Pro review: Battery and charging

Honor has put a 5270mAh battery into the Magic7 Pro in Europe, but in further-flung markets without legal restrictions on battery density, the phone gets a 5850mAh cell instead. Worse still, last year's Magic6 Pro had a 5,600 mAh battery, making the European version an obvious downgrade.

After my usual test of 3 hours of 1080p YouTube video playback at medium brightness, the Magic7 Pro lost 20% of its battery, a reasonable result. However with the OnePlus 13 losing only 14% on the same test, and the Magic6 Pro 18%, it's annoying that Honor couldn't make a larger battery work in Europe while OnePlus could with the OnePlus 13's 6,000mAh power pack.

Honor lists the max charging speed of the Magic7 Pro as 100W wired and 80W wireless. We were unable to test the speed for ourselves as there is no charger in the box and previous Honor phones used a different charging tech, but Honor's claim is that the phone will charge to full in 33 minutes when plugged in and in 44 minutes if you use a compatible wireless charger.

Honor Magic7 Pro review: Software and special features

Honor elected to switch out the Magic6 Pro's optical fingerprint scanner with a new 3D Fingerprint Scanner on the Magic7 Pro. This worked very well, requiring only three taps to verify a fingerprint and then unlocking promptly every time I used it. Not that I ended up using it much, as the 3D scanner in the front camera block still enables secure facial recognition. This is a rarity on Android phones, but works similarly quickly and at a similar range of angles to the well-established Face ID system on the latest iPhones.

Debuting on the Magic7 Pro, MagicOS 9 (based on Android 15) contains the rest of the phone's unique abilities. In keeping with recent trends, Honor offers various AI tools on the Magic7 Pro, such as AI image editing, translation (both in voice calls and if you’re face-to-face with the other speaker), text transcription, summaries and minutes. The phone also features Google's Gemini assistant.

Unique to Honor is its Magic Portal, a speedy sharing and searching system that works with text and images, including a Circle to Search-style lasso tool for specifying an area of the screen to send, accessed by tapping the screen with your knuckle.

Honor’s also proud of its AI Deepfake Detection system, which it claims will flag suspicious video calls within seconds. But this is not coming until later this year in a future update, so we can’t say for ourselves if the feature matches Honor’s promises or not.

Honor looks to be sticking with its current update policy of four years of Android updates and five years of security updates. That almost matches what OnePlus offers with the OnePlus 13, which is due to get four years Android and six years of security, but still lacking compared to Google and Samsung, which both offer seven years of Android and security updates for their flagship phones.

Honor Magic7 Pro review: Verdict

There are a few scenarios where my recommendations for buying the Honor Magic7 Pro are clear. If you're considering it against the OnePlus 13, then unless you're very concerned about pricing, the Honor likely wins out for you. And if you're thinking about the Magic7 Pro against a Pixel 9 Pro XL, then it'll depend on if you want to spend your 1.1 grand on better hardware now with Honor or smarter software down the line with Google.

The problem is if you're also weighing up buying a Samsung flagship phone. The Galaxy S25 Ultra isn't here yet, and while it'll presumably be more expensive again, it could offer upgrades that leave the Magic7 Pro in the dust. And the fact you'll have to order Honor's phone in from overseas in the U.S. makes the Honor less appealing for American buyers, too.

None of this detracts from the Honor's high points — the Magic7 Prois feature-packed from front to back, and performs and snaps photos on a par with any other flagship phone. Even the downsides of shorter battery life and software support could be forgiven by large groups of users depending on how they use and buy their phones.

Cross your fingers that the Honor Magic7 Pro doesn't get lost in the Galaxy S25 tide. Because its features — both the cutting-edge and the familiar but refined — should earn it a place on many a shopper's shortlist.

The Honor MagicPad 2 is something special – one of the best Android tablets you can buy right now. But it’s those words “Android tablet” that cause concern for a lot of potential punters.

You probably already know the score by now. In terms of tablet app ecosystem, iPad lineage has a clear edge. When it comes to being productive in many different ways, Apple has this war won in both hardware and software. However, the MagicPad 2 comes close enough to matching it that you could get away with using this and be just as happy.

Software-wise, this comes in the form of MagicOS offering a super slick UI that is a cinch to browse around and get most work done – supercharged with AI innovations that rival Apple Intelligence, and a smooth multitasking experience that matches the various picture-in-picture and split screen options you see on an iPad. In fact, as I wrote about a little earlier, you’ll be surprised at how much you can actually do on Android tablet if you ditch your laptop for this.

And hardware wise, you’ve got a drop dead gorgeous OLED display, which matches and even beats the cream of the crop in the M4 iPad Pro in terms of brightness and refresh rate. Color so vivid you’ll believe you’re tasting the rainbow at every glance. 

On top of that, the battery capacity gives you over 10 hours on one charge, Snapdragon 8S Gen 3 may not be the same as Apple silicon, but it’s enough for the Android tablet app levels of casual productivity, and all of this is packed into a gorgeously luxurious chassis and surrounded by ergonomically strong accessories in the keyboard cover and MagicPen 3.

So what you need to do is make a choice – think about what apps you’ll actually use and what you actually want to do with your tablet. If you don’t want to be hampered by the limitations of a reduced tablet app library and reduced power, then something like the similarly-priced M2 iPad Air may be the one for you. On the android side of things, the OnePlus Pad offers more performance.

But if your workload is more in the office space and you want the best of the best in terms of displays for binge watching, then the Honor MagicPad 2 could very well be the one to buy.

Let’s get into it some more.

Honor MagicPad 2: Cheat Sheet

• What is it? This is a premium Android tablet.
• Who is it for? For those who want the best viewing experience on a tablet (thanks to that OLED screen).
• What does it cost? Pricing is set at £499 in the UK (roughly $600).
• What do we like? The OLED display is a true feast for the eyes that beats the iPad Pro, MagicOS 8 is a phenomenal effort by Honor to workaround Android tablet limitations and give us a slick UI, and all of this is packed into a drop dead gorgeous chassis.
• What don’t we like? The downside is a simple one here – it’s an Android tablet. This isn’t really Honor’s fault here, but I can’t ignore the fact that a sea of stretched out phone apps is a huge detractor from a tablet like this, and should make you seriously consider an iPad for the better app support.

Honor MagicPad 2: Specs

Honor MagicPad 2: What we like

Let’s get to the good part. After the admirable effort of the Honor Pad 9, the MagicPad 2 is a leap frog — so much better than expected in three key areas.

A half-price iPad Pro

There’s one shining strength here, literally when you take into account its 1,600-nit peak brightness. The 12.3-inch OLED panel on here is nothing short of a mouthwatering marvel — a flash flood of color that greets your eyes in a way that only the M4 iPad Pro has done so in the past.

On top of that, you may notice that the screen on offer here is slightly better too with a higher resolution and a faster refresh rate. Realistically though, those improvements won’t really be noticeable, and if you really believe you can spot the difference between 120 and 144Hz, I have a bridge you sell you.

But the real superpower here is that you’re getting this glorious glow of OLED at half the price of the Pro. Don’t get me wrong, the performance of this tablet doesn’t even come close to Apple’s uber premium slab (more on that later). But if your main motivation is the best display for binge watching and casual productivity, this is the best option at a fraction of the cost.

Special shout-out to the confidence felt in the color-accuracy when using Photoshop Express to edit, and dipping into some super HDR-rich content like Blade Runner 2049 that showcases those inky blacks, the deep contrast ratio and the raw vividity on offer here.

An Android tablet you can actually get stuff done on!?

I’ve already gone into some detail about this when talking about switching my MacBook Pro with the MagicPad 2. But to turn this section into a quick TL;DR — the marriage of this sleek, productive hardware and the super slick UI of MagicOS 8 makes this an Android tablet you can actually use for productivity as well as entertainment.

Working around the awkward lack of Android tablet-optimized apps is definitely easier here, as Honor has built its own office suite and notes app to complement what is already present in Google’s selection of apps like Gmail and Chrome. Add the fact that multitasking is a cinch on here, from picture-in-picture to side-by-side, and you’ve got an all-in-one for all your document creation needs.

Of course there are limitations in its power and app selection (more on that later), but if you’re workload is more of a typist and doodler than a prosumer, then the MagicPad 2, the Smart Bluetooth Keyboard (honestly one of the best typing experiences I’ve had with a tablet, that uber response Magic Pencil 3, and the OS skin come together and help you get into your focus rather well.

Actual intelligence

For a while now, phone and tablet makers have been figuring out how to make AI a worthwhile selling point. In some cases, the answer is to go a little crazy on the generative side of things, but for Honor, I really enjoyed the small but thoughtful and logical additions here and there.

You’ll see it pop up here and there, or just aid in the background without you even realizing. So far, two key ones come to mind, but honorable mentions are the handwriting recognition for writing in formulas, voice transcription and the usefulness of Gemini Advanced that you already know about.

First is the Magic Portal, which sees the screen peel off in a 3D effect to reveal some quick actions — chosen by learning the way you use the tablet. Think of it as an AI-driven right-click functionality, which grabs context of what you’re looking at and points you towards what you’re most likely to do. 

For example, if I’m looking at a review of a game, opening up Magic Portal gives me the options to find the game to buy on Amazon, share on my very geeky Whatsapp group chat, bookmark the page or take a note of it. All these things I do often, and the MagicPad 2 picked up on it.

Second is something you’ll never notice, but is a good one if you ever see any normal screen blur slightly in front of you. Myopia is a very common in those who spend a lot of time looking at screens (so basically all of us), and Honor’s got a nifty workaround alternative to buying a pair of computer glasses — the AI Defocus Display.

Simply put, the front facing camera judges your distance from the screen, and through some trickery, Honor is able to fudge the pixels a little to subtly blur your peripheral vision while keeping the center of your gaze in sharp definition. It’s proven to help reduce the Myopia effect by some margin, which will keep those peepers strong for longer.

Honor MagicPad 2: What we don't like

For all the love I have for this tablet, it doesn’t make me blind to the two key obstacles here for the MagicPad 2, which may make you want to consider its competition — even though the OLED display here is clearly superior.

Keep it casual

That sub-flagship Snapdragon 8s Gen 3 is decent, don’t get me wrong. It is enough for casual productivity and some lighter multitasking, but you can see it strain around the edges when you start to put it under a little more pressure. For example, a Premiere Rush video export, Chrome with 5 tabs, a PiP video playing and a sketching app being used gave me a bit of stuttering.

And the same can be said for the graphics. Most Android games will be more than playable on here, but you may see some frame rate reductions when you throw anything more graphically intense at it.

If you make sure you play by its rules, you won’t see these problems. But there’s no getting away from the fact that the M2 iPad Air just eats this thing for lunch in the performance department, and you can get more zippiness from the OnePlus Pad 2 for the same cost.

The decision of whether that OLED display is worth it at the sacrifice of raw performance comes down to your use cases, so allow me to break it down.

• If your workload is a lighter one (office work and web browsing), and you casually dabble in creative work, then the MagicPad 2 is enough and you can get that gorgeous OLED panel.
• If you’re starting casual but want to get into more advanced creative workloads, the iPad Air is absolutely the right decision – even though you’ll lose out on that OLED panel, you’ll get more longevity.

Trying to swim upstream

For all the work Honor has done to paint over the cracks of an Android tablet, there’s no escaping the OS and its lack of tablet apps. And no, I’m not talking about a raw number of apps (like some of you mentioned in the comments of my Pad 9 review), I’m talking about the actual tablet app experience – an area that the iPad dominates.

There’s no avoiding this fact, and I still find myself running into the same familiar issues of stretched out phone apps across social and creative software. It constrains what you can actually do, and feels a little defeating against the hard work Honor’s put in.

Hopefully developers notice just how prominent the Android tablet market is and start to adapt for it, but at the moment, you’ll have to go through the rigmarole of entering the big screen option of settings and forcing every individual app into full screen.

Put simply, if you want all the apps, it’s no competition. Get the iPad. But Honor does an admirable job in providing an alternative.

Honor MagicPad 2: Verdict

And that’s the story of the Honor MagicPad 2 – a phenomenal tablet that is only held back by that one issue that faces every Android tablet.

The hardware is supreme, the UI skin is easily the best you can get on any slab sporting this OS, and the AI implementations on offer here are thoughtful and even caring for health thanks to that defocus display functionality. 

Pair that with the stellar accessories, and you can make this a great device for both your entertainment and productivity needs, while being the coolest person in the office with the most premium looking device in the group.

But with any tablet purchase, you’ve got to think carefully about how important that tablet app ecosystem is to you. If it’s critical, then the iPad Air’s mid display in comparison to the MagicPad 2 may be a worthwhile compromise. But the best credit I can give to Honor here is that this is the first tablet that makes the decision between Android and Apple a difficult one.

The Honor MagicPad 2 has just been announced at IFA 2024, and I’ve been testing it for a couple weeks. While we wait for the chance to tell you all about it in a review, I wanted to do something a little different – replace my M3 Pro MacBook Pro with this tablet for a week.

You see, Steve Jobs got a lot of things right, but one that he didn’t quite hit the mark on was this notion that tablets will replace laptops. All his talk of comparing this transition to the way people switched from trucks to cars just hasn’t come to fruition. 

No matter how many articles you read that test and ponder whether a tablet can be a laptop, that won’t change the inevitable fact that for peak productivity, laptops have won this war. So that argument would be pointless for me to make.

What I want to do instead is dip back into the world of Android tablets, and see whether they’ve come any further along. There’s a reason why iPads are a solid lock for the top spot of our best tablets list – they have access to a smorgasbord of apps as well as the performance and the capability to not just be binge-watching slabs, but actual productivity devices to help you get things done. 

Android slabs have never had the same expansive support in my experience, with a vastly smaller app library and a far less sleek UI. Well, that’s at least what I thought until I used the MagicPad 2 as my daily driver for 7 days.

Smooth operator

And so, I set it up with everything I needed and got to it. I have to say I’m surprised by how much I can get done here. MagicOS 8.0 (built on Android 14) is a sleek UI and you can tell Honor has put time and thought into making this make sense on a tablet.

Multi-tasking options are just a drag and a swipe away, and you have the chance to pre-save your most used side-by-side. Shout-out in particular to Magic Portal becoming something of an AI-infused version of a right-click for me – learning preferred system functions based on where I am on the MagicPad 2 and presenting them in a list for me to activate.

Plus, Honor’s done a bang-up job here with its own apps for getting things done, which have been supercharged with AI.

For example, it can do all the same things you’re seeing with Apple Intelligence, such as fixing your handwriting and solving formulas you doodle down, voice transcription in Honor notes, and more. Put a sleek file manager in the middle of it, and all the apps come together in a fine synergy of productivity.

Combine this with my workflow fortunately benefitting from having tablet-optimized apps for it, such as Slack and Gmail, and I was working hard in no time. Whether it’s sketching out an idea with the Magic-Pencil 3 with super low latency and a huge range of pressure sensitivity, or typing to my heart’s content with the Smart Bluetooth Keyboard case (keys feel amazing with 1.6mm of travel), it’s been a joy to write out this and many other stories.

A feast for the eyes

I’m of course talking about the main event here – that 12.3-inch 3K OLED panel with a 1,600-nit peak brightness and a 144Hz refresh rate. That beats the M4-equipped iPad Pro 2024 in both resolution and refresh rate, while being just as bright. 

In use, the UI zooms around oh so slickly, color temperature changes make this a nice display to work on, and that flash flood of color paired with peak brightness make even the most HDR-est of content look incredible

But the magic (pardon the pun) doesn’t stop there as the 4,320Hz Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) dimming sounds super technical, but means that any brightness fluctuations or flickering stripes are basically eliminated. And on top of that, Honor’s bringing something big to the table in the form of an AI Defocus Display.

This will be hard for me to show on camera, so let me explain. A common problem of spending so much time in front of screens is nearsightedness, but myopia glasses (or you may see them called defocus glasses) can help with that by intentionally defocusing everything in your peripheral vision and keeping the screen clear.

Well, the MagicPad 2 is just going to go ahead and use AI to recreate that. Using the camera to judge your distance and angle to the screen, this panel is able to replicate that same defocus glass effect, which can be important in reducing the myopia impacts of this display.

To say it’s better than an iPad would be a “stretch”

But imma stop you right there. Before I start gushing too much, there are some of what I’d like to call the Android Tablet Tribulations. First, we’re not entirely sure how many years of major Android updates this will get. In previous devices, Honor has committed to five years, which isn’t quite iPad-levels of longevity, but it’s good enough. We’ll see if that’s the case here.

Second, for all the work that Honor has done to make an office suite and apps that can give you a whiff of laptop-esque productivity, there’s no getting away from the fact that most of the biggest Android apps aren’t built for tablets. There’s a cumbersome process for these (Facebook is a classic example) where you’ll have to go into the Large-Screen Features settings menu and force these apps to go full-screen. And after all that, you’re left with a blown up phone app. Comparing that to seeing how developers make the most of that extra screen real estate on an iPad, this will always be a bit of a bummer.

And on top of that, while the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3S is a great sub-flagship chipset for most of your productivity, if anything more strenuous appeared in the app store (akin to Final Cut Pro or Logic Pro as you see on iPad), this tablet would slow to a crawl. You can configure this to 16GB of RAM, which is a blessing for multi-tasking, but it's a phone chipset slapped into a tablet, and you’ve got to be mindful of that.

Outlook

Now, there’s only so much I can say about the Honor MagicPad 2 before the review (don’t worry, it’s coming sooner than you think). But what you have here is a damn fine tablet – made even sweeter by that iPad Pro beater of an OLED display that is a joy for the eyes.

You can tell that Honor’s been in the tablet game for a while, as the company works around the common obstacles of using this OS to give you something that’s damn slick to use for productivity and entertainment. It’s reign as being the most iPad-est Android tablet you can buy continues strong.

As for this little experiment I was doing, there are for sure still some limitations in use when it comes to the whole “replacing a laptop for a tablet” thing. Those same common problems like the constricted tablet app selection and the lack of a suite for creative work rear their head again. Oh and you’re still contending with stretched out phone apps for everything else.

But Android has come a long way on the big screen, and so has Magic OS – to the point that I know I can get pretty much all of my more standard day-to-day tasks done on here, while having a stunning screen for chilling out after work. 

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I've always known that a device like the Honor Magic V3 was possible — it was purely a matter of timing. Previous Honor foldables offered strong design but outdated components, but this new model turns things around just seven months after the previous Honor foldable went on sale outside China. And it's debuting at just the right time.

This won't be the foldable phone for everyone. It's not available for purchase in the United States, it gets fewer software updates than its rivals, and there's a bit of an inconsistency problem with its cameras. But what Honor has done with the Magic V3 is make the world's thinnest foldable that you can easily use like a standard phone most of the time, with a super skinny and light build that just so happens to open up to a massive display that's the ideal canvas for running multiple apps or trying out Honor's unique AI features.

As you read my full Honor Magic V3 review, you'll hopefully see exactly what I mean when I say it belongs among the best foldable phones around. And maybe then you'll think about buying one for yourself or lament its lack of availability where you are, and demand more from the brands that you can buy.

Honor Magic V3 review: Specs

Honor Magic V3 review: Price and availability

Honor has kept the Magic V3 the same £1,699 price as the Magic V2 model this new phone replaces. That makes the Magic V3 a little cheaper than most of the competition. In the U.K., you have to pay a minimum of £1,799 for a Galaxy Z Fold 6, or £1,749 for the Pixel 9 Pro Fold, with the OnePlus Open still the cheapest of the bunch at £1,599.

As with all Honor phones, the Magic V3 isn't going to be available in the U.S. Enterprising individuals will be able to import one of course, but for most users, it's a far better option to pick up a phone that's in stock where you live for cell coverage and customer support reasons.

Honor Magic V3 review: Design and display

Honor has cracked foldable phone design with the Magic V3. The new phone is a similar size to its rivals, but it manages to still be the thinnest and lightest foldable on the market today. Though this depends on where you live, since as we mentioned, U.S. shoppers can’t get their hands on the Honor Magic V3.

Whether folded or unfolded, the Honor Magic V3 is certainly thinner than the Galaxy Z Fold 6, Pixel 9 Pro Fold and the OnePlus Open. Plus it's lighter than these foldable phones in addition to weighing less than some conventional flagships like the Galaxy S24 Ultra.Whether folded or unfolded, the Honor Magic V3 is certainly thinner than the Galaxy Z Fold 6, Pixel 9 Pro Fold and the OnePlus Open. Plus it's lighter than these foldable phones in addition to weighing less than some conventional flagships like the Galaxy S24 Ultra.

Despite its relatively featherweight status among foldables, the Magic V3 still feels sturdy even when open, similar to when you hold a premium tablet like an iPad Pro. When folded, the Magic V3 feels the closest to a standard smartphone of any foldable I've handled, with no difficulty in typing or swiping imposed by the second layer of phone hiding beneath it. That means you can open or close the phone as you see fit for the task you're doing, rather than the inner display feeling like the one you have to use on rival phones with narrower cover screens.

Moving between folded and unfolded modes feels satisfying too, with the phone springing open and closed once you move the hinge past a certain point. And with the help of Honor Super Steel parts, the hinge is apparently rated for half-a-million folds, more than enough to keep the mechanism going until your next smartphone upgrade.

On the back, we can appreciate the Reddish Brown, Green or Black (pictured) color of the Magic V3, which fits nicely with its luxurious-feeling matte glass back and glossy metal hinge and side rails. Honor's new centered octagonal camera block looks good, though that placement makes it hard to balance the phone on a flat surface whether it's closed or open. Fortunately, there is a case included in the box that comes with a fold-out stand, but it would be better if you could keep the phone stable without an accessory’s help.

The screens on the Magic V3 are a 6.43-inch OLED on the outside, and a 7.92-inch OLED on the inside, both with 120Hz adaptive refresh rates. The two displays also have stylus support — a contrast to the Galaxy Z Fold devices that just include stylus support for the inner screen. It's just a shame that, like Samsung and its S Pen, Honor’s Magic-Pen stylus is sold separately.

For durability, Honor claims its Anti-scratch NanoCrystal Shield and Super Armored Inner Screen technology gives the Magic V3 protection against potential hard and sharp threats. The phone has also been rated as IPX8 water resistant, although to 2.5 metres rather than the usual 1.5 metres. That's good to have but it doesn't fully match the IP48 dust and water resistance that the Galaxy Z Fold 6 offers.

Honor likes to pack its displays with eye health tech, such as 3840Hz PWM dimming on the inside, and 4320Hz on the outside, a method of reducing eye strain. There’s also Dynamic Dimming, Circadian Night Display, and Natural tone systems to adjust the screens' colors to make them both more natural in different lights and different temperatures and brightness levels depending on the time of day.

The newest addition to this set of features is AI Defocus, a system designed to prevent "transient myopia" (temporary shortsightedness) by blurring the screen slightly to make your eyes adjust more regularly, as they would in your off-screen life. It's hard with these features to know if they are doing their job, since if they work, you won't notice a thing. But Honor assures potential buyers that this is backed up by scientific research.

Honor Magic V3 review: Cameras

While not quite up to the standard of its Magic6 Pro flagship phone, the cameras on the Magic V3 are still impressive for a foldable. The Magic V3 offers 50MP main and 3.5x telephoto cameras, plus a 40MP ultrawide sensor on the back. Identical 20MP cameras on the front and inside the phone can shoot selfies or film video calls.

I first tested the Magic V3's main camera against the Pixel 9 Pro Fold with a shot of this crossing near to Hyde Park. Everything's much more lively and colorful in the Honor image, and its dynamic range has helped to capture both the bright light coming through the trees above and the darker shaded areas of the trees.

However, in this comparison against the Galaxy Z Fold 6, we can see the Magic V3 has tripped up a bit. Both phones have made this planter on a canal-side path very saturated, but the Honor does it to the extent you lose definition in the petals, even if its warmer tone is more inviting.

Staying with the Galaxy Z Fold 6, we now have an ultrawide shot from within the Paddington Central Amphitheatre. The colors are stronger in the Honor's shot, and the image is less distorted than the wider-angle Samsung shot. The Galaxy Z Fold 6 has also given its image a higher contrast, letting you make out details in elements like the grass on the steps, but it's spoiled the colors with an unusual yellow-ish cast.

Next is a telephoto camera shot of a beehive on top of a building. Setting aside the difference in zoom lengths between the Honor (3.5x) and the Pixel 9 Pro Fold (5x zoom), the difference we see is that the Honor image is the brighter of the two, while there's more detail and better color balance in the Google version.

Standing in front of some green foliage for an outer camera portrait selfie battle between the Magic V3 and Galaxy Z Fold 6, we see the Honor phone's portrait effect is way worse than the Samsung, eating a big chunk from my glasses. The Magic V3 has also rendered me and my background in cooler and brighter colors, giving it a very different vibe to the Samsung.

Last of all, I checked what regular selfies looked like from the inner cameras of the Honor and Google foldables. The Honor is once again the cooler-colored of the two, with the Pixel 9 Pro Fold providing a warmer and more saturated take on things.

Honor Magic V3 review: Performance

Since it uses the same Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset as the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6, you might expect the Magic V3 to offer roughly the same performance. But going by benchmark results, it seems like Honor isn't tapping into the chip's full potential.

It would appear that Honor's not stretching the Snapdragon chip's CPU to its maximum potential, with both the Galaxy and the Pixel beating its Geekbench CPU benchmark scores. However, the Magic V3 does very well on the 3DMark GPU test, scoring higher than any of the other phones here.

Despite some underwhelming results, gaming on the Magic V3 still feels great, provided you don't mind the unusual aspect ratio when playing on the inner screen. Genshin Impact at high settings at 30 frames per second didn't tax the Magic V3 much, but at 60 fps, you can feel the phone heat up quickly, even if it can still keep up with the action at that speed.

Honor packed 12GB of RAM into the Magic V3, on par with rival foldables. But the single 512GB storage option is a generous basic spec, since 256GB is the standard amount offered by the Samsung and Google foldable base models. It would be awesome if Honor also offered a cheaper 256GB model, though, to make the phone more attractively priced, or a 1TB version for users who want even more space for their files and apps.

Honor Magic V3 review: Battery and charging

Honor overshadows the battery capacity of its rivals with a split 5,150 mAh silicon-carbon battery, the material allowing greater density and therefore smaller overall battery sizes compared to regular lithium cells.

This sophisticated battery drained by 20% after playing a YouTube video at 1080p for 3 hours on the Magic V3 inner display at 50% brightness. The Galaxy Z Fold 6 drained by 18% on the same test, while the Google Pixel 9 Pro Fold lost 21% of its maximum charge. The Samsung foldable has smaller displays and battery than the more similarly-sized Honor and Google models, but it's not that far ahead of what seems to be the par score for foldables in this test.

The Magic V3 is equipped with 66W wired charging, with the brick still supplied in the box. 50W wireless charging is on offer too, if you buy a separate Honor-made stand. 

The 66W charger managed to fill the phone to 36% full after 15 minutes plugged-in and 67% after 30 minutes, reaching 100% at the 54-minute mark. The Galaxy Z Fold 6 and Google Pixel 9 Pro Fold reached 56% and 47% respectively in charging testing, with the OnePlus Open reaching 85% after half an hour with its 67W charger.

Honor Magic V3 review : Software and special features

The Android 14-based MagicOS 8.0.1 brings us typical Honor features and style whether the Magic V3 is open or closed. The large inner display works especially well with MagicOS's unique widgets and large folders, and helps deal with the default app drawer-less home screen layout.

While clearly derived from the iPhone's Dynamic Island, the MagicCapsule is still handy. It's a persistent UI element that lets you quickly return to your currently playing track or video or a running timer. But unlike Dynamic Island, MagicCapsule is quite unintrusive since it can live fully in the top bar of the Android interface rather than sitting around a Face ID cutout.

AI naturally makes an appearance in the Magic V3's headline software features. For instance, Magic Portal provides the ability to drag text and images to relevant apps that pop up on the side of your screen, such as Google Lens or Maps, or Gmail for sending your findings on to another user. Compatibility is mixed outside of the standard Google apps, but that still offers a lot of easily accessible utility, even compared to the standard copy/open relevant app/paste routine.

The Magic V3 offers more AI via Google Cloud, such as its AI Eraser feature. Compared to the Pixel 9 Pro Fold and Galaxy Z Fold 6's own photo erasers, the Magic V3 took the longest to process my sample photo, but the resulting attempt to remove two people walking in front of Duomo di Milano is arguably cleaner than the Galaxy Z Fold 6's attempt, despite the weird pink artefact that's appeared. If that could be removed, it would be on the same level as the Pixel 9 Pro Fold's version.

As well as these features, you get a Face to Face Translation app that lets you use both displays to converse more easily with someone in a different language, similar to what Samsung and Google offer on their own foldables. Meanwhile Honor's Notes app also gets voice-to-text, live translation and user ID abilities that helps reduce the chance of background noise interfering with your transcribing by locking onto your voice alone.

Honor's current update policy for its phones delivers three years of major Android updates and five years of security updates. That's not a great offer given Google and Samsung both provide seven years of full updates, and even the OnePlus Open gets four years and five years of mainline and security updates, respectively.

Honor Magic V3 review: Verdict

I've fallen for the Honor Magic V3 in a way that I didn't for previous Honor foldables, despite their overall quality. This is a seriously good foldable, which makes it even worse that it's not available in the U.S.

The Google Pixel 9 Pro Fold, which prioritizes usability and design polish in a similar way to the Magic V3,  is the closest equivalent to the Honor foldable for American buyers. The Galaxy Z Fold 6 and its AI and stylus support could also appeal to users who want a pocketable productivity machine, even if the hardware's getting a bit stale. The OnePlus Open, despite being a year old, remains a better foldable overall thanks to its aggressive pricing, strong design and ingenious approach to multitasking.

But the Honor Magic V3 excels with its record-breakingly thin design, meeting the goal of a foldable that's easy to use both folded or unfolded with great displays inside and out. Even if it's still behind on photography, software updates and some aspects of its performance, the Magic V3 could still be the foldable that turns you into a folding phone believer, were you to give it a chance.

Honor is set to redefine smartphone display technology while tackling one of the most pressing issues of our digital — eye strain. 

The upcoming Magic v3 handset, set to be revealed at IFA 2024, will include the industry-first Honor AI Defocus display. This was first revealed earlier this year and makes use of on-device AI technology to adjust the display after prolonged use.

The display technology uses AI algorithms to replicate the function of traditional optical methods in specialized eyewear. 

The aim, according to Honor, is to reduce eye strain and fight off transient myopia, or nearsightedness, a condition believed to come from prolonged screen exposure.

How does the Magic v3 reduce eye strain?

Defocus signals are embedded into display layers, effectively reducing stress on the eyes for users and providing a far more comfortable viewing experience.

According to Honor the display and AI model combination can reduce near work-induced transient myopia by an average of 13 degrees after just 25 minutes of use.

Myopia is an increasing problem globally due to increases in screen time. At its core, AI Defocus display technology helps to eliminate the elongation of the eye that eventually causes myopia with DIMS or, defocus incorporates multiple segments.

During testing, it was found that the display technology led to an increase in central choroid thickness. This is an indicator of eye strain, as well as other eye health conditions, and can be caused by screen usage.

At the moment, AI Defocus technology supports popular apps like YouTube and Amazon Kindle, which means users can comfortably enjoy their favorite content for longer periods of time without suffering eye strain. 

Honor says it plans to support more applications in the future. Beyond that, the Honor Magic V3 also offers ultra-high PWM dimming. This is a technology that radically reduces screen flicker for enhanced eye protection. 

These industry-leading features highlight the company's commitment to using technology to improve the health of its users. Honor describes the Magic V3 as a device that not only delivers in performance but also well-being.

How big of a problem is myopia?

According to findings from the National Institutes of Health, half the world's population will be affected by myopia by 2050. 

Over the past few decades as computer use and then phone use have increased, there has been a global rise in cases of nearsightedness. This is caused by prolonged near focus — time looking at a screen from a short distance — over time it causes the eyeball to elongate and lead to myopia.

One solution open to optometrists' when dealing with myopia is to have patients wear defocus glasses. These utilize specialized lenses to create intentional defocus in front of the retina and trigger a visual induction signal. 

If you suffer from eye strain while using a smartphone, especially if much of your time is spent on YouTube or the Amazon Kindle app, then you might want to consider the Honor Magic v3 when it is released.

More from Tom's Guide

• I finally found a good use for foldable screen laptops
• I didn't get the hype around foldable phones, but the Galaxy Z Fold 5 changed my mind — here's why
• Forget pricey flagships — this could be the year of the sub-$500 foldable phones

Have you ever found yourself struggling to focus on the phone screen or feeling eyestrain due to spending too long scrolling through TikTok? Honor, the Chinese phone giant says it has a solution to this problem and it comes in the form of an on-device AI model.

Honor has unveiled its AI Defocus Eye Protection technology at MWC Shanghai. This utilizes on-device AI models to relieve common eye problems associated with screen use such as myopia (nearsightedness).

It works by leveraging AI to simulate defocus glasses on the phone screen. Part of a growing trend of using AI for health. Originally designed to correct nearsightedness in children, in adults defocus glasses have been shown to enhance focus, prevent eye fatigue and improve comfort while using a screen.

The company also released a new deep fake detection technology that can warn users if AI filters are being used on video calls or in messages. Combined these form part of a new approach from Honor in creating a human-AI synergy through on-device technology.

How can AI help with eye strain?

Over the past few decades as computer use and then phone use have increased, there has been a global rise in cases of nearsightedness. This is caused by prolonged near focus — time looking at a screen from a short distance — over time it causes the eyeball to elongate and lead to myopia.

Children are given defocusing glasses when young to reverse myopia but in adults the same glasses can help ease the symptoms and limit the impact of using a screen for long periods.

According to Honor their technology leverages AI to simulate defocus glasses on the display by inducing controlled defocus in the user’s peripheral visual field. This effect “creates an altered visual perception that slows down the eye elongation process, which leads to nearsightedness.”

The company says its technique has already shown to reduce users’ transient myopia by 13 degrees on average after reading for 25 minutes, with some users experiencing a maximum reduction of 75 degrees.

“AI is revolutionizing our lives and driving the smartphone industry forward, but much of the industry has focused on cloud-based AI, which is just a part of the puzzle. On-device AI, which is run on smartphones that understand us better than any other devices, is uniquely positioned to deliver services that are tailored to us and our preferences,” said George Zhao, Honor CEO.

Using AI to detect deepfakes

Deepfakes are a growing problem in the age of AI, with scammers using it to hide their appearance or voice in calls, or even make themselves look like someone else.

Some of this can be tackled using cloud AI models and labeling but, according to Honor the best approach is to utilize on-device models. 

The Honor approach works by examining frame-by-frame information such as eye contact, lighting, image clarity and video playback and uses that to identify flaws that are imperceptible to the human eyes. 

The company also trained through a large dataset of videos and images linked to online scams which helped the local model make those predictions. 

It essentially performs screening and comparison within three seconds of a call starting. “If synthetic or altered content is detected by the feature, a risk warning is immediately issued to the user, deterring them from continued engagement with the potential scammers for their safety,” the company explained.

More from Tom's Guide

• I finally found a good use for foldable screen laptops
• I didn't get the hype around foldable phones, but the Galaxy Z Fold 5 changed my mind — here's why
• Forget pricey flagships — this could be the year of the sub-$500 foldable phones

The freshly-announced Honor 200 series, featuring the Honor 200 Pro and 200 Lite, is a series of Android phones with their sights set on beating the best cheap phones, and the best Android phones overall. Google and Samsung should be taking notes.

While previous Honor "N-series" phones like the Honor 90 have targeted phone buyers on a budget, the 200 series' launch marks first time we've got a Pro version in Europe (still no U.S. version of either phone sadly). Armed with several premium features, this particular model wants to undercut entry-level flagship phones like the Galaxy S24 or Google Pixel 8 while offering more in certain areas. 

You can read more about these phones below, but if you're already sold on this offer, then the Honor 200 and 200 Pro models are up for sale today from Honor itself, and on general pre-order and sale from 21st and 26th of June respectively.

The basic 200 will sell for £500, the same as the Google Pixel 8a and a little more than the Samusung Galaxy A55. The Pro meanwhile is going for £699, giving it a sub-flagship pricing like the Pixel 8 or OnePlus 12R. As for the Lite, it starts at £279, making it an even better budget option for those who need it.

Honor 200 series specs

Honor 200 Pro cameras

While the 200 and 200 Lite look like formidable phones in their own right, the 200 Pro is understandably the star of the series. And its focus is its cameras, specifically for taking portrait mode shots.

The Honor 200 Pro features a 50MP main camera (with a large 1/1.3-inch sensor) and a 50MP 2.5x telephoto camera to help you with your portrait photography. That's joined by a 12MP ultrawide camera on the back, plus a 50MP selfie camera too for when you need to take front-facing photos. The inclusion of a telephoto camera is notable since its two main rivals from Google and OnePlus don't carry one.

These portrait photos will benefit from Honor's collaboration with French photographers Studio Harcourt, with the two companies designing an "AI Portrait Engine" together, designed to help you get you attractive, dramatic-looking portraits. There are also Harcourt Vibrant, Color and Classic modes to use when taking portraits that will add unique color profiles, including the studio's signature black-and-white style.

Honor 200 Pro design and display

Honor's given the 200 series a unique look with its oblong-shaped camera block and combination of glossy and wavy matte textures on its back. And the selection of Moonlight White, Ocean Cyan or Black colorways is a small but attractive set of options.

The 200 Pro is rated IP65 for protection against dust and water, but it's a bit behind the competition. Admittedly the OnePlus 12R only has an IP64 rating, but the Pixel 8a and Galaxy A55 both managed an IP67 rating for improved water resistance, while the Galaxy S24 offers the the flagship-standard of IP68.

In typical Honor style, the 200 Pro features a big and bright 6.78-inch OLED display, rated by the company as being capable of 4,000 nits peak brightness. Also like Honor's Magic6 Pro, the 200 Pro uses a quad-curved display, which may sound like a nightmare to anyone who has trouble with the typical left/right curved edges of some flagship phones, but does mean the phone's comfy to hold upright or sideways.

Honor's usual set of eye health features when it comes to the display are present on this phone too. This includes abilities like 3840Hz PWM Dimming for less eye-straining flickering, and Natural Tone, Adaptive Dimming and Circadian Night Display to adjust the screen's colors depending on surrounding brightness levels, phone usage patterns the time of day.

Honor 200 Pro Specs

The silicon center of the Honor 200 Pro is a Snapdragon 8s Gen 3 chipset, an up-and-coming chip designed to bring top-notch AI to less expensive phones. It's not going to outperform the standard Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 seen in this year's best Android phones, but it should offer all the power you could need for daily activities.

Honor's latest MagicOS 8.0 software, based on Android 14, provides the interface. It's being promoted on its AI features like instant search and navigation results by dragging elements to different apps via the Magic Portal feature, and accessing the phone's apps and files on Honor laptops and tablets through the power of its Magic Ring cross-device abilities. It also contains Honor's take on the iPhone 15's Dynamic Island with its Magic Capsule's persistent notifications and widgets for in-use apps.

Currently Honor offers four years of full software updates for its phones, plus a fifth year of security updates only. Google's seven-year update schedule for the Pixel 8a dwarfs this, but that's the exception rather than the rule at this price point.

A large 5,200 mAh battery provides the necessary juice for the Honor 200 Pro to work, and is refillable with zippy 100W wired and 66W wireless charging options. We're also happy to see that the 200 Pro comes with 12GB RAM and 512GB storage by default, a generous amount of memory compared to rival phones' base specs.

Honor 200 Outlook

We're already impressed by the Honor 200 Pro's photography abilities in our hands-on review, though it's got a lot more testing before we come to a full conclusion.

But already we know that like with previous Honor phones, U.S. users have no choice but to look past it. Unless you want to go through the trouble of importing a global version instead of just picking up one of the best cheap phones already available in your country.

For me in the U.K however, the Honor 200 and especially the Honor 200 Pro occupy interesting spots in the phone market. The Google Pixel 8a and Samsung Galaxy A55 are great budget phone options, but make sacrifices in areas like cameras, battery size and display that the Honor 200 does not. Same goes for the Honor 200 Pro versus the Pixel 8 and OnePlus 12R, only with the cameras as well as the above three points, and a pricetag that makes the Galaxy S24 look a little overpriced.

Honor's always been competitive in the mid to upper tiers of the smartphone market, and the Honor 200 series looks like its most convincing effort at being a Samsung, OnePlus or Google alternative yet. But stay tuned for a full review to back that all up.

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Over the past few weeks, I’ve been using the new Honor 200 Pro. While this premium Android phone has all the features you’d expect, what blew me away was the quality of the camera and the subtle but powerful use of artificial intelligence present throughout the device.

Many of us take photography for granted. We capture a quick snap on our phone without any real thought of the artistry or potential of the form. Speed matters over quality. But Studio Harcourt in Paris, Honor's camera partners for the 200 series, is the antithesis of that idea. 

This French portrait photography house has captured some of the most famous faces of the past 90 years, and has created a house style that utilizes light in such a way that it gives the resulting portraits a sense of depth and of dimensionality. It was this expertise Honor turned to in creating its camera software, and the reason why I keep going back to take portrait mode photos again and again.

Honor 200 Pro specs

AI-powered photos

The artificial intelligence used to power AI Portrait Engine was trained on the tens of thousands of images taken by Studio Harcourt over 91 years. It formats the image as you take it based on the lighting settings of a Studio Harcourt session, then continues to improve it using AI after the fact.

This utilizes similar generative AI techniques found in image generators, but focuses specifically on improving the image taken by the phone, enhancing it to match one of three Harcourt-based styles better.

During a tour of the Studio Harcourt facility, I had the chance to first try the phone out in the actual photography studio, complete with tens of thousands of pounds worth of studio lights, and then again in a normally lit room but utilizing the new generative AI filter.

I was shocked at how well the non-studio image came out. Don’t get me wrong, having a professional lighting array is a bonus and can create something spectacular, but Honor seems to have captured the essence of that setup without the expense or time with the 200 Pro's camera.

Comparing it to the iPhone camera

The result of all of this AI and expert control of the settings is a smartphone camera, unlike anything I’ve tried before. It leaves the Portrait mode of my iPhone 14 Pro Max, which in itself is already pretty good, looking like a child’s toy.

As an Apple fanboy with every iPhone since the 3GS (I couldn’t get the earlier versions as I lived on a small island at the time and it wasn’t available), this discovery was surprising to say the least. I like the way the iPhone camera works, and I like Apple’s use of AI to enhance images without making a big deal out of it 

But Honor's managed to match, or even beat this, with a phone that costs £400 less than my iPhone did. Honor's also managed to capture that “just works” workflow that makes iPhones so nice to use. Part of that is definitely because it's trying to match the iPhone camera interface very closely, but original or not, it certainly works well.

Honor 200 Pro: The rest of the package

The Honor 200 Pro's an attractive package, even when setting its photo abilities aside. The 6.78-inch handset with its quad-curved OLED display feels nice in my hand, with a two-texture back and a uniquely-shaped camera block, inspired by the atrium of the Casa Mila in Barcelona, Spain.

It uses a Snapdragon 8s Gen 3 chip and an Android 14-based interface to run things, with Honor's MagicOS 8.0 software adding onboard AI models to better predict your needs as you make use of the phone. Thanks to features like Magic Portal, which pops up apps and services you're likely to use when selecting things like an image of a product or an address, the OS helps speed up common tasks in a way more natural than I’ve otherwise seen.

But the biggest selling point is still the camera. Even ignoring the impressive Studio Harcourt portrait mode and “beauty filters”, it has a level of controllability I wish Apple would adopt.

I likely won’t switch to the Honor 200 Pro as my only phone as I’m embedded in the Apple ecosystem, but this will certainly be a device I’d keep around as my photography phone. Stay tuned for our full review, where we'll be able to tell you if the cameras, and the rest, still stack up after further testing.

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During a recent conference I was given a demonstration and overview of the Chinese phone manufacturer Honor’s approach to artificial intelligence and it made perfect sense — eventually.

The company spoke about 4-layers of AI, with each layer representing different parts of the system. Diving into this with CEO George Zhao during a press conference, it was clear the plan is to create a sustainable approach to AI for a whole device ecosystem.

It puts local AI, which is fast and secure but not as powerful, at the heart of the system to ensure data is secure, then turns to a range of cloud offerings to handle compute-hungry services. In addition, this would allow other devices such as earbuds, watches or smart glasses to share that secure, local data processing.

This is very similar to the approach I suspect we’ll see from Apple given the rumors and research papers published over the past year. We won’t know for certain until WWDC but I suspect Tim Cook will unveil on-device for personal data, and cloud for complex tasks.

How does this approach to AI work?

The idea is that anything that can be done on the device should be done on the device. Then, anything that can’t be done locally should first have data secured by on-device models.

Applications make use of a range of locally running AI models, including ones for specific tasks like image editing, data analysis and transcription. Rumors suggest Siri 2.0 will act as the hub for Apple in all things AI, even able to dive into apps and perform tasks automatically.

This level of deep integration, which Honor announced at Viva Tech in France as its 4-layer system, allows for flexibility in terms of which models or providers to use and gives developers more choice over how to integrate AI into apps.

Honor says its system will also allow its MagicOS to adapt to the user, presenting the right apps at the right time and adapting functionality depending on frequency of use.

What are the Honor 4-layers

Zhao says the approach they’ve taken to AI is designed to be a beacon to the wider industry and that they will be open to partnerships. For example, at the cloud level, the partnership is with Google Cloud rather than for Gemini specifically. This means they can utilize any AI product available as part of Google Cloud, including Claude 3.

The main focus though is on ensuring data doesn’t go off the device unless absolutely necessary. Through a series of small language models built by Honor, they manage personal information and perform actions on the device first, including securing the data.

The CEO gave the example of taking a financial report and wanting AI to provide analysis. Some of this can be performed on a device; then abstracted data, minus the sensitive information, is sent to the cloud for more complex calculations and analysis.

The four layers sound like something Apple would make, focusing on security and privacy at a local level and working with a range of partners for the cloud. I think Apple is also likely to have its own models for set tasks. We’ve seen some of this coming out from Apple Research already.

We won’t know what Apple will do around AI until WWDC or how far the split between local and cloud services will go — especially given the partnership with OpenAI — but I think Honor has given us some indication of what we can expect.

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Honor has announced a new foldable clamshell in the Honor Magic V Flip. It’s a device that is supposed to feature a huge external display, perhaps larger than 4-inches, which would make it bigger than the upcoming Motorola Razr+ 2024. 

The initial announcement was spotted by Phone Arena on the Chinese social media platform Weibo. Officially, Honor will be unveiling the Magic V Flip on June 13 in Shanghai the 2024 Technology Fashion Show.

This timing could steal a little bit of thunder from the Galaxy Z Flip 6, which is rumored to launch at the Galaxy Unpacked event on July 10. 

The initial announcement doesn’t have any specifications but Honor did put up a reservation page on their Chinese site. It does have a couple of specs that we can see.

The Magic V Flip will be available in Black, Champagne and White. And it looks like it will come in three storage sizes all with 12GB of RAM; 256GB, 512GB and 1TB.

But that’s about it. Again, there are rumors that the exterior display will be larger than 4 inches. Though that doesn’t indicate what the main display will be. Other rumors include a 4,500 mAh battery and 66W fast charging.

The Galaxy Z Flip 6 is tipped to feature a 3.9-inch external display, which would be a major upgrade from the 3.4-inch cover screen on the Galaxy Z Flip 5. 

Honor has been expanding globally, so we expect the Magic V Flip will make its way out of China soon after Honor’s announcement.

Earlier this year, we took a look at the Honor Magic V2, a great foldable phone that should have come out earlier, mostly due to the large asking price.

Honor phones are expensive, so we expect the Magic V Flip will be pricey as well.

During the same week, Honor is launching the Honor 200 and 200 Pro. Though, it might not be part of the Shanghai Fashion show. The 200 and 200 Pro are supposed to feature Honor’s foray into 4-layer generative AI. It’ll be interesting to see if all of Honor’s forthcoming phones get these AI features or if they keep the tools to the 200 series.

Honor’s 4-layer AI is supposed to be on-device, so the new Magic V Flip might not be powerful enough to handle the feature. Hopefully, Honor will provide more technical specifications during the June 13 reveal.

We’ll keep an eye out for Honor’s announcement and update you as the new phone debuts.

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At VivaTech in Europe this week, Chinese phone manufacturer Honor announced the release date of its new 200 series phones and its own 4-layer AI architecture that will be used in the latest devices. 

The Honor 200 and 200 Pro, which will launch globally on June 12, will be the first devices from Honor with the new 4-layer generative AI. 

This is not Honor's first foray into AI. Earlier this year at MWC 2024, Honor showed off its MagicRing system, similar to Apple's Continuity feature. MagicRing allows users to use a phone as an additional window or as a tablet. Honor also showed off a tool they call Magic Portal, which tries to guess which app a user might want to share content through. 

The 4-layer AI architecture Honor announced works like this. The first layer is cross-device and cross-operating system AI that allows computing power and services to be shared among devices and operating systems. 

Level two is a platform AI that features intent-based human-computer interaction, which enables personalized operating systems and resource allocation. It sounds like upgraded versions of MagicRing and Magic Portal. 

The third layer of this architecture is app-focused and meant to encourage generative AI applications. 

The final and fourth layers are Cloud-AI services, which utilize the cloud to perform specific AI experiences. This is similar to how Google and OpenAI use the cloud to run Gemini and ChatGPT functions. 

The critical part of this announcement is the focus on on-device AI. Most prominent companies running AI are zoomed in on cloud services. On-device AI services tend to be separate tiny language models that do specific tasks. How robust will this 4-layer architecture be if cloud access is gone? 

"At HONOR, we firmly believe that, by combining the power of on-device AI's personalization, intuitiveness, and privacy protection, everyone can harness the full potential of AI safely and securely," said George Zhao, CEO of Honor, in a press release. "We are also delighted to forge ahead with Google Cloud, leveraging our combined expertise to unlock the potential of this hybrid approach, delivering even more seamless AI experiences to our users."

As part of the AI push, Honor also revealed a collaboration with Harcourt Studio. The Parisian photography studio is known for black-and-white portraiture. Honor claims that with this partnership, they have distilled the Harcourt Studio style into algorithms that the 200 series phones can replicate.

Honor claims to have broken the portrait photography process into nine distinct steps. This breakdown enables the 200 series phones to faithfully recreate the Harcourt method and promises studio-quality portraits.

Despite the Honor 200 and 200 Pro debuting in June, there isn't much out there in terms of specs. Even the pre-order page on Honor's Chinese website has nothing. We know that the phones will feature Magic OS 8.0, and one leak suggests that the phones will have a 50MP primary camera, but that's about it.

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Long-teased and long-hyped, the Honor Magic6 RSR is now here, offering a sportier, more luxurious version of the excellent Magic6 Pro. And oddly, there may be something here for average phone buyers outside of fans of Porsche Design-branded ware.

You'll have to get over the sticker shock first. The Magic6 RSR, which goes on sale May 2, costs £1,600. That's £500 more than the standard Magic6 Pro, and just £150 less than a Galaxy Z Fold 5 in the U.K.

Honor launched an RSR variant of its Magic V2 foldable earlier this year, which changed little other than the design and storage capacity. But there's more to see in the Magic6 RSR, where Honor has tweaked some of the standard Pro model's other specs to make a phone that's arguably another full tier on the Magic6 series, rather than a simple luxury edition of the phone.

To see what difference having the Porsche Design touch has made, I tried out the Magic6 RSR and its altered features against the familiar Magic6 Pro. And there is indeed more to this phone than just its new outfit, even if it's hard to notice at times. But whether it's worth the extra money is another matter entirely.

Design

The Magic6 Pro strikes the right balance between subtle and shouty design, with its wavy vegan leather back and watch face-like camera block in the top center of the phone. The Magic6 RSR meanwhile goes for a sportier look that's more likely to draw eyes, and maybe even compliments.

It starts with a choice of two exclusive colors either Agate Gray or Frozen Berry pink. That's applied to a smooth–textured back panel with a mean-looking hexagonal camera array, ringed in trendy titanium. From there, a central "flyline" ridge heads from the block's bottom corner down to the phone's bottom edge, featuring the Honor and Porsche Design logos on either side.

From the front and around the sides, there's nothing to help you tell the RSR and Pro models apart, at least not with the screen on. Honor has tweaked its MagicOS interface to make the logos match the color of the phone, and added some custom boot-up and charging animations on top. None of this was present when I first set up the phone, so I was initially very disappointed to see the familiar green wavy background and regular app icons, but now everything's been tweaked to be jet black with gold highlights, the phone feels as unique as you'd hope from a special edition device.

The package

A special edition phone would not be special if it didn't come in a fancy box, and sure enough the Magic6 RSR comes in a jet-black, two-layered presentation box. Inside the box, as well as the phone, there are two chargers (one European, one U.K. in my case) and two USB-A to USB-C cables, so you can get the full 100W charging experience more easily when traveling. 

You'll also find a custom SIM tool and a luxurious leather-likecase with a fabric interior and stitched exterior design. 

It's not the most sumptuous selection of goodies, but it at least is all useful. The default Magic6 Pro doesn't even come with one charger, let alone two.

More RAM and storage

Honor doubled both the RAM and storage of the Magic6 Pro to give the RSR model 24GB and 1TB respectively. But with the same Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset still on board, how much difference does that make?

Looking to the benchmarks, the answer appears to be a little, but not too much. The Geekbench CPU result is noticeably lower on the Magic6 RSR than it is on the Pro, which is odd since both use the same chip. However the RSR does score a small win on the 3DMark GPU test. 

Also, it should go without saying that 1TB of storage is a huge amount for a phone. The 512GB of the Magic6 Pro was already roomy, but you needn't fear running out of room on the Magic6 RSR any time soon. 

Cameras

Honor touts two main camera upgrades for the Magic6 RSR over the Magic6 Pro. The first of these is improved LiDAR autofocus for quickly homing in on the subject of an image. This is hard to demonstrate, but trying both phones side by side, I could definitely tap to switch between subjects in the viewfinder faster on the RSR than on the Pro.

The other is improved HDR in photos, which ensures more of the range of colors in an image, from the brightest whites to the darkest blacks, are all captured and displayed properly. While there is a difference when you compare the shots, it's subtle, and hard to see you're looking at a photo normally and not trying to play spot the difference.

Overall the RSR's photos are a little darker, and its exposure times are faster when you pull up the images' metadata. Both of these are presumably to keep the brightest parts of an image in check, allowing them to render as a color other than pure white, which is what HDR is all about.

Display

The last main upgrade area for the Porsche edition phone over the standard one is its screen. First off, the Magic6 RSR's display is rated at 5,000 nits for peak HDR brightness, the same as the Magic6 Pro, but a higher 1,800-nit global peak brightness, compared to the Pro's 1,600 nits. It's easily visible when you hold the phones side-by-side.

The RSR edition also features a dual-layer OLED panel (explained in this rumor story about future iPads using the tech), which Honor states is an industry-first use of the feature. It's something that will apparently give the screen greater power efficiency and a longer life span. Sadly I can't time travel, so can't tell you if this is true or not, but it sounds like a good addition for users who want to keep their new phone for as long as possible before their next upgrade.

So is it worth it?

To my surprise, there there are more meaningful differences between the Magic6 RSR and the Magic6 Pro than just the look of the two phones, although it's questionable whether the increase in price is worth it for the minor gains.

A quicker-focusing camera that can handle lighting better, a display that's brighter and longer-lasting, extra storage and RAM capacity and a thoughtful bundle of included accessories are all good things to have when comparing a top-tier phone to the next model down in its line. A unique look is arguably worthwhile too, if only for bragging rights. But at £500 over the standard edition, that's some expensive gloating you'll be doing.

The Honor Magic6 Pro is quite easy to recommend (unless you're in the U.S. where it isn't sold), so if this feature's piqued your interest, it's the one you should go looking for now. The Magic6 RSR meanwhile is certainly a good phone, but you're going to have to be the rare sort of person who's willing to pay for exclusivity to feel like you're getting your money's worth.

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Honor has made some pretty forgettable laptops over the past few years, but all that has changed with the MagicBook Pro 16 — something I found out when using it as my daily driver instead of the M3 Pro MacBook Pro.

When it comes to taking aim at one of the kings of laptops in the form of Apple’s aluminum slab, you have to nail three things: design and ergonomics, screen and speakers, and great performance with power efficiency. It’s a tall order, but Honor comes so close to the point that by finding a fine balance between sleek stylings, pure power and (interestingly) gaming prowess.

This 16-inch machine manages to tick off most of these criteria, thanks to the Intel Core Ultra 7 and RTX 4060 pairing inside, a fantastic keyboard, a bright and vivid 16-inch 3K panel with 165Hz refresh rate, alongside some of the best speakers I’ve heard outside of a MacBook Pro.

That’s not to say everything can stand up to the Cupertino crew — some of it is a double-edged sword. That 115W TDP gives you solid performance, even during more intense workloads, but that 75Wh battery gets drained fast. In white with those dynamic edges, this laptop looks seriously sleek…well it would if the lid didn’t stain so easily. Seriously, I’m a clean freak and that slight yellowing was already present when I received this system.

Then there’s the webcam, which I’ve become accustomed to the inevitability of each tiny shooter atop a laptop looking like a potato, no matter how much AI you throw at it. But with these issues in mind, it’s clear that Honor has taken a giant step in the right direction. The MagicBook Pro 16 is not quite there in proving to be the MacBook Pro’s ultimate foe, but there’s a lot to love.

Honor MagicBook Pro 16: Cheat Sheet

• What is it? This is a powerful multi-purpose laptop — nailing prosumer work, AAA gaming and content consumption.
• Who is it for? I’d recommend this for creative pros with the power under the hood, but those gaming credentials could make it a good option for the players as well.
• What does it cost? We don’t know the global pricing as of yet, but we can make some conclusions based on the cost in the Chinese market. With a base model with Intel Core Ultra 5 at CNY 8,999 ($1,250 / £1,000), and the model we tested priced at CNY 9,999 ( $1,400 / £1,100), this could come in rather competitively.
• What do we like? It performs well, feels great to type on and has a stellar display/speaker combo for all your streaming/gaming needs.
• What don’t we like? The battery life isn’t too hot when under pressure, the webcam is dull, and that white finish of the lid stains easily.

Honor MagicBook Pro 16: Specs

Honor MagicBook Pro 16: The ups

So we’ve got quite a lot to unpack here, because the MagicBook Pro 16 can be a lot of things to a lot of people — be it creative professionals, multitasking magicians or even gaming gurus.

Display + speakers = <3

It all starts with probably the most potent combination of the whole laptop — a divine display and stellar speakers (I promise I’ll stop with the alliteration now). 

Up top, the 16-inch 16:10 display sounds relatively standard with IPS LCD tech, but the colors are really well balanced to inspire confidence in any and all of your creative work accuracy, while bringing out the vividity of any games you throw at it. Plus the strong 500 nits of brightness with that matte coating atop makes it easy to read in bright lighting conditions.

Oh, and I almost forgot to mention the buttery smooth 165Hz refresh rate. Of course this can be most easily spotted in games running with that slickness you know and love from some of the best gaming laptops, but even in your day-to-day, your eyes will thank you for the increased fluidity.

And then we turn our attention to the Honor Spatial Audio system — a combination of six speakers to make this the first Windows laptop to sport this technology. 

While the actual surround effect is kind of a dubious claim, what this bunch of tweeters and a subwoofer actually achieve is a sound quality that practically matches my MacBook Pro in terms of impressive details in the highs and mids, along with a nice bassy warmth. While there may be small ways to improve this (i.e. giving us an OLED display), the formula on offer here makes this a mightily satisfying machine for content consumption.

Solid all-round performer

This is backed up by surprisingly good performance. Not that Honor has shocked the world here — the Intel Core Ultra 7 155H, RTX 4060 and 32GB of DDR5 RAM means this was always going to be quite the speed demon. But rather that this configuration and the high 115W TDP gives it more of an edge in gaming than you might think.

Outside of the MacBook Pro, I’d say the MagicBook Pro 16’s closest competition is the Samsung Galaxy Book 4 Ultra and, well, Honor comes real close to its more expensive brethren and in some circumstances, manages to absolutely trounce it. 

Of course this comes at the expense of battery life (more on that later), but my theory is since the Intel Core Ultra 9 and RTX 4070 of the 4 Ultra is stuck to 80W TDP, whereas Honor’s machine can go up to 115W; a lot more performance is extracted from these components.

Nothing from Intel is going to touch what the M3 line of silicon is capable of, but for the greater amount of things you can do on a Windows machine, alongside the simply salivating price-to-performance ratio of the MagicBook Pro 16, Honor has blindsided us with a real beast whatever you throw at it.

Stellar ergonomics for productivity

Then, you get to work on this machine, and you’re greeted by a generously-sized keyboard with a number pad. The 1.5mm key depth of these tactile switches makes every keystroke feel intentful, and you’ll love gliding across this board if you’re a fast typer. The subtle backlighting gives everything a nice, calm glow when working (or playing) at night, and even though this is a plastic construction, there’s none of that giveaway bend to the top deck that can distract you with a cheap, tacky feel.

Complimenting that is a vast touchpad with a lovely smooth surface that has a subtle friction to give you more precise control. I would’ve preferred to see a vibration-driven click like with the Force Touch trackpad on the MacBook Pro — instead you’ve got your standard bottom left and right clicks here. But the snappiness of said clicks is enough to forgive this missing element.

Once you get into your flow, the Honor MagicBook Pro 16 stays right there with you.

Honor MagicBook Pro 16: The downs

Given the pricing of this machine, Honor has made some difficult decisions — going in hard on certain aspects to tell the story of who this laptop should be for, while making compromises elsewhere. One thing, however, is a bit of an own goal.

More off-white than the family computer

You know the kind I’m talking about, right? Either that or I’m showing my age real bad here. The off white family computer that took pride of place in the living room — ready for you to play a ton of flash games and downloading “LiNkInGpArK-nUmB.exe” on Limewire for the impending wave of 24 viruses.

The pure white finish of the Honor MagicBook Pro 16 reminds me of those days, and not in a good way, as that lid can pick up discoloration so fast. By the way, this is coming from a clean freak. There ain’t no way I’m approaching this machine with a snack in hand, and still you can see the slight yellowing on the lid.

Let me be clear. This is not a beef about the physical design. I love the sharp edges with that brushed metal sheen, along with the sensible port arrangement that keeps your desk tidy. But some sort of color treatment is desperately needed to avoid it losing its white glow, and without it, you’re just left feeling a little let down.

Webcam could be better

Not much to say here. The 1080p camera doesn’t really feel like FHD, as pictures feel a little mushy in quality, and really ramp up the noise when lighting conditions go anywhere less than perfect.

Plus, it’s not the most helpful potato of a camera either, as no IR functionality means Windows Hello is limited to the fingerprint sensor. It is a fast one, though, but face scanning would’ve been far quicker.

Battery life is a letdown

We don’t have lab tested battery life scores yet, but I always expected this — looking at the max TDP and the size of that 75Wh cell inside. Something’s got to give, and it is the battery life. When just going casual with your usage, you can make it through a whole working day with roughly 10% left. But if your workload includes anything more than just a couple tabs on Chrome, make sure you have that beefy charger handy to keep it topped up.

Then when you throw a demanding game like Cyberpunk 2077 at it, you’ll be lucky to make it past an hour. I understand the choice being made here to lean into performance, but hopefully with the continual improvement of power efficiency in these chips and a larger cell in the next gen system, we can get past this. Either that or more immediately, some sort of more granular controls on the system wattage may be a good workaround.

Honor MagicBook Pro 16: Verdict

And that is the tale of one of the more surprising laptops of 2024 — one that shows Honor finally getting its groove in the notebook space. If the Galaxy Book 4 Ultra is Tony Polanco’s new favorite Windows laptop, the MagicBook Pro 16 is the cost effective alternative.

Because sure, when compared to my M3 Pro MacBook Pro, there are some key things missing like a premium aluminum unibody, lightning quick performance, and the legendary battery life. 

But Honor’s goal is to be all things to all people — a potent prosumer device by day, and a powerful entertainment machine by night. And you know what? I think with the issues taken into account, I think the team have only gone and cracked it.

I remain skeptical of the way artificial intelligence has been used recently in smartphones. AI and machine learning have been present in phones for years already, helping manage and improve phone performance in all kinds of areas. But lately, AI has stepped into the spotlight as the selling point of choice for the Samsung Galaxy S24 and Google Pixel 8, and possibly the iPhone 16 later this year.

But to me, many of the ways that this AI surfaces involves gimmicks. That's not to say that things like generative image editing or live in-call translation are not impressive feats of computing, nor that they don't add any value to the phones they're on. But it's not yet clear if these features are going to be something users will want to keep using once the novelty wears off.

Contrast that with what Honor showed off at MWC 2024. That phone maker's approach to AI-powered features strikes me as more immediately useful than what we're seeing elsewhere. And perhaps as the AI hype train slows down, this is how we're going to see AI featured on phones over the long term.

What Honor gets right with AI

What caught my attention first-off was Honor's MagicRing system. This is similar to Apple's Continuity features across iPhone, iPad and Mac, but the difference with the Honor version is that you can use a phone as an additional window as well as a tablet (handy when you have a big-screen foldable like the Magic V2). That approach lets you freely access files on all the devices and move those files between them. 

The AI isn't obvious here, but it's around to help you manage the different device windows, and help you sling images and documents between them.

There's also the Magic Portal feature on the new Magic6 Pro phone, which tries to guess which app you'll want to share a selected piece of content through. You can then transfer that to the app you want in a single step by dragging the content over to a set of shortcuts appearing on the left or right edge of the screen. As I mentioned in my Magic6 Pro review, it's not as ambitious as what rivals are doing, but in a way that's a good thing — I can see how Magic Portal fits in with ways I already use my phone.

Behind all that, Honor's focus on on-device processing, even for things like Llama 2 chatbot integration (currently undergoing testing on the Magic6 Pro) feels like a strong path for the company to go down. Not only is it a brilliant flex of the chipsets and NPUs that Honor has fitted into its new devices, but hopefully it means these features will always work without extra paid updates or subscriptions getting in the way. That's quite a contrast with what Samsung has threatened to do in future with the Galaxy S24's Galaxy AI features.

Sadly, all of this is limited to Honor products. You might expect this given how Samsung and Apple treat their own cross-device features, but the similar Smart Connect app from Motorola and Lenovo (another standout on the MWC show floor in Barcelona) only needs one of its phones to function. This seems optimal for users who then have greater freedom in choosing devices, but could be a hard sell for manufacturers hoping to get users invested in their whole ecosystems.

I won't claim to have powers of clairvoyance, so maybe more creative generative AI features will prove a big hit with users, and it'll become another key tool in a smartphone's arsenal of abilities. Plus when it comes to Honor's stuff, the only feature I've been able to try myself outside of a controlled demo was Magic Portal. So maybe MagicRing won't be the perfect productivity package I want it to be. 

Still, I believe that AI's future is in the background of a phone's processes rather than the foreground for the majority of users. And of all the manufacturers who've been shouting about their AI so far, Honor's implementation best fits that particular bill.

More from Tom's Guide

• Forget Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra — 6 reasons to buy Galaxy S24 Plus instead
• Google Pay app is being discontinued in the US — everything you need to know
• 200 photos with the Galaxy S24 Ultra vs iPhone 15 Pro Max — here's the winner

The Samsung Galaxy Ring isn't the only smart ring looking to take on the Oura Ring. Honor is planning a device of its own, which would add to the growing ranks of Oura Ring alternatives.

Honor's interest in developing a smart ring comes directly from George Zhao, the CEO of the device maker. Zhao confirmed Honor's smart ring plans in a CNBC interview at MWC 2024. “Internally, we have this kind of solution, now we are working on that part, so in the future, you can have the Honor ring,” Zhao said.

Zhao didn't provide a lot of detail about what Honor's ring would offer, but did note that it was part of the company's broader focus on health. Zhao also said that he sees AI as being key to providing more health insights to users.

“This hardware capability will work together with AI-enabled apps (and) can help you make the professional training course tailored for you because they studied your habits and health data to give you professional suggestions,” he said.

Honor was at the mobile trade show in Barcelona primary to show off the new Honor Magic6 Pro smartphone. Along with battery and photo improvements, that device is set to get eye-tracking technology that's also powered by AI.

Still, it's the talk of the upcoming Honor smart ring that might draw some attention, as Zhao made his announcement just as Samsung was showing off the Galaxy Ring in public after teasing its release just a month ago. Already this year, AmazFit has launched its own smart ring, and there's even talk that Apple is in the process of developing a ring of its own.

Smart rings appeal to health- and fitness-conscious users who may not necessarily care to wear a smartwatch to log exercises and monitor their vital statistics. For phone makers like Samsung and Honor, it's also a way to release devices that tie into their handsets while leveraging health-monitoring features developed for phones and other mobile devices.

It's unclear when Honor's ring would be ready to debut and even the markets where the product would be available. Honor phones aren't available in the U.S., for example,. so it would seem unlikely that any smart ring from the company would ship to that country.

More from Tom's Guide

• Galaxy Ring details start to emerge — battery life, features and more
• OnePlus Watch 2: OnePlus turns a mediocre wearable into something amazing
• Apple smart ring — three features I'd like to see, and one I wouldn't

I've loved having the Honor Magic6 Pro in for testing, as it's another example of Honor nailing the basics of a flagship phone while still injecting some personality into the phone through some uncommon extra features. But it's harder to recommend this phone than you'd think.

The Magic6 Pro should be competitively priced, but it won't be on sale in the U.S. at all. Honor promises some ingenious AI features for the phone, but what's currently available is quite straightforward. And its cameras are well-specced with the capacity to produce excellent photos, but it trips up in low-light situations. There's also the matter of a slightly shorter software update schedule if you're concerned about getting the most post-purchase support.

Our Honor Magic6 Pro review will explain exactly how the phone still impresses even with some uneven performance. But to spoil things early, users who can focus and appreciate the stuff this Honor flagship can do that its rivals can't will be able to forgive its weaknesses very easily.

Honor Magic6 Pro: Specs

Honor Magic6 Pro: Price and availability

The price of the Magic6 Pro has been revealed as 1,299 euros, with pre-orders starting from February 25th. 

Accounting for the higher default memory spec, this price puts the Magic6 Pro in the same bracket as the Samsung Galaxy S24 Plus, the OnePlus 12, Google Pixel 8 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro - a tough crowd to be going up against. But no matter how good the Magic6 Pro's pricing ends up being, we can also fairly safely assume that the phone will not go on sale in the U.S. Though it will still be offered in the U.K. 

Honor Magic6 Pro: Design and display

Like most leading Android flagship phones, the Honor Magic6 Pro offers a 6.8-inch OLED display with a 120Hz adaptive refresh rate. But one interesting difference is Honor still offers curved edges on all four sides of the Magic6 Pro’s screen, whereas most other manufacturers now use flat edges. I've never had an issue with using curved displays, and Honor's four-sided approach means you get the ergonomic benefits of rounded edges even when holding the phone horizontally. But it could be a sticking point for some buyers all the same.

Honor claims the Magic6 Pro is capable of 5,000 nits of brightness, with a more reasonable 1,600-nit "global peak" rating that you're more likely to see in typical use. We didn't get the Magic6 Pro into our lab for thorough testing, but placing the Honor phone alongside the OnePlus 12 and Galaxy S24 Ultra, the Honor seemed to beat the Samsung and sit just slightly behind the OnePlus when set to maximum brightness.

Honor’s updated the Magic6 Pro's display to offer 4,320Hz PWM dimming, which minimizes the imperceptible flickering that mobile screens make. This, along with returning display features like Dynamic Dimming, Natural Tone and Circadian display, makes what Honor claims is the healthiest screen you can get on a phone. The effects are subtle, and I don’t think it made much of an effect on my sleep quality or eye tiredness, but admittedly I don’t use phones like the average owner does, and I’ve only had a few weeks to try the Honor, not for months or years.

If you want to buy yourself a Magic6 Pro, you can pick either the Black version, with a matte-textured glass back, or the Epi Green one (pictured), which comes with a ripple-textured PU back. It’s a fairly pale green, and the ripples help make the phone nice and grippy, so I’m definitely on Team Green in this phone’s case.

Honor says the Magic6 Pro is rated IP68 for dust/water resistance, and features an updated “NanoCrystal Shield” display material for enhanced drop resistance. We didn’t test these properties for ourselves but it’s nice to have this promise of durability.

Honor Magic6 Pro: Cameras

Honor's camera loadout for the Magic6 Pro has some very unique features. The 50MP main camera, for instance, has an adjustable aperture. It’s similar to the variable aperture feature that Samsung had on the main camera of the Galaxy S9 and Galaxy S10 but that we've not seen since. Normally the camera's set to a standard f/2.0 aperture, but when taking low-light shots it'll switch to the wider f/1.4 settings. And with Pro mode enabled, you can switch between the two freely.

Meanwhile, the telephoto camera has upped its resolution from 50MP to an impressive 180MP, but has downgraded its optical zoom to 2.5x telephoto f/2.6. That sounds disappointing, though Honor still promises lossless hybrid zoom of 5x.

Then there's the 50MP front-facing camera, upgraded from a 12MP sensor and still joined by a 3D time-of-flight (TOF) sensor for depth sensing, among other purposes. Lastly, there's a 50MP ultrawide camera which is apparently unchanged from last year.

But how does this compare to the best camera phones on the market - the iPhone 15 Pro Max and the Galaxy S24 Ultra?

Starting off with a main camera comparison of an old metal park sign, we have two quite similar versions of the shot from the Magic6 Pro and the Galaxy S24 Ultra. The Samsung phone offers a slightly warmer color temperature, but otherwise both phones capture the detail in the lettering and worn paint very well.

Inside the park, I swapped to the iPhone 15 Pro Max as my comparison phone for a wider shot of a bench and a flower bed. The iPhone image is brighter than the Honor's, and more detailed since it takes 24MP main camera shots by default, but the Honor instead offers richer color that helps make this image more interesting.

At night, still against the iPhone and stood in front of the BFI IMAX at night, the Honor image looks a bit washed out, especially in the black sky background. The color of the vivid green tennis ball image on the building's screens also looks off, although at least there's no problem with the sharpness or detail.

In both zoom shots of this patch of flowers, I took with the Honor Magic6 Pro, one at 2.5x and one at 5x, it offers higher contrast than the equivalent 3x/5x shots from the Galaxy S24 Ultra, but at the expense of color. 

Since the Honor is using digital zoom for part of the 5x shot, it's impressive that the image quality is consistent with the all-optical 2.5x shot, even if it ends up bleaching some of the purple from the petals.

The Honor's ultrawide photo of a tree, which I again compared with the Galaxy S24 Ultra, offers better color, brightness and contrast than the Samsung version. The difference between the color of the leaves and grass is surprisingly wide between the two phones.

Last of all, a selfie portrait-off. With the Honor up against the iPhone again, there are a lot of similarities in tone and brightness. But the Honor's done a better job with its portrait effect, while the iPhone's squeezed a little more contrast out of where the light hits my skin and hair.

After testing, the Honor Magic6 Pro's cameras are definitely flagship-worthy, even the 2.5x telephoto, assuming you don't mind your photos on the on the desaturated side. The night mode shot is the only one I actively dislike of the Honor's photos here, with all the rest differing in terms of personal preference only. That's still a very impressive result.

Honor Magic6 Pro: Performance

The Magic6 Pro features a Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip like other leading Android phones this year. But it also comes with 12GB RAM and 512GB storage, a generous amount of memory for default storage. Which is just as well, since you don't have the option of speccing more.

We put the Honor through our usual battery of performance tests, and found it lags behind the competition on CPU power, but offers much more impressive results on the GPU test, beating both the Galaxy S24 Ultra and the iPhone 15 Pro Max. We were unable to do our Adobe Premiere Rush video transcoding test at the time of writing. 

When playing games, the Magic6 Pro is as capable as its benchmark scores would suggest, handling racing and FPS titles at max graphics smoothly throughout a play session. Honor isn't selling this as a gaming phone, but like other top flagship phones, it'll serve you just as well as a phone marketed at gamers like the ROG Phone 8 Pro, minus that phone's more unique features.

Honor Magic6 Pro: Battery and charging

There’s a spacious 5,600 mAh battery inside the Magic6 Pro, beating all rivals on capacity. This is a silicon-carbon battery too, which replaces the graphite used in standard lithium batteries to provide more milliamp-hours in a smaller area. Honor’s also shouting about its improved power management chip for enhanced battery management in the cold as well as at regular temperatures.

In my YouTube-based battery test, the Honor Magic6 Pro drained 18% over three hours of non-stop viewing. In the same test, the Galaxy S24 Ultra drained 21% and the OnePlus 12 by 18%. With the OnePlus 12 offering some of the best phone battery life results we've ever had in our full testing, it seems like the Honor is capable of strong longevity on a charge.

The Magic6 Pro supports up to 80W wired and 66W wireless charging. Since Honor no longer ships its phones with chargers in the box, we couldn't test the speeds for ourselves. Honor estimates a full charge will take 40 minutes when the phone's plugged in, but take that with a pinch of salt until we are able to verify this in real-world testing.

Honor Magic6 Pro: Software and special features

Starting with the basics, the Honor Magic6 Pro runs on Magic OS 8.0, which is based on Android 14 like other recent Android releases. But through its own OS, Honor’s promising some fancy AI abilities for the Magic6 Pro, even if you can't use them all just yet.

The center of the Magic6 Pro's current AI package is Magic Portal, part of what Honor calls its “intent-based UI.” By highlighting text then tapping and holding it and dragging it to the edge of the screen, the phone then suggests some apps you may want to send it to. You can do the same with images too, with Honor claiming the phone learns which apps you're most likely to use and surfacing those in the bubbles.

This is a smart way to streamline organizing multiple services or events between apps. However, it still looks a little unambitious compared to the things that Samsung and Google offer on their latest phones, like generative photo editing or quickly summarizing and/or translating text. Maybe further updates to the intent-based UI will expand the Magic6 Pro's artificial intelligence further, and perhaps Honor's approach will prove more useful in the long run than Google and Samsung's generative stuff, but right now Magic Portal lacks a bit of wow factor.

A new design element that’s been staring at you (somewhat literally) this whole time is the Magic Capsule, an enlarged front camera punch-hole that offers secure facial recognition unlocking like the Magic5 Pro, except now positioned in the top center of the phone's display, a lot like the iPhone 15 series.

As well as face unlock, the Magic Capsule also permits the use of air gestures to move around the phone’s interface like older Huawei phones and the Google Pixel 4 series. You can scroll up and down, side to side, take screenshots and go back a screen with various hand motions, but getting the spacing and speed of movement just right means you probably won't use this in place of regular taps and swipes too much.

On top of that, the phone can also use the Capsule for iPhone Dynamic Island-style widgets for the phone, clock and screen-sharing features. Just like the iPhone, this is handy for keeping an eye on how one app is progressing while checking something else, and without having a regular picture-in-picture window getting in your way. 

Honor has promised four years of full Android updates and five years of security updates for the Magic6 Pro. This matches what OnePlus offers for the OnePlus 12, but lags behind Samsung and Google’s promises of seven years of Android and security updates for its latest devices.

Honor Magic6 Pro review: Verdict

Once again, Honor has shown with the Magic6 Pro that it can do flagship phone-worthy hardware just as well as the biggest brands on the market, and shouldn't be underestimated as a result. Its photos are impressive, its battery life appears to be very strong, the display looks great and it offers some interesting extra functions like Magic Capsule. 

Plus, in theory, this phone should be better for your eye health than other smartphone screens. While we don’t know the price just yet, we can assume the Magic6 Pro will offer a good value proposition, offering a similar level of features and performance to phones several hundred pounds more expensive.

Obviously not being able to buy this in the U.S. is going to be a problem for a lot of TG readers. But putting that aside, users may dislike the Magic6 Pro's weaker low-light photography, its lower CPU benchmarks and its shorter update schedule. Plus, at this point, we can't judge how good its AI features are, even if they don't seem as significant a part of the equation as they are for rival devices.

Taking the phone as we tested it though, the Honor Magic6 Pro could be what you're looking for if you're currently trying to find room for a top-flight phone in a tighter-than-ideal budget. Or if having things like a Dynamic Island on an Android phone or cutting-edge battery tech sounds just perfect. 

The Galaxy S24 Ultra, Google Pixel 8 Pro or OnePlus 12 are all strong choices, especially if you're in the U.S. and can't buy Honor phones. But a Magic6 Pro might be the perfect pick thanks to its unique blend of pricing, battery performance and display features.

The Honor Pad 9 is not your standard Android tablet. It may look like one, feel like one, and have the same wide aspect ratio display like most models, but appearances can be deceiving. That’s because Honor has created the most iPad-esque experience I’ve seen on an Android slab, thanks to MagicOS on Android 13.

Sure, there are some cutbacks for that £299 price tag, such as the underwhelming Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 chipset, tinny speakers, and a camera system that is more potato than prime shooter. But these quickly fade into the background because of three key things.

First, you have a gorgeously sleek, lightweight design, with an evenly-balanced weight distribution that makes holding it with one hand a joy without a single hint of strain. Second, that 12.1-inch 2.5K Eye Protection display with a 16:10 aspect ratio is a colorful joy for the eyes. And finally, for whatever reason you’re away from a power outlet, the battery life in here is generously long.

In my own experience, the slickness of the software and the holistic experience comes close to beating the 10th Gen iPad — especially impressive given you’re paying £200 less for the privilege. If you’re willing to give up that additional power and a near-infinitely larger app library in the iPadOS app store, Honor has a good shot at being an iPad killer here.

However, it’s hard for any hardware to overcome a huge number of apps and games like this, and as you can see, that’s one of the key reasons why an Apple slab tops our list of best tablets. 

For what it’s worth, this has been my favorite Android tablet of the past few years. But just make sure you look for the apps you want to use, and see whether they are present in tablet form on the Play Store.

Honor Pad 9: Cheat Sheet

• What is it? This is a mid-range Android tablet.
• Who’s it for? This tablet is perfect for constant content consumers on-the-go.
• What is the price? The Honor Pad 9 comes in at a starting price of £299 (roughly $379).
• How does this compare to an iPad? Its closest competition is the £499 10th Gen iPad, which has a more powerful chipset and a huge number of tablet-specific apps.
• What tasks is it capable of? Outside of binge watching the latest movies and tv shows, the Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 is capable of casual gaming and some productivity-driven multitasking.

Honor Pad 9: Specs

Honor Pad 9: The ups

Let’s take it from the top. There’s a lot going for the Honor Pad 9, and as a content consumption device, it has the display, the dimensions, and the stamina to be a fantastic tablet for watch and play.

Sleekness that puts iPad to shame

To house that larger 12.1-inch display over the iPad’s 10.9-inch panel, the Honor Pad 9 is taller and wider. But most importantly to its comfort in use, it’s just as thin and only a touch heavier. Put into real world context, that means you won’t feel a single bit of that typical wrist strain you get from holding up the weight of heavier slabs.

And none of this is because of relying on cheaper materials that are usually lightweight. The sleek, utilitarian aesthetic maintains a perfect symmetry from all angles — using a combination of aluminum and glass to exude an impressively premium look and feel.

A treat for the eyes

Then, we turn our attention to the most important part of any content consumption device, which is the display. At 12.1-inches, this 16:10 aspect ratio is ideal for a tablet UI of this nature, while also giving you enough of a widescreen form factor for watching movies and TV shows.

Now, I know you looked at that IPS LCD bit of the specs and probably panicked a little. It’s normally hard to extract a ton of color out of IPS tech, and the cost of this tablet may raise more suspicions about its quality. However, those suspicions are quickly put to rest with the visual feast you’re treated to at a buttery smooth 120Hz refresh rate.

Watching my partner’s newest love, Kid Cudi’s gorgeously animated love story Entergalactic, demonstrates how well the 2560x1600-pixel resolution is capable of handling the intricate details of every scene, and the color and contrast nail the flash flood of vividity that hits the screen every minute. 

MagicOS is…well…pretty magic

One common gripe with Android tablets has got to be the user interface (UI). Sure, companies have figured out effective workarounds, but in my opinion, none have come close to the smooth, user-friendly experience of MagicOS — built on Android 13. Oh, and it comes with Google services too!

Simple three-finger gestures drop you straight into multi-tasking modes (including running two instances of the same app) with the greatest of ease, swiping up from the bottom to flip between apps is super fast and fluid, and the option to interconnect your various devices over the cloud with Honor Connect is close to Apple Continuity levels of “it just works” neatness.

While I can’t guarantee how many years of updates this device will get (this has not been confirmed by Honor), I can safely say that in its current form, navigating this tablet is quite the joy.

The stamina champ

Under the hood, you’ll find an 8,300 mAh battery, which is capable of some great things here. On paper, Honor promises 11 hours of “online video streaming,” which in my experience, the Pad 9 hit and then some at 11:26. For a wider range of tasks like productivity and gaming, you’ll see that drop below the 10-hour mark, but this is iPad territory in terms of longevity.

Plus, if you do see it drain to zero, Honor’s tablet supports fast charging up to 35W — allowing you to juice this thing back up to 100% in just over 20 minutes.

Honor Pad 9: The downs

But while I can heap the praise on this software UI, the battery life and that display, there are some big obstacles. Let me explain.

Speakers are rather tinny

Honor is making a big song and dance about the speaker system, and why wouldn’t the team take a victory lap? The outer edge of the Pad 9 is surrounded by eight speakers — placed strategically for surround sound, and Hi-Res audio-certified to deliver crisp audio.

But in reality, while there is a nice clarity in identifying individual high and mid-tone sounds amongst the multi-track composition of an orchestra, there is certainly a real tinniness to the sound here. I know tablets usually are a little light on bass, but this is more so than I’d experienced from other competing slabs. 

Of course, this is easy to fix with a pair of the best bluetooth headphones (since the 3.5mm headphone jack is missing). But for social listening moments like doom scrolling TikTok, you’re going to sorely miss that hint of bass.

Camera = potato

Let’s be honest here — chances are you’re not going to use your tablet as a camera. That smartphone in your pocket is going to take vastly better shots. But in the moments that you want to do a quick video call, or maybe you’re in a clutch moment of only having the Honor Pad 9, picture quality is a bit basic.

The 8MP front-facing sensor is decent enough for the occasional WhatsApp video chat, but you will detect a lot of noise in the darker corners of an image. Meanwhile, the 13MP main snapper round back generates pictures with less noise, but a mushy lack of detail and absence of the finer color details.

Raw horsepower is not quite enough

Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 is enough for your basic productivity needs and casual gaming. Most importantly to the Honor Pad 9’s super power, it’s powerful enough to run the high quality movie and TV show experiences. 

But when you start to apply a little more pressure to the chipset (paired with 8GB RAM) and start to multitask a couple of CPU-intensive apps like Adobe Lightroom and Sketchbook, or opening up multiple Chrome tabs, you can start to feel the Pad 9 begin to buckle under the pressure.

This is understandable in the realm of the Android tablet market — Honor opted for the entry-level Snapdragon 6 Gen 1, which does also come with a built-in AI engine (similar to Meteor Lake’s NPU) that will handle more of these tasks in the future (when they appear).

But looking at the fact this doesn’t even match up with the 9th Gen iPad, it’s clear to see Apple and Android tablets are operating on different battlefields here.

Honor Pad 9: Verdict

Alas, this is just symptomatic of the iPad vs. Android tablet battle — namely that the battle is already kind of over. Don’t get me wrong, you’ll get a lot of mileage out of this specific Android slab. 

The Honor Pad 9 is a binge-watchers dream tablet, and MagicOS does go some way to giving you a super clean iPad-esque experience with the customizability and freedom of Android 13.

But looking past my gripes with its performance and speakers, there is that one unavoidable problem: it is not an iPad. You’re not getting the hundreds of thousands of apps purpose built for iPadOS, neither are you getting Apple’s dense creative suite with the likes of iMovie.

I’m not saying you shouldn’t buy the Honor Pad 9, and the score I gave it is a clear indication that you should look at it at least. But just make sure you know the compromises you’re making before opting for this banger of an Android tablet.

The Honor Magic V2 has shown up late to the foldable phone get-together, but hopes that with its shiny new outfit and some new party tricks, you'll forgive it taking six months to get here.

This is Honor's newest foldable to finally get a global release, replacing the good but not chart-topping Honor Magic Vs that launched early in 2023. Similar to the Vs, the Magic V2's focus is on its physical attributes, showing how foldables can be lighter and more compact than you think, while still offering a big battery and flagship-worthy cameras

Unfortunately this focus on flagship phone creature comforts has meant Honor has not provided the Magic V2 with any compelling foldable-specific features. Plus all that expert engineering doesn't come cheap, even with a chipset that's over a year old. And that's not to mention the fact that this is not a phone you'll find easily in the United States. 

Right now, the Honor Magic V2 is a challenger for the best foldable phones you can buy. But the danger it poses to Samsung, OnePlus and others could be short-lived.

Honor Magic V2: Specs

Honor Magic V2: Price and availability

Honor launched the Magic V2 on January 26th, for the cost of £1,699.99 for its single available 512GB of storage model. This makes it a little cheaper than the Galaxy Z Fold 5 (which costs £1,799 for only 256GB storage), but a bit more expensive than the £1,599 OnePlus Open, also 512GB storage by default.

As this is an Honor product, you're not going to find this on store or carrier shelves in the U.S. While Honor does have access to all the usual Google apps (unlike its ex-parent company Huawei), this difficulty in buying the phone in the U.S. is still a considerable hurdle for foldable buyers.

Honor Magic V2: Design and display

Honor hasn't changed much from the Honor Magic Vs to the Magic V2 beyond changing the camera block shape, but a lot of behind-the-scenes refinement has happened to make the new Magic foldable better.

For one, the Magic V2 boasts a thickness of just 9.9mm (0.39 inches) when closed and 4.7 mm (0.19 inches) when open, and a weight of 231g (8.15 ounces) in its Black Vegan Leather guise (those measurements are 10.1 mm / 4.8mm and 237g for the glass-backed Phantom Purple version). That's thinner and lighter than either the OnePlus Open or the Galaxy Z Fold 5, and is in fact lighter than some standard smartphones like the 233g/8.22-ounce Galaxy S24 Ultra.

Honor's also done work on the Magic V2's hinge, including trendy (but more importantly light and strong) titanium parts. The hinge is primarily designed to keep the Magic V2 open or closed, rather than sit at any in-between angle like the Galaxy Z Fold 5, but you can get the Honor to stand up and remain part-open in just the right position for watching stuff on its cover screen.

That outer display is similar to a standard phone in size at 6.4 inches with a 21:9 aspect ratio (most phones are around 20:9), while the inner display is 7.92 inches, sizeable even for a book-style foldable phone. Honor offers 120Hz on both displays, unlike the Magic Vs which was stuck with 90Hz on its outer screen, and promises 1,600 nits of brightness on the inner screen and 2,500 nits on the outside. We weren't able to verify these numbers in the TG lab but I certainly never had a problem using the Magic V2 outdoors.

Honor also included its signature display comfort technology like 3,840Hz PWM dimming, which Honor claims reduces eye strain.

The one unusual thing about the Magic V2's outer display, inherited from the Magic Vs, is its single curved edge on the side away from the hinge. It makes the phone more obviously asymmetrical than even other foldables, although as a right-handed user, it does make it easier to reach across the full breadth of the other display. However, I imagine curved display haters will still dislike it.

Honor Magic V2: Cameras

The Magic V2's camera arsenal consists of 50MP main, 50MP ultrawide and 20MP 2.5x telephoto cameras on the back, and two 16MP selfie cameras across the inner and outer displays. On paper, this puts the Honor foldable ahead of the Galaxy Z Fold 5 but behind the OnePlus Open in terms of pure megapixels, but resolution alone doesn't make a great photo.

To put these cameras through their paces properly, I compared the Magic V2's photos with those from the OnePlus Open, the current top of our best foldables guide thanks in part to its strong photography.

With a main camera photo of Paddington Basin, we first see the essential difference between these two phones — the Honor foldable skews towards richer colors, while the OnePlus prioritizes a brighter composition. In this image, where a fair chunk is taken up by the sky, and the grey cloudy weather drains the scene's natural color, the Honor's approach has resulted in the more appealing shot.

It's the same story of color vs. brightness in this ultrawide shot of a colorful barge. One extra thing to note is that the text on the right side is clearer on the OnePlus image, a big plus in the Open's favor when taking photos of more complex scenes.

Next we come to a telephoto image of a statue. Setting aside the difference in background due to the two phones' different magnification, the Honor struggled to bring this sculpture to life, offering only minimal color saturation difference. The OnePlus Open has its biggest sensor resolution advantage in this round, and it seems to have put it to good use, balancing both brightness and color.

Last, but not least, we have the portrait selfie round. There's not a huge color or brightness difference this time around, instead the most obvious differences being that my skin's smoother in the OnePlus image, but the portrait effect is better in the Honor photo.

Foldables aren't interested in being the best camera phones around, but photography is still important to consider when buying a phone. The good news for those interested in the Honor Magic V2 is that its photos mostly keep up with the leading phone in its category, despite it being an older device at heart.

Honor Magic V2: Performance

Since Honor first released this phone in China in July 2023, the phone uses a Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset, the latest in flagship silicon for Android phones back then but a chip that unfortunately is dated now the first Gen 3 chips are appearing in phones. Fortunately, rival foldables have yet to adopt the new generation of Snapdragon, meaning Honor's not at a disadvantage just yet — especially with its generous 16GB of RAM and 512GB of storage. 

The table above shows how the Honor compares to the Galaxy Z Fold 5 and OnePlus Open, which use the same chipset, as well as the Google Pixel Fold, which uses Google's own Tensor G2 chip. Since the Samsung foldable uses a special "For Galaxy" version of the Snapdragon chip with slightly higher performance, it beats the Honor on all the tests, while the Honor trades blows with the OnePlus Open and soundly beats the Pixel Fold.

So at least for the time being, the Honor Magic V2 has strong performance, although putting it to use with mobile gaming wasn't that enjoyable. I'm not a fan of gaming on foldable phones, because their main displays are squarer than games are normally designed for, meaning you end up either wasting display space to play in a windowed mode or have to deal with a weirdly zoomed-in view of the game world.

Putting aside my own feelings on it, playing things like "Genshin Impact" or "Grid: Autosport" on the Magic V2 were at least smooth, with graphics quality equal to other leading Android phones. Plus the relatively normal proportions of the outer display mean I could game on the Magic V2 fine when it was folded — you just have to get used to the extra thickness compared to a standard phone.

Honor Magic V2: Battery and charging

The 5,000 mAh battery capacity in the Honor Magic V2 is quite large for a foldable phone, beating the Galaxy Z Fold 5, OnePlus Open and Google Pixel Fold by several hundred milliamps. It's also a silicon-carbon battery, which Honor says has an efficiency advantage over standard lithium-ion cells.

After three hours of watching YouTube videos on the Magic V2's main display over WiFi, the battery dropped 23%. On the same test, the OnePlus Open lost 27% of its capacity, which would translate to a noticeably longer runtime for the Honor if you tried to drain it fully.

Like its last foldable, the Honor Magic V2 works with 66W charging, only there's no charger in the box. Using a 66W brick from a previous Honor phone, the Magic V2 powered up from 0 - 48% in 15 minutes, to 80% in half an hour and finally to 100% in 46 minutes.

The OnePlus Open's 67W charger fuels it to 50% in 15 minutes and 85% in 30 minutes, which is a little quicker but not by that much considering it has a smaller battery overall.

Honor Magic V2: Software and special features

The Magic V2 runs MagicOS 7.2, based on Android 13. It's unfortunate that Android 14 isn't available out of the box, but it should appear in due course. Honor's update policy is four years of full Android upgrades and five years of security updates, which looks a bit lacking compared to the seven years other manufacturers offer, but is still better than things used to be in Android world.

Honor's version of Android has its charms, like large folders to keep large numbers of apps tidy but still immediately accessible. However, it's light on foldable-specific features. You can split apps across the two halves of the inner display (but only vertically) with one floating window on top of that, and use Hover mode on certain apps, where the bottom portion of the display gains special controls while the phone is bent at 90 degrees, like a laptop. But overall that's a bit limited.

Having tried OnePlus Open's super-flexible Open Canvas system, or the 3+1 window system and S Pen compatability of the Galaxy Z Fold 5, this doesn't cut the mustard. Extra annoying is that Honor does offer stylus support on the Magic V2, but doesn't sell its compatible stylus in Europe.

Honor Magic V2 review: Verdict

Even with its delayed launch, the Honor Magic V2 has a clear vision of how to keep developing the large-format foldable to be a leaner device with fewer compromises. Even if the Honor trips up in some areas all the same.

The Magic V2 is definitely a stand-out product when it comes to hardware, offering some great quality displays with sensible aspect ratios for practical use folded and unfolded. Its cameras certainly do a good job too, particularly if you like your images color-rich.

But the combination of a higher than average price, and software that's a step behind the competition, make the Magic V2 harder to justify. Plus, with its older chipset this phone's going to look outdated in even shorter time than normal for a flagship device.

Unless you're a multitasking fiend, I think most foldable buyers who can purchase an Honor Magic V2 in their region will be well served by it, even if the OnePlus Open remains the best all-round foldable. Just keep in mind the potential reward of waiting a few months for fresher foldables is larger than normal in this case.

Google is releasing an upgrade for the Gmail app that will allow users to easily unsubscribe from unwanted mass emails. However, this feature is not available on every Android phone just yet.

The unsubscribe option has been available on the web app for a while, but it was quite hard to find. As such Google redesigned the option to make it more obvious for the user. Surprisingly this change previously didn’t affect the Android app, until now. 

The new design follows the same trend as the web browser with the unsubscribe button being placed at the top of the email. When tapped it will either ask for confirmation or redirect you to the newsletters unsubscribe website. This is supposedly down to how the publisher implemented this option. 

If you are unsure of the website, or just don’t want to risk being sent to a potentially harmful website, it is still possible to mark an email as spam or block them. This will send the newsletter to a separate inbox and will send any further correspondence to the same place. However, it is worth showing some restraint with labeling emails as spam as it may cause your system to forward legitimate emails.

However, it appears that the feature is not yet available for everyone. In a recent report, Android Authority found the option was available on a Pixel 8 Pro, but not on an Honor phone. This will likely be solved soon and we imagine the addition will be implemented on more phones as time goes on. Until then users are still able to unsubscribe from emails the old-fashioned way.

Google's attempts to improve the visibility of the Gmail Unsubscribe buttons are certainly one that many users will appreciate. It is all too easy at the moment to lose track of emails and, while it may seem like a minor headache, having a massively full inbox can cause issues. One of them being that it'll fill up your Google cloud storage, which can then become a cost to pick up some more. It can also mean that important emails get easily missed as there are just too many to look at. 

It is also important to keep security in mind when it comes to emails. As stated before, if the email has come from an untrusted source it is better to send it to the spam folder rather than trying to unsubscribe. If you do feel that your phone may have a virus then we have compiled a list of the best antivirus software for phones.

Google is known for constantly updating its programs to make them more appealing to users. This change is not a major one, but it does make an already existing feature more prominent and that is enough. Hopefully, some of the other options, such as how to select important emails, get the same treatment.

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Honor CEO Zhao Ming has revealed some details about the Honor Magic 6 Pro. And apparently this phone will have a revolutionary new satellite connection feature. 

According to a report in MyDrivers, Honor has developed its own satellite communication technology and has "overcome the three major technical problems of antenna size, call endurance, and communication experience," said Ming. "Honor provides consumers with the smallest size, the most stable signal and the most reliable service. So what you're getting is a power-saving mobile phone satellite communication experience."

Satellite communication on mobile phones is not new. The iPhone 14 and iPhone 15 have Apple's Emergency SOS via satellite, although Apple has focused on using the feature primarily for emergencies. Honor wants to broaden the appeal and allow users to make phone calls and send text messages over the satellite connection. This would be a first for smartphones and could be a precursor of things to come.

Using a satellite connection has several advantages to using mobile networks. The main advantage is that it allows the phone to make contact in even the most remote locations. This is a great advantage in emergency situations or where cellular service isn't available. Outside of emergencies, it could also be used while on vacation to avoid roaming charges, depending on the cost.

What's not clear is whether the Honor Magic 6 Pro will offer satellite communications outside of China. However, this is a great time to announce given the cancellation of Snapdragon satellite. The ending of Android’s SOS satellite solution has left the market open for something else to challenge Apple. 

The Honor Magic 6 Pro is also rumored to pack the new Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip for increased performance and graphics power, as well as a 200-megapixel telephoto lens with a sensor in a 1/1.5 format. This hardware could place the Magic 6 Pro at a similar level to the upcoming Samsung Galaxy S24, which is tipped for a January launch. The Honor Magic 6 Pro is set to release at some point early next year.

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IFA is one of the world’s largest tech events, with nearly 2,000 exhibitors spread over the 160,000 square meters (1,700,000 sq ft) of Berlin’s Messe, and boy did my feet know it!

The iconic building, which has been extended to include 26 halls since it was built in 1936, plays host to all of the biggest global tech brands for IFA. But it just as warmly welcomes hundreds of start-ups who are just getting their feet off the ground — most boasting an ingenious bit of kit that makes you think "how is this only being invented in 2023?". In fact, here's our Best of IFA 2023 Awards celebrating the best things we saw at the show this year.

IFA’s uniquely earnest venue gives you the sense that you’ve accidentally walked behind the scenes at what could otherwise have been a very pretentious technology conference, and that’s to its credit. This breeds a sociable atmosphere despite the conference’s enormous scale, however navigating the venue also brings its fair share of challenges.

Refreshingly, I found IFA to be an authentic celebration of innovation rather than a profiteering exercise for the tech giants — this is evident in the rich variety of exhibitors. Equally, IFA’s commitment to reducing e-waste was clear, with its Sustainability Village filling an entire hall and offering free onsite device repairs at a ‘mend and repair shop’ run by volunteers.

But with so much to do and so little time, I can only describe IFA as the Glastonbury Festival of tech conferences. It’s mammoth, overwhelming and darn right awesome on so many levels! In fact, with 180K visitors even the crowd is nearing the same magnitude. So where did I go wrong while attending IFA?

Mistake #1: I got lost

My main warning when visiting IFA; you will get lost. I spent two days traversing IFA, and for the majority of that time I was trying to find exhibitors and staring at the map. Messe’s endless halls and passageways are bewildering, so if you’re planning a visit be sure to plot your route around ahead of time — and include a well-timed stop at IFA Outdoors where the best food can be found in a series of trucks and stands.

It can take half an hour to walk from one side of the venue to the other, but there are a number of shuttle buses available across the site. You just have to know where to find them. And if you’re planning to meet up with a friend or colleague, good luck!

As I unintentionally walked around the same hall for the fifth time my Apple Watch clocked 23,000 steps. No wonder I felt exhausted — that and the fact I'd unknowingly caught Covid somewhere along the way.

Mistake #2: I went on the wrong day

Make sure you’re attending on the right day. From what I've heard from my colleagues the crowds on Saturday were “insane” and made it difficult to get around, meanwhile Friday was a relatively quiet day in comparison with many of the exhibitors still setting up for the five-day stint. IFA requires planning, and details of the scheduled events and showcases for each day can be found in the IFA schedule on the official app.

IFA should be a social media editor’s paradise, with trending and TikTok-worthy tech around every corner along with enthusiastic founders, engineers and reps ready to discuss their product’s specs. Unfortunately for me — the social media editor for Tom’s Guide —  my mistake was expecting the exhibitors to be fully set up on the press days, the Wednesday and Thursday before it opened to the public on Friday September 1st. While this is more of a problem for the media specifically, I thought it was worth mentioning nonetheless as I'm told the same unreadiness tailed into Friday.

The big players, namely Samsung and Panasonic, were there to announce their launches to the press before the crowds poured in and there was still plenty to see, but for the most part the halls were filled with construction crew working at speed to assemble hundreds of stands from endless piles of plywood, and stacks of LED displays.

In fact, on arriving in Berlin following a 6am flight from London I was surprised to find that IFA’s event space more closely resembled a building site than a world-leading tech conference. Where were the humanoids? (they arrived on Friday apparently). More importantly, where was the cutting edge consumer tech — including the Honor V Purse, a phone questionably disguised as a purse? The answer; still in the box.

As you can imagine, this was not ideal for getting picture-perfect Instagram and TikTok content. However, it endeared me to IFA’s spirit as I watched thousands of tech-minded people working together to make it happen. So yes, I didn’t get to experience IFA in full force but I’m sure I felt the beating heart of it. 

Will I be returning to IFA to celebrate its 100th year in 2024?

All being well, I can’t wait to attend the conference again for the full five days. If you’re someone with a passion for finding tech that enhances your day to day, IFA has something to improve every aspect of our tech-driven lives and you can guarantee you’ll leave feeling inspired. 

My favorite part of the show: Samsung’s mahoosive hall full of smiling representatives, photobooths, and a huge range of their products that they patiently let me test.

More from Tom's Guide

• Best of IFA Awards 2023: Our top gadget picks from the big show
• I've seen weird products at IFA 2023 — Honor's V Purse is a talking point
• IFA 2023: The first Qi2 wireless chargers are here in time for iPhone 15

IFA 2023 is a proving ground for a lot of weird and wonderful things, but none piqued our interest more than the idea of the Honor V Purse. It’s a foldable phone that’s supposed to double as, you guessed it, a purse. Or a handbag if you're living in North America. That’s what Honor claims, anyway, but in reality this device is a phone. Nothing more, nothing less. Oh, but unlike the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 5 it has a shoulder chain.

I can get behind the Honor V Purse’s general idea. This is a foldable phone that keeps the foldable display on the outside, meaning both halves of its screen are visible at all times. The idea here is that the V Purse is supposed to be a fashion accessory you can wear out in the world. Loud and proud. The wearer also gets to decide what’s displayed on the screen, meaning that they have some sort of accessory for every occasion and outfit. How many leather or fabric purses can claim to do that?

So far so good. The V Purse even has the aforementioned chain to help carry it around, but that’s about as close as it gets to functioning like an actual purse. The problem is the V Purse is literally just a phone. Yes, you can use it to pay for stuff, but there's no way you're finding any space between the screens for mascara, car keys or any other gadgets and wires you carry around.

Perhaps the more worrying thing, as far as I can see, is the expectation of carrying the device around in the least secure manner imaginable - with an emphasis on it being in full view of the people around you.

I may not be a purse expert (or even the desired target audience for such things) but I’ve always assumed the whole point of a purse is the ability to put stuff inside it. Big or small, fashionable or plain, the holding ability is the purse’s raison d’etre. Without that you just end up with an annoying lump you have to carry around for no good reason.

So really the Honor V Purse is just a phone with a chain on it. It’s a very purse-like chain to my untrained eye, but the chain isn’t what makes a purse a purse — and neither do Honor’s purse-like wallpapers.

Had Honor wrapped a foldable phone screen around some sort of clutch and thrown that on stage at IFA, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. I'd be talking about how delightfully ridiculous the idea is, and possibly even praising the fact that Honor developed an actual purse for just about every occasion.

And I'm not downplaying Honor's technical ability, either. In fact, the company's other phone (the one you'll actually be able to buy) received the Best Phone award from the Tom's Guide Best of IFA 2023 Awards.

But throwing out what looks like a refurbished version of the Huawei Mate Xs, and calling it a purse seems less kooky and silly to me and more downright perplexing.

Now, I could be completely mistaken and the smartphone-buying public has been clamouring for just this kind of innovation for years on end. But, I think what has got me concerned the most is something a bit deeper. Every few years it seems like tech companies forget that women regularly buy and use technology and "gadgets" just like men. So, they take it upon themselves to launch products directly marketed and brand as being “for” women, often with copious amounts of pink thrown into the mix.

The problem is these products always seem like they’ve been designed and developed without consulting any actual women. Part of it may be cultural differences and I take that on board, but Honor is an international company exhibiting at a European tech show. If you are female and you do disagree, please let me know in the comments section below this article.

But like 3D displays, smart fridges and companies called X, “lady tech” is one of those ideas that keeps popping up every few years, despite the fact nobody wants or asks for it.

Of course, all this is by-the-by because the Honor V Purse is a concept device, and isn’t actually going on sale! As such, I can't help but be a bit sad Honor didn't go all in on something completely bonkers but still somewhat more interesting than a pretty phone with a chain.

I’ve seen concept devices of flexible displays wrapped around all sorts of crazy things, including retro-looking TVs, toasters and even smartwatches. We know Honor is capable of some really awesome stuff but a phone cosplaying as a purse just isn't for me.

Still, there's always IFA 2024. And, in the meantime, you can check out our hands-on review of the Honor Magic V2: the best designed foldable phone yet.

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The Honor Magic V2 has just been unveiled at IFA 2023 in Berlin, with Honor exposing how rival foldables still aren't pushing the engineering envelope that hard.

We only saw the Honor Magic Vs's global launch in the spring of this year , but we're excited to see a sequel appear so quickly to take on the newer Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 5 and Google Pixel Fold, not to mention upcoming foldables like the OnePlus Open. We're especially happy to see a sequel that somehow manages to be larger than its rivals while also coming in lighter and slimmer.

We've still got questions about the Magic V2's user experience beyond the hardware, but those will remain only partially answered until we get to try the final version. So for now, here are our initial thoughts on the Honor Magic V2.

Honor Magic V2 first look: Price and availability

There's no price announced at the time of writing, but Honor laments how expensive foldables can be. For context, the Magic VS costs £1,400, which is £400 cheaper than the Galaxy Z Fold 5 or Google Pixel Fold. That gives us hope that Honor will keep the Magic V2 on the cheap side for a foldable too.

Also, Honor has yet to tell us if and when the Magic V2 will go on sale. It's already available in China, but an IFA presentation suggests an upcoming global release. The Magic V2 remains unlikely to make it to the U.S. though, so apologies to those of you hoping for another Samsung and Google challenger.

Honor Magic V2 first look: Design

A probable lower-than-average price doesn't mean you're getting an unrefined product from Honor. The Magic V2 features some very impressive engineering, which is what allows the phone to measure just 4.7mm thick when open, and 9.9mm when folded. For comparison, the Galaxy Z Fold 5 is a positively chunky 6.1mm/13.4mm respectively.

Weighing 231g, the Magic V2 is lighter than the Galaxy Z Fold 5, too. In fact, it's lighter than the non-folding Galaxy S23 Ultra or iPhone 14 Pro Max, something you can feel just by holding both phones in your hand. Honor says that part of this is achieved with a new hinge design, which is made with titanium and 3D-printed parts.

The new hinge is even tougher, too. Honor claims the Magic V2 is rated for 400,000 folds, double what Samsung had the Galaxy Z Fold 5 certified as capable of managing. That's not to say the Z Fold 5 couldn't make it to 400k folds, but it's not guaranteed.

There's no IP rating like the Galaxy Z Fold 5 or other conventional flagship phones have, but Honor does promise it's splashproof. I wouldn't want to test that myself, though.

Honor Magic V2: Display

Honor's not changed the inside display from the Honor Magic Vs; it remains a large 7.9-inch OLED panel. The outer display's a little different, measuring 6.43 inches compared to 6.45 inches on the Magic Vs, but that difference is not very noticeable. Besides, this still makes the Honor Magic V2 one of the largest foldables on the market right now, with only the OnePlus Open potentially poised to match or beat it.

Both of the Magic V2's displays feature 3,840Hz PWM dimming, just like the Honor Magic5 Pro and Honor 90. Honor claims this helps save your eyes from strain over long periods of use, although I definitely couldn't confirm this from my brief time tying the Magic V2.

Honor Magic V2: Cameras

Honor's introduced a new 50MP main camera on the back of the Magic V2, and adopted a 20MP telephoto camera with 2.5x optical zoom to replace the 8MP 3x sensor on the Magic Vs. The 50MP ultrawide camera, plus 16MP selfie cameras on the front and on the inside, are the same though. 

Honor's never struggled with camera hardware on its phones, but sometimes its software processing can't match up to what rival devices are capable of. The sample shots I took (but couldn't bring away with me) looked fine on the day, but I'll need to do a full comparison to know for sure if the Honor Magic V2 cameras can compare to the strong cameras on the rival Samsung and Google foldables.

Honor Magic V2: Performance and battery

Running things inside the Magic V2 is a Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset and 16GB RAM, with your choice of 256GB, 512GB or 1TB of storage. Honor is using essentially the same chip as the Galaxy Z Fold 5's 8 Gen 2 for Galaxy silicon — the latter is the overclocked version — but there's much more RAM in Honor's phone than there is inside the Z Fold 5 or Pixel Fold. That should be good news for multitasking, assuming Honor adds some extra abilities in the software to make use of it. The phone maker didn't mention anything of the sort during its presentation though, nor did I come across any while trying out the phone.

Within the slim body of the Honor Magic V2, there's a 5,000 mAh combined battery capacity with 66W charging, which should mean it lasts longer and charges faster than either the Galaxy Z Fold 5 or Google Pixel Fold. With this potent power cell, Honor promises the Magic V2 will last longer on a single charge than an iPhone 14 Pro Max, whether you've got the phone folded or unfolded.

Honor's also flexing more technical prowess here by using a silicon-carbon battery, rather than a traditional lithium-ion one. Silicon-carbon batteries can offer greater energy density, meaning more milliamp-hours in less space. Honor let us handle one of these batteries alongside the phone, and we found the battery truly is as thin as a credit card. I'd have tried to fit it in my wallet had I not been watched carefully by its representatives at the briefing.

Honor Magic V2: Early verdict

It's hard to fault the Honor Magic V2 after my hands-on time. A foldable phone that's slimmer and lighter than its rivals (and some standard phones) is very impressive, and shows Honor's trying its utmost to provide users a compelling alternative to a Galaxy Z Fold 5 or Google Pixel Fold. If either Samsung or Google offered a foldable built like this, it'd be an instant recommendation.

But since this is an Honor phone, there are two big issues to address. One is availability, since it's no good being a great phone if customers can't actually buy it. The other is software, as it's the main reason why previous Honor devices have not quite been able to crash the party for the best phones or best foldable phones around. We'll be considering both of these when we get a final version of the device to review.

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A new Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 5 and Google Pixel Fold rival has emerged from China in the form of the newly announced Honor Magic V2.

There's no confirmation yet that the Magic V2 will make it to the global market. However, we can hope that it'll be sold outside China since Honor already sells the Magic VS foldable globally. Don’t expect to see it in the U.S. though, Honor hasn’t attempted to make it in America yet.

We can immediately see a major difference between the Honor Magic V2 and its rivals in its pricing. Honor's asking for 8,999 RMB (around $1,250) in China for the entry-level model, which is a fair bit cheaper than the original 12,999 RMB (roughly $1,800) price of the Galaxy Z Fold 4.

Looking at the displays shows an immediate spec gap too, as the size and shape of the Magic V2's displays should mean it's got more screen space than the Galaxy Z Fold 4 and Pixel Fold, while remaining usable when folded up. 

To be precise, the Magic V2 features a 7.92-inch 1,600-nit FHD inner display, and a 6.4-inch, 2,500-nit sub-FHD which offers a wider-than-average 20:9 aspect ratio. Both run at 120Hz and use Honor's PWM dimming technology to theoretically reduce eye strain.

For photography, Honor furnished the Magic V2 with a 50MP main camera, 50MP ultrawide and 20MP telephoto camera (zoom level unknown) on the back, and two 16MP selfie cameras found in punch holes on the inner and outer display. The Galaxy Z Fold 4 has a 50MP main camera too, while the Pixel Fold uses a similar 48MP main sensor. Neither of these two phones beat the Honor ultrawide, telephoto and selfie camera sensor resolution though, which could likely have an effect on overall image quality. 

A Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset powers the Magic V2, with up to 16GB RAM and 1TB storage. Meanwhile, a 5,000 mAh silicon-carbon battery provides the electrical juice, a type of battery it's only used on the China-only model of the Magic5 Pro before. This can then be refilled with speedy 66W charging.

To actually get the Magic V2 to fold, Honor's fitted the phone with a titanium hinge, which Honor claims is rated to last 400,000 folds, and it estimates is good for around 10 years of regular use. Despite its folding nature, the Magic V2 is apparently 9.9mm (0.39 inches) thick when closed, and weighs 231 grams (8.15 ounces). This would make it not only considerably thinner and lighter than the Galaxy Z Fold 4 or Google Pixel Fold, but thinner than regular non-folding phones like the Galaxy S23 Ultra or iPhone 14 Pro Max.

We're due to see the Galaxy Z Fold 5 and Galaxy Z Flip 5 at Samsung's Galaxy Unpacked event later this month. From what the rumor mill has told us, the Galaxy Z Fold 5 won't offer too many upgrades on top of what the Galaxy Z Fold 4 already offers, giving rival foldables the opportunity to seize Samsung's crown. We can't say at the moment if the Honor Magic V2 is capable of beating the Pixel Fold, our current best foldable phones champion. But if it does go on sale beyond China, Honor could have a winner on its hands.

More from Tom’s Guide

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If you want to really make your socials sizzle, you need the HONOR 90. It’s packed with cutting-edge tech to capture, create and share your vibe, and with 4K video and clever AI it’s also a brilliant phone for creating videos and memes to make your friends and followers laugh. It’s the ultimate creative tool and the perfect phone for big nights, big laughs and big adventures too.

 More megapixels means more amazing

If you’ve ever struggled to get great group selfies during big nights out you’ll love the HONOR 90’s 200-megapixel camera and new 1/1.4-inch sensor. Together they bring in much more light, ensuring that your group shots look great and portraits really pop even when the lights are low. And because the HONOR 90’s main camera and selfie shooter have very wide fields of view you can get more people into your group selfies or just include more of the scenery when you’re the star of the shot.

The HONOR 90 has another trick up its sleeve. It’s called pixel binning, and what it does is very clever. In really low light situations, it combines sixteen pixels together to make one super-pixel, and each super-pixel brings in much more light — so the result is crisper, clearer night-time photos without any of the noise or jaggies you’ll get from less capable cameras.

 Make your portraits pop 

We love portrait mode, which makes every day a looking-good day. And it’s even better in the new HONOR 90 thanks to that new sensor. The HONOR 90 is even better at delivering bokeh, the effect that makes the background soften so the focus is on you or the person you’re photographing, and if you’ve ever laughed at the over-processed, plastic-looking skin some rival phone cameras deliver you’ll love how accurately the HONOR 90 handles skin tones. 

 These cameras can do everything 

The HONOR 90 also has a 2MP depth camera for brilliantly blurred backgrounds and a 12MP Ultra-Wide and Macro camera. That means you can take breathtaking shots of landscapes, buildings and other big things, and thanks to its incredibly short 2.5cm minimum distance you can also get up close to shoot the tiniest details. That’s handy for all kinds of photography, and it’s pretty cool for creators and crafters to take pictures of their work to sell on places such as eBay and Etsy too. 

4K video and instant memes too 

You’ll love how the HONOR 90 handles video. With 4K resolution, HDR and dual microphones with AI noise reduction you’ll be shooting incredibly crisp video with beautifully clear audio, and if you use the AI Vlog Assistant you can get your HONOR to create TikTok- and Instagram-ready clips in just one second. Not only that but there’s a built-in GIF creator that can take your funniest photo and instantly turn it into a meme.

The HONOR 90’s video quality is really impressive, and once again there’s a lot of cutting-edge AI tech helping you with every single frame. AI Super Resolution and AI Sharpening Technology analyze every frame of your video, optimizing it for the best possible quality and clarity. It can also upsample your videos, for example by taking SDR and making it HDR or by taking HDR and making it even more dynamic by upsampling it to HDR10+.

One of our favorite features here is the choice of video modes, which makes it easy to get the right settings for any kind of socials: all you need to do is choose Portrait Video, HDR Video, Close-up, Multi-video or Solo Cut to get pro-level video at the touch of the screen.

Power that won’t run out of puff

There’s nothing worse than shooting something spectacular only for the battery to run out mid-record. That’s why the HONOR 90 has serious stamina: its 5,000 mAh battery delivers around 20 hours of video. And if you forget to charge it, you’ll love the 66W HONOR SuperCharge tech that’s built into your phone. It gets you from flat to 45% battery in just 15 minutes.

The rest of the phone’s pretty spectacular too. It’s powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 Accelerated Edition processor, which delivers 20% faster GPU performance and 30% better AI performance than its predecessor. And it runs an optimized version of Android, HONOR MagicOS 7.1. That has all the Android features you know and love, but it adds some really useful features such as Magic Text, which can automatically recognize and act on text when you point your camera at it – so you can automatically call numbers, save contacts, open websites and store email addresses.

Click here to discover the HONOR Summer Event and find out more about your next favorite phone.

The Honor 90 stands out in a line-up of midrange phones, both literally and figuratively. Its large frame and focus on display and battery specs dwarf the competition, and it’s not often you find a 200MP main camera at this price.

Looking past the limited availability of the Honor 90 — U.S. shoppers won’t have a chance to buy this device — its worst qualities are its extreme photo processing and a disappointingly low amount of promised updates. Those are two very big parts of the smartphone experience, but fortunately the rest of the Honor 90 is good enough to outweigh those shortcomings.

This device has plenty going for it, although it doesn't quite hit the consistent highs needed to land it a spot on our best cheap phones guide. But read on and learn which type of user will still find the Honor 90 ideal for them.

Honor 90 review: Specs

Honor 90 review: Price and availability

The retail launch date for the Honor 90 has yet to be confirmed, but we know the phone is up for pre-order right now, and starts at £449, with a higher-specced £499 version also on offer.

At its basic price, the Honor 90 goes up against competitors such as the Google Pixel 7a and the Samsung Galaxy A54 (both also starting at £449). Like last year's Honor 70, the Honor 90 doesn't have a price advantage to hold over its main competitors, which while reflecting Honor's use of plenty of high-quality components, means it'll have to do a lot to defeat the incumbent cheap phone champs.

It's also safe to assume, like with all Honor phones, there won't be a U.S. release. Maybe this will change one day, but considering what happened to Honor's old parent company Huawei, Honor seems understandably cautious about trying to sell phones in the United States.

Honor 90 review: Design

At a glance, you'd think the Honor 90 was a much more expensive phone than it actually is. The quad-curved display gives the phone a comfortable feel whether you're holding it vertically or horizontally; it’s also the same you'll find on Honor's flagship Magic5 Pro. The same goes for the Honor 90’s matte-textured back panel, which looks rather smart whether it's appearing in Diamond Silver, Emerald Green (pictured), Peacock Blue or Midnight Black. 

At 6.7 inches, this is a big phone for the price, too. The Pixel 7a is a petite 6.1 inches, while the Galaxy A54 is a slightly larger 6.4 inches. The Honor 90's a strong deal if you want a lot of screen real estate for the price.

The only element I dislike is the dual circular camera block on the back. It continues the Honor 70's style of hiding small camera lenses in large housings, perhaps to make the phone's optics look more impressive. With the shiny metal surrounds drawing your eye further to these bumps, it feels a little dishonest compared to the simpler individual lenses of the Galaxy A54 or the Pixel 7a's camera bar.

Honor 90 review: Display

Honor's put a lot of focus on the Honor 90's display. Not only is it quite large at 6.7 inches, it also offers a 120Hz refresh rate and an alleged 1,600-nit peak HDR brightness. Unusually, though in line with Honor's other phones, the Honor 90 has a resolution of 2664 x 1200 pixels — that’s higher-res than the FHD panels on the Pixel 7a or Galaxy A54, but not quite as detailed as the QHD panels you'll see on flagship phones.

We also see Honor's usual suite of unique features for preserving eye health. There's 3,840Hz PWM dimming, which Honor claims makes the display less flickery and therefore less straining on the eye, along with Dynamic Dimming and Circadian Night Display, which change the screen's color and brightness throughout the day. 

All of this apparently adds up to the Honor 90 being easier to use for long periods of time without straining your eyes or disrupting your sleep as much as a typical mobile device display. I didn't get quite enough time with the Honor 90 to tell if I was sleeping better or not, but Honor cites the work of University College London's Prof. Glen Jeffery on blue light and eye strain to prove its effectiveness.

During my battery test (more on that below), I compared the Honor 90 to the Pixel 7a at 50% brightness, and found that the Honor display looked far brighter, with the Pixel barely visible, even indoors.

Honor 90 review: Cameras

Camera hardware on the Honor 90 is a mixed bag. A 200MP main camera usually will be found on flagship phones like the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra, but here, it’s a starring feature on a far cheaper phone. 

Finding a 50MP selfie camera on the front of the Honor 90 is quite surprising, too, since most front cameras do not have this high of a resolution. The Honor 90’s 12MP ultrawide camera and 2MP depth sensor are more in line with what we'd see from other phones of this price.

By default, the Honor 90's main camera takes photos at 12.5MP, just like the Pixel 7a. Unlike the Pixel, you can shoot at the sensor's full resolution on the Honor. This comparison uses the default resolution for both phones.

In this shot of Ladyburn Lake at Druridge Bay Country Park in Northumberland, England, we see the Honor produced a much more saturated shot, while the Pixel offers more contrast. Either approach can make for a good photo, but I think the Honor's overcooked its shot, leaving me with the Pixel as my favorite.

I used the main cameras to try a portrait-effect shot of Lola the cavachon. The Honor's got an advantage on paper thanks to its 2MP depth sensor, but the image turned out very soft, with a limited depth of field. Meanwhile, the Pixel did not blur much of the background, but rendered Lola's curly fur in much sharper detail.

Perhaps the Honor algorithm is tuned for human subjects, which would explain the short depth of field — people's heads are not known for being particularly long. However pet photos are at least as important as those of people to the average smartphone photographer, so Honor could stand to improve this.

We move back to Druridge Bay and to the phones' 12MP ultrawide cameras for this next comparison. Aside from a different field-of-view, the Honor again cranks up its image's brightness and color saturation. Fortunately, it's not done so to excess like on the main camera. So I consider this round a draw.

Lastly I tested the Honor 90's selfie camera with its impressive 50MP sensor. It still takes 12MP resolution images like the Pixel 7a, but produces an overall cooler shot, in a reversal from what we saw with the Honor's rear cameras. The detail of both shots is similar, but the strength and accuracy of the Pixel 7a's portrait effect is much better here, although neither phone did a good job at capturing the edge of my glasses.

The Google Pixel 7a is one of the best camera phones around, despite its low price. It was always going to be a tough opponent for the Honor 90, so while the Honor phone's not triumphed here, it's done quite well just to be in the same conversation as Google’s superior shooter.

Honor 90 review: Performance

Honor picked the Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 Accelerated Edition to power the Honor 90, with the silicon assisted by either 8GB or 12GB RAM depending on which version of the phone you buy. In contrast, the Pixel 7a uses Google’s own Tensor G2 chipset while the Galaxy A54 taps into an Exynos 1380 system-on-chip.

The Honor 90 handily defeats the Galaxy A54 on every benchmark except our Adobe Premiere test in which we transcode a 4K video to 1080p with some minimal effects added. The Honor 90 seems particularly weak at that task taking 1 minute and 44 seconds to complete the job.

Meanwhile, the Tensor G2-equipped Pixel 7a beat the Honor 90 on every test, even if the margin is only small on the Geekbench 6 CPU benchmark.

The Tensor G2 is technically a flagship-grade chip, since you'll also find it in the Pixel 7 and Pixel 7 Pro. Compared to other flagships the Tensor G2 isn't that powerful, but when transplanted into the cheaper Pixel 7a, it offers power that beats any other Android in the same price bracket.

Honor's been very generous with storage space on the Honor 90 — you get 256GB by default with the option of upgrading to a 512GB model. Both the Pixel 7a and the Galaxy A54 only offer 128GB, though the A54 also offers a 256GB version in some markets and microSD expansion for up to another terabyte of space. But without shelling out for a roomy microSD card or extra cloud storage, you're going to fit the most stuff onto the Honor for the price. 

Honor 90 review: Battery and charging

A flagship-grade 5,000 mAh battery sits inside the Honor 90, making good use of the phone's large body. To test its capabilities, I put the same video at 1080p on both the Honor and the Pixel 7a at full charge, set both to 50% brightness and left them to play. 

After my usual three-hour test, the phones were neck-and-neck at 84% full. After another three hours, the Honor 90 had drained slightly slower, sitting at 64% to the Pixel 7a’s 63% reading. 

If you turn that percentage into milliamp hours drained, then the Honor has used more since it's got a bigger battery than the Pixel. But since it's also driving a much larger display at a much higher brightness, it's on balance the winner here.

When the Honor 90 does need refilling, Honor provides a 66W wired charger in the box, a speed that's faster than a lot of phones on the market, including expensive flagships from the biggest phone makers. On the Honor 90, this charger offers a 49% charge in 15 minutes, an 87% refuel in 30 minutes and gets the phone from 0 - 100% in 45 minutes. 

The Pixel 7a only reaches 41% in 30 minutes with its 18W charging. It does offer wireless charging though, which is something you don't get on the Honor 90.

Honor 90 review: Software

Installed on the Honor 90 is MagicOS 7.1, Honor's dressing on the Android 13 salad. Honor promises two years of full OS updates and three years of security updates, which unfortunately falls behind Google's full three-year and Samsung's full four-year update plans for new software.

MagicOS provides Honor’s familiar suite of unique features like large folders, the ability to temporarily summon widgets by swiping up on apps and cross-device collaboration with Honor's tablets and laptops. New for MagicOS 7.1, though, is Magic Text. This lets you read and interact with text in images, such as following contact details or addresses to relevant apps, create PDFs from the captured text or just copy and paste what's written in the image. It's a trick you can already perform in iOS or in One UI, so it's nice to see Honor catch up.

Honor 90 review: Verdict

Even among other attractively-priced midrange phones, the Honor 90 offers quite the bargain. You get a lot of phone for your money thanks to the large display, long-lasting battery and high-res main camera, even if overall photo quality comes up a bit short.

The Honor 90 delivers enough to make U.S. phone buyers jealous, even if the Galaxy A54 or Pixel 7a remain quality options. The Honor 90’s a world away from the iPhone SE, which may come with a powerful chip but also offers limited photography in a tiny, outdated chassis.

If you are in a country where the Honor 90 is sold, we still think you should check out the Pixel 7a and Galaxy A54 alongside the Honor, since they're better-rounded phones for the price. But the Honor 90 is absolutely worth shortlisting, especially if you want the maximum amount of display space, storage capacity and battery life for your money.