Honor Magic 6 Pro, analysis: is good design and artificial intelligence enough to compete with the biggest models?

It seems that Honor is a customs company. Once again, the company took advantage of the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona to announce a smartphone that aims to compete with the most powerful models from brands such as Samsung or Xiaomi. In this case Honor Magic 6 Prowhich has interesting changes compared to its predecessor and that in Hypertext Over the course of several weeks, we carried out rigorous testing to check not only whether the generational leap we were expecting, but also whether this mobile phone is capable of competing with the likes of Xiaomi 14 or OnePlus 12.

Honor too, it seems conservative brand in several aspects. Honor Magic 6 Pro, in fact, practically inherits the design of its predecessor, as well as many of its features. It has almost the same camera setup and the same screen. There are only minor changes in a few key areas.

• CPU: The Magic 6 Pro comes with Snapdragon 8 Gen 3, the latest SoC from Qualcomm.
• Telephoto: Its resolution is now 108 megapixels, although it retains 3.5x optical zoom and up to 100x digital zoom.
• Battery: Honor Magic 6 Pro is equipped with a 5600 mAh battery. This is 500 mAh more than last year’s Magic 5 Pro.

Honor Magic 6 Pro is also equipped with several AI-powered features thanks to its proprietary MagficML language model, which allows, among other things, the creation of videos from images. All this for 1299 euros. Enough to compete with the limited premium range?

Design and screen: one made of lime, the other made of sand.

Honor is not one of those brands that attracts attention with its design. At least it is not like OnePlus or Google, who have mobile phones whose appearance is quite impressive due to the camera module or its color. In this aspect – at least in those versions that the company produces on the European market – Honor is different.

And this is good in this case. Honor Magic 6 Pro exudes elegance. The quality of their materials is amazing; frosted glass back, very comfortable; and the aluminum frames with a high-gloss finish match perfectly with the camera bump, which also has a ring in the same shade.

The front end will not leave you indifferent. Here Honor has made another small change compared to last year’s model: an island, so to speak, on which two cameras are located, now it’s in the center, not from the side. However, the most striking thing is the thin bezels as well as the double curvature that makes the phone look very elegant.

Now let’s talk about the screen, because I have mixed feelings here. The panel of the Honor Magic 6 Pro is generally excellent. This 6.80-inch OLED display with QHD+ resolution. and a 120Hz refresh rate for clarity and excellent color calibration. It also has a fairly high brightness level: 1600 nits peaks up to 5000 nitswhich means that we can play content in complete comfort even in direct light.

Dog? The lucky double curvature is quite pronounced and although it gives a more elegant aesthetic addition and a sense of greater depth when viewing the screen (since it appears that we have no bezels), in many cases it does interfere a little with the viewing experience of the display. .

Mainly because when the panel reproduces white tones, a kind of shading is created at the edges of the curve. In addition, it leads to unwanted touches when we hold the device with one hand and makes it difficult to type on the keyboard. In principle, nothing serious, but this makes the Magic 6 Pro panel a step below the competition. Respect, please, it’s time to follow in the footsteps of Samsung or Xiaomi and get rid of the double curvature on the screen.

Energy in abundance and spare battery

It’s hard to pick out negative aspects of performance when the processor is Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 3rd generation. And even more, with that generous 12GB of RAM. This configuration allows Honor Magic 6 to move with complete fluidity, no matter what we do, even the most powerful games will not be able to resist it. The software also seems pretty well optimized. I encountered almost no interruptions or lags in animations, and the terminal also handles heavy-duty processes like downloading multiple apps, transferring files, and more very well.

All this is also complemented impressive 5600 mAh battery, allowing you to spend an intense two-day day without any problems. For now, of course, some basic settings remain active, such as adaptive refresh rate, which allows you to automatically change the screen refresh rate depending on what is playing.

There is an important point related to performance (as well as software) that is worth mentioning: AI Features. Honor wanted to follow in the footsteps of Samsung and Google and join the artificial intelligence with additional features of MagicOS, its layer of customization, which works thanks to its own language model called MagicML.

This, in particular, makes it possible to provide the device with such functions as detecting text in imagesthe ability to detect addresses or events in messages to directly open Google Maps or a calendar, or intelligent image search, for example to determine the availability and price of a product.

These features, however, They’re not revolutionary at all.. Not at least compared to the AI ​​features of other mobile phones. In fact, text detection is something that’s been available on iOS for years, but image detection doesn’t seem to work very well. Honor has also included some AI features in the camera that might be a little more interesting, such as the ability to create videos from images. This works well, but the truth is that the results leave much to be desired.

In the Honor Magic 6 Pro cameras, the main character is the zoom.

Let’s talk about cameras. We reiterate that Honor has chosen a conservative configuration with some very interesting changes. To begin with, the company completely changed the telephoto lens, giving preference to one of 108 megapixels with 2.5x optical zoom, hybrid (which uses optical and then digital crop) up to 5x, and digital up to 100x. In addition to this, Honor has retained a 50-megapixel main sensor and an ultra-wide-angle camera of the same resolution.

Telephoto lens He is without a doubt the main character. I have to say that Honor has done a very good job here, with images taken at the 2.5x zoom offering stunning detail and excellent color calibration. These are results that are discussed in an even broader context.

Main sensor It also does a very good job, especially in terms of exposure. There is still good detail and processing that produces colors that are quite correct, although it does tend to saturate them slightly in some cases. The same thing happens with the ultra-wide-angle camera, which, although not the best, also does a good job with color and sharpness. Of course, the three cameras are a step below phones like the Pixel 8 Pro or iPhone 15 Pro. I would even dare to say that the OnePlus 12 offers better results on the wide-angle sensor (main), especially in terms of interpreting colors that are more similar to reality.

Is Honor Magic 6 Pro worth the money?

Honor Magic 6 Pro gave me the same feeling as Magic 5 Pro. It is almost a round product., with a good design, excellent characteristics and cameras that, although they do not have time to position themselves in the top 1, but give more than good results. And all this with an impressive battery.

Its negative sides? Double screen curvature and artificial intelligence functions that are not very well optimized and above all cannot compete with what Samsung or Google offers. Yes, these are small flaws that make the mobile phone imperfect, but the truth is that the Magic 6 Pro, like its predecessor, is still a very interesting option if you are looking for a mobile phone that stands out with its appearance. and design, which has good battery life and great power. Of course, it is a good option if we buy it through one of the offers that Honor offers for its launch.

You see, Honor Magic 6 Pro goes on sale at a price of 1299 euros. (100 euros more than last year’s model). And Honor, on the occasion of the launch, offers those users who buy it on its website a discount of 300 euros. Thus, the cost of the terminal will remain at 999 euros; much more interesting price. However, you should keep in mind that the smartphone has competitors, which also stand out, in my opinion, in three advantages of the Magic 6 Pro. One of these phones is the OnePlus 12, which I recently tested.