Long after the split from Huawei, Honor built a reputation for its excellent hardware. The company routinely adds the latest and greatest to its flagship phones. It is one of only a few Android makers to offer true biometric face authentication — even for unlocking secure apps, something that can’t be said for one of thebest phonestoday, theGoogle Pixel 7 Pro. But where Google’s phones are known for their impeccable software coupled with some hardware problems, the equation is the other way around for Honor. Its excellent hardware is often hamstrung by less-than-mediocre software. That makes the Honor Magic 5 Pro so exciting, the company’s latest flagship phone. It packs some serious improvements in the software department.
The Honor Magic 5 Pro is, as always, a hardware beast. It has a huge camera array with a triple 50MP setup, the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, an incredible LTPO 120Hz display, and so much more. But this year, it seems that Honor is finally taking software seriously. Even the pre-release software I initially got my hands on didn’t have any major issues. And despite a weird performance glitch I ran into a couple of times with my final review unit, there were no major deal-breaking issues with the software, much unlike with theHonor Magic 4 Pro, its predecessor. That doesn’t mean that everything is perfect, though. Let’s dive right into it.
Honor Magic 5 Pro
As the archstone of the Honor Magic 5 series, the Pro offers three 50MP cameras on the rear, a “floating,” vivid LTPO display, refined, extra hardware for display control, laser focus, color temperature, and more. It’s a minor update from the Magic 4 Pro, but still a whole lotta phone.
Availability and network
Sadly, the Honor Magic 5 Pro is not coming to the US, like so many other great phones out there. You can easily get an imported version on Amazon, though, and it isn’t much more expensive than it usually is if you would buy it in Europe or another market. Before you jump the gun, see if your US carrier supports the phone, though. Take a look atKimovil’s excellent Honor Magic 5 Pro resourceto get the full picture.
Design and display
If you’ve seen the Honor Magic 4 Pro, the Magic 5 Pro should be instantly recognizable. Like its predecessor, the Magic 5 Pro has a “quad-curved” display at the front with a pill-shaped selfie camera cutout at the top left, while a circular “eye of the muse” camera array sits centered at the top of the understated glass back. There are some refinements to be seen, though. The Magic 5 Pro’s big camera array still makes it just a little top-heavy, but it’s nothing compared to the Magic 4 Pro, which felt like it wanted to glide, top first, out of my hands while using it. The new frosted glass on the back is also really good at hiding fingerprints, even though I don’t love how slippery it makes the phone. Other color variants than the green one I reviewed here retain the glossy back, though.
I don’t love how the back of the phone curves up ever so slightly to meet the camera array. I feel like the curve is too subtle, making for a weirdly organic-looking design that makes me uncomfortable. Combine this with the fact that the camera array has the same color as the rest of the back; it also feels like the company is trying to hide the big bump it makes, which makes the phone feel less camera-focused than it actually is. I prefer the way the Vivo X90 Pro or the Xiaomi 13 Ultra deal with this, but this comes down to preference more than anything else. After using the Magic 5 Pro for more than a few weeks, I don’t mind it as much as I used to, either.
Like the Honor Magic 4 Pro, the Honor Magic 5 Pro comes with an unapologetically curved screen. The company again claims it’s a quad-curved display, though it’s hard to see any of that on the top or the bottom. The sides are clearly curved, leading to the usual issues like extra glare on the sides and slight discolorations when you look at the display straight on.
Given the size of the display, the curves are a necessary evil, though. On a technological level, you’re in for a 1312x2848 6.81-inch 1-120Hz display that reaches a brightness of 1,300 nits (with 1,800 nits peak brightness), making it more than easy to use in the sun. Honor’s display is a boon to look at, and it claims that the LTPO technology that offers 2160Hz PWM dimming makes it less straining for eyes. I do not usually have problems with this, but it’s good to have on board.
I’m also happy to report that the OLED screen is much better than its predecessor. On the Magic 4 Pro, dark gray colors were heavily rasterized, which every OLED suffers from. Still, it was a particularly pronounced problem on the Magic 4 Pro — despite Honor sending us a replacement unit after we first complained about the problems. Neither our Magic 5 Pro hands-on unit with unfinished software nor our proper review sample exhibits the problem to the same extent, though.
Other hardware and what’s in the box
As for the rest of the hardware, we’re looking at the top-notch Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, joined by 12GB of RAM and 512GB of storage. It’s the latest and greatest LPDDR5X and UFS 4.0, respectively. The battery comes in at a more than comfortable 5,100mAh which can charge at 66W wired and 50W wirelessly — gone is the much-advertised 100W wired and 100W wireless charging that the Magic 4 Pro has.
On the connectivity front, you will find Bluetooth 5.2, Wi-Fi 7, and 5G, with dual physical SIM and eSIM support. Like its predecessor, the Magic 5 Pro supports biometric face unlock for both the lock screen and apps while also offering a fingerprint scanner. For some reason, the company decided to downgrade to an optical solution. Last year’s Magic 4 Pro still had an ultrasonic sensor, which is generally more reliable and doesn’t need to light up for scanning. That said, the optical fingerprint sensor does the job just fine whenever you decide not to rely on face unlock.
Honor may not have changed too much on the surface, and it may look a lot like it did a year ago despite now being based on Android 13, but it’s clear that a lot of optimizations were done in the background.
The stereo speakers get decently loud and provide great clarity. Like many competitors, the bottom-firing speaker is stronger than the one at the top, doubling as the earpiece. When holding the phone in landscape mode and when not covering the bottom speaker grill, you’d be hard-pressed to notice this, though.
In the box is a 66W wired charging brick with a USB-A to C cable, a SIM ejector tool, the usual warranty card and information, and a simple, transparent plastic case. A plastic screen protector is also pre-installed on the phone.
Software and performance
As I mentioned, the software has been my biggest gripe with Honor in the past. Thankfully, things look much better on the Magic 5 Pro. First and foremost, the company promises three Android version upgrades and five years of security patches, which is right up there with Google Pixel phones but a little weaker than what aSamsung Galaxy S23would give you. This new promise alone is worth a lot, and it shows that Honor is finally committing to long-term support for its devices.
This same theme is also visible in the much-improved MagicOS 7.0. Honor may not have changed too much on the surface, and it may look a lot like it did a year ago despite now being based on Android 13, but it’s clear that a lot of optimizations were done in the background. The system runs smoothly and without bigger issues. I’m mostly fine using Honor’s MagicOS 7.0, and that’s a big compliment considering how bad my experience was with it last year.
While it’s nothing that truly woos me, the company added a few software tricks to stand out from the crowd. There is Honor Connect, which allows you to move your cursor freely across your Honor tablet, Honor phone, and your Windows computer with Honor’s software installed.
Its biometric face unlock mechanism also gives the software some features straight out of the Pixel 4’s playbook. You can enable so-called Air Gestures, which you can use to scroll through content or take screenshots using hand gestures in front of your screen. This might be useful when you use your phone while cooking and don’t want to touch the screen, though it takes a bit of getting used to it. Honor also supports more useful ambient features, like a camera-supported Smart View, which keeps the screen active as long as you look at it, among other things. It’s nothing new and available on many phones, but a much-appreciated addition nonetheless.
On top of this, the phone is fast and reacts smoothly to input while staying cool in virtually all circumstances outside charging and gaming. The Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 processor in it certainly does its part.
That said, there are some things I disagree with. Honor decided to turn off support for per-app languages, a new feature introduced with Android 13 that does just what its name implies. Some apps, like library app Libby, already rely on this. When you try to change your preferred language within the app on an Android 13 device, it will send you to the system’s per-app language setting. In Honor’s case, this is just a broken and unfinished stub within the settings app.
Honor Magic 5 Pro Gboard positioning vs. Google Pixel 7 Pro
Minor annoyances like these are spread throughout the system. When you gesture navigation and Gboard, the keys are further down than on other phones, right at the bottom edge of the screen, which makes typing rather uncomfortable. Gesture navigation also doesn’t properly work when you use a third-party launcher, which might be a dealbreaker for some people.
Speaking of launchers, Honor’s default launcher breaks with some conventions like long-pressing for app info and makes adding widgets cumbersome in favor of its own widget system called “Cards.” Then there is Honor’s system share sheet, which doesn’t support copying links and doesn’t show direct share targets. If you come from a Xiaomi, OnePlus, or Oppo phone, you might not mind these changes too much, but for Pixel and Samsung users, Honor’s software will take some getting used to.
Honor also isn’t too friendly to background apps. Google Tasks reminders would routinely reach me minutes or even hours after they were supposed to fire, and lesson reminders from Duolingo were anything but reliable. It’s possible to turn off a lot of the battery optimizations that cause these issues by hand, but this is something that no phone maker should force you to dive into. Apps should just work as expected. Honor is far from the only manufacturer doing this, but that isn’t any solace when you run into this problem.
I also ran into three instances of full system freezes, with the phone suddenly locking up and becoming painfully slow to react to any input. While using the camera, the viewfinder would all but freeze completely. I haven’t been able to pin it down to a single cause, but it seemed to happen more often when using the camera in battery-saving mode than in other circumstances. I contacted Honor about the problem, and soon after, the company pushed out an update that was supposed to fix this issue. Following the update, I haven’t run into it again, so it seems that whatever the problem was is fixed now.
The Honor Magic 5 Pro comes with a triple camera setup on the back that is arranged symmetrically in the form of a triangle, all with a resolution of 50MP. The primary wide camera supports optical and electronic image stabilization at f/1.6, while the ultra wide makes do with EIS only and offers a 122-degree field of view. The periscope telephoto camera offers a 3.5x optical zoom and both OIS and EIS, coming in at f/3.0.
When the Magic 4 Pro would routinely struggle with a stuttering viewfinder and all kinds of software problems, the Magic 5 Pro seems like a completely different device. The camera app is mostly reliable, providing a fun and satisfying experience. Hitting the shutter button is a near-instantaneous affair, and the phone comes much closer to the Xiaomi 13 Pro or the Vivo X90 Pro than many other phones I’ve tested.
Having a versatile camera setup like this is a boon, especially when all of them can produce equally high-resolution images. With the Honor Magic 5 Pro, you’re not going to have to compromise on optical zoom images or when using the ultra-wide camera — all three of them are class-leading. They can create great snaps on the go without worrying too much about composition and which lens you’re using.
The reason for this is the good hardware. Honor’s fusion technology automatically combines photos from different lenses to create the final image, mixing and matching depending on your zoom level and which details are important. This helps you create great images in both good and bad lighting.
Sometimes, the Magic 5 Pro has issues separating hair from the background
With this complicated imaging pipe, there are some minor inconsistencies cropping up. Honor seems to have particular issues with separating fine details from the background, like hair and leaves, which it likes to lump into a blob of color rather than the real thing. This didn’t happen too often, though. Another thing to note is that there are some issues with 100x zoom. Something goes terribly wrong during post-processing, as the viewfinder previews look substantially better than the effectively useless finished result. I’m sure both issues can be fixed with a software update.
One brand-new feature to come to the Magic 5 Pro is Motion Sensing Capture, which prioritizes fast shutter speed to provide crisp and motion-blur-free images of action scenes. you’re able to optionally also flip a switch in the camera settings that makes the phone automatically look for the right moments to hit the shutter, helping you capture the action.
Testing the feature, I’ve noticed that it’s a great way to take selfies with the back cameras, too, with the camera automatically snapping a picture when you look in the lens and smile. It likely needs more work, though, as it feels like it doesn’t only react to smiles but also to someone just looking at the camera, no matter the expression. Either way, it’s more meant as a backup when you take Motion Sensing shots, so you can’t expect too much out of it standalone.
Battery and charging
A calm day spent on Wi-Fi vs. a day of intense usage while traveling
The Honor Magic 5 Pro is an absolute beast regarding battery life. It’s hard to run down in a single day, even when you use it out and about during a busy day on vacation. I used it all day during a trip for public transit and walking navigation, taking tons of photos and some videos, and some light reading and surfing, and I never fully ran out of battery. One day, I came close, but that was more than five hours of screen-on time. That 5,100mAh battery is a great addition to the phone.
In the charging department, the Magic 5 Pro is a slight regression compared to its predecessor, which supported 100W wired and 100W wireless charging. The Magic 5 Pro only goes up to 66W wired and 50W wireless. A regression like this is never nice to see, but let’s be real: At 66W, the Magic 5 Pro still charges from zero to 100 in about 45 minutes, much faster than anything Google or Samsung offer. On the wireless front, the Magic 5 Pro’s 50W is still comparatively bonkers and supports 5W reverse wireless charging.
If you were hoping to leave behind all other cables and chargers while traveling, note that Honor’s charger and cable aren’t compatible with other USB PD devices. If you have headphones or yourfavorite tableton you while traveling, you’ll need to carry two chargers or forgo Honor’s fast charging in favor of carrying a single third-party cable and brick. This isn’t an elegant solution and something I haven’t run into a lot with other phones.
Should you buy it?
The Honor Magic 5 Pro is a serious upgrade over its predecessor, fixing a lot of the gripes we’ve had with it in our review. The display seems more uniform, its weight is much more balanced and less top-heavy, and it doesn’t lose any of the features that made its predecessor special. It’s the first Honor flagship phone I can recommend, even with the caveats mentioned in this review. I would still love for Honor to create software that feels more distinct from Huawei’s EMUI, but it’s getting there, and there isn’t much left to complain about.
The problem, as with so many great phones from China, is that Honor isn’t officially selling the phone in the US, and that means worse network support and limited warranty if you’re willing to pull the trigger on this phone. But when you look at this device without considering its limited availability, it’s definitely right up there with other phones in its $1,200 price category.
