The Honor Magic 5 Pro is a flagship camera phone that continues the brand’s tradition of delivering high-quality devices, reminiscent of its parent company Huawei, but with the added benefit of full Google support. In this comprehensive review, we delve into the phone’s design, display quality, performance, camera capabilities, and more.
Design and Build Quality:
Similar to its predecessor, the Honor Magic 5 Pro boasts premium hardware and complete support for Google services, setting it apart from Huawei phones. The device features an elegant glass construction with a textured matte finish and a glossy aluminum frame.
The standout feature is the round camera bump, which adds a touch of uniqueness but contributes to the phone’s slightly top-heavy feel. Notably, an Eco leather back version is available exclusively in China. The phone is IP68 rated, ensuring superior water and dust resistance, and incorporates a new antenna setup for enhanced Bluetooth and Wi-Fi performance.
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Speaker Quality:
The Honor Magic 5 Pro boasts a pair of stereo speakers that offer loud and high-quality sound output. The speakers deliver well-balanced audio with great vocals, sufficient bass, and well-presented highs, providing an enjoyable multimedia experience.
Fingerprint Scanner and Storage Options:
For biometric security, the device offers a responsive under-display fingerprint reader and a secure Face Unlock system powered by a 3D ToF sensor. Storage options include 256GB or 512GB of onboard storage, though there is no provision for expandable storage via microSD.
Display Quality:
The Magic 5 Pro sports a curved 6.81-inch LTPO OLED display with a resolution of 1312 by 2848 pixels and a refresh rate of 120Hz. With its higher-than-average pixel density of 460 PPI, the content appears sharp and vibrant. The display supports 10-bit color and HDR 10 Plus, delivering excellent color accuracy.
The brightness levels are impressive, reaching up to 760 nits manually and nearly 1230 nits in auto mode for outdoor visibility. The LTPO panel adapts the refresh rate dynamically, ranging from a smooth 120Hz during usage to as low as 1Hz when idle, optimizing energy consumption.
Android 13 and MagicOS 7.1:
The Honor Magic 5 Pro runs on Honor’s MagicOS 7.1, which is based on Android 13. The interface is reminiscent of recent Honor or Huawei phones, featuring customizable looks, notification settings, and quick access options.
Notably, the Magic 5 Pro provides full support for Google Apps and services, which distinguishes it from Huawei’s offerings. Honor’s proprietary apps, including Gallery, Notes, System Manager, and Weather, are included, and the device’s IR blaster allows it to function as a remote control for appliances.
Performance:
Powering the Honor Magic 5 Pro is Qualcomm’s flagship chipset, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2. This chipset offers improved CPU and GPU performance compared to its predecessor, the Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1, and supports new memory technologies like UFS 4.0 and LPDDR5X RAM.
The device delivers smooth and snappy performance, ranking among the best in its class. However, during prolonged stress tests, thermal throttling was observed, indicating room for improvement in thermal management.
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Battery Life and Charging Speed:
The Magic 5 Pro houses a substantial 5100mAh battery, a notable upgrade from the previous model. As a result, battery life has significantly improved, achieving an endurance rating of 150 in hours. The device supports 66W fast charging, with the charger included in the box. Users can expect a zero to 75 percent charge in just half an hour.
Cameras:
Main cameras: We’ve made it to the cameras, which include a 50-megapixel main cam, a 50-megapixel ultra-wide cam with autofocus, and a 50-megapixel 3.5x periscope telephoto. You also get a DTOF laser focusing system, a flicker sensor, and a multi-spectrum color sensor. The biggest upgrade from last year is the main cam. It has a new sensor with larger pixels, a wider aperture, and OIS this time around.
Main camera image and video quality: The main cam takes 12-megapixel images by default, thanks to pixel binning and a slight crop. These daylight photos are some of the best you can get from a smartphone these days. There’s an impressive level of detail with balanced processing, and even fine details are well rendered. The colors are true to life, contrast is high, and the dynamic range is wide but not over the top.
Portrait mode photos are taken with the main cam, with a two-time serum applied by default. They’re solid, with excellent subject rendition and great separation. Portrait stickings at one times are even better, providing more detail than the zoomed ones.
In low-light conditions, the Magic 5 Pro applies automatic night mode processing to its photos. There’s also a dedicated night mode you can enable, but it provides the same results. These low-light photos from the main cam are excellent. They’re well exposed, with a ton of resolved detail and little noise. Colors are saturated, there’s plenty of contrast, and the dynamic range is impressive.
Videos can be taken with all of the cameras in up to 4K resolution. 4K videos from the main cam are great, with plenty of detail and sharpness, high contrast, true-to-life colors, and a balanced dynamic range. There is electronic stabilization available for the main, ultra-wide, and selfie cameras, and it’s always on to smooth things out.
In low-light, 4K videos from the main cam are average in quality. The colors look good, but the dynamic range is narrow, and the noise reduction smears a lot of the details. There is a night video mode available for the main cam as well. It’s limited to 1080p resolution, but it improves the exposure and dynamic range. You also get plenty of detail, low noise, and excellent colors.
Telephoto camera image and video quality: Now let’s talk about the telephoto camera with its 3.5x zoom. Its photos are very good, sharp, with plenty of detail and balanced processing. The colors are accurate, and the dynamic range is wide. There’s also a 10x zoom toggle on the viewfinder, achieved through a digital crop and upscale. These photos are a bit less detailed but still provide enough with a pleasant rendition.
The telephoto cam does a good job at night, taking photos with a nice exposure, impressive dynamic range, and low noise. The color rendition is great, and while the shots aren’t the most detailed, they’re sharp enough. Video from the telephoto comes at a 4x zoom, and the quality is alright. You get good colors, contrast, and dynamic range, but the detail level and sharpness are just average.
Nighttime zoom videos from the telephoto cam are soft, dark, and a bit noisy, but they’re still usable.
Ultra-wide camera image and video quality: Now we have the ultra-wide cam. Its photos are great, especially wide, with a lot of detail and a balanced rendition. The colors are true to life, the contrast is good, and the dynamic range is wide too. Since the ultra-wide has autofocus, you can use it to take macro close-ups. These are pleasant with good detail and sharpness in the center and wide dynamic range.
The low-light photos from the ultra-wide are excellent for this sort of camera. They’re surprisingly well-exposed with low noise, and you get good-looking colors and more than enough detail.
4K videos from the ultra-wide are great. There’s enough detail, low noise, and accurate colors. There’s plenty of contrast, and the dynamic range is decent. The low-light ultra-wide videos are usable. They’re noisy but have some detail, good colors, and okay dynamic range.
Selfie camera image quality: Finally, we have selfies from the 12-megapixel front-facing cam. They’re outstanding, with a lot of sharp detail that isn’t over-processed. There’s low noise, accurate colors, plenty of contrast, and above-average dynamic range.
So, that’s the Honor Magic 5 Pro. It brings pretty much everything you need in a flagship: a great display, premium hardware, fast charging, and solid versatile cameras. The most notable shortcomings are that you don’t get 8K video recording, and the thermal management of the chipset isn’t the best around. But if these don’t bother you, then the Honor Magic 5 Pro is worth a full recommendation.
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