A fusion of durability, performance and innovation
Luqman Hakim
You might have seen durable smartphones, able to withstand all sorts of impacts and falls without a scratch, or smartphones that can capture stunning images with sharp details.
However, Honor is bringing the best of both worlds to you through its latest flagship - the Honor Magic 6 Pro.
Build and spec
The Honor Magic 6 Pro comes in two colours - black and pastel-like Epi Green. The back cover uses some sort of leather-like material which gives it a unique feel.
Equipped with a 6.8-inch LTPO quad curved floating screen, the big and weighty build is what you would expect from current flagship lineups.
Then there's the not-so-discreet camera bump, which to me, can feel a bit weird as I have to place my fingers on it when playing games.
Overall, the phone is still bearable to put inside your pocket. Just make sure you're not wearing skinny jeans.
Camera
The Honor Magic 6 Pro sports an impressive triple camera setup, including a 50-megapixel main camera, a 50-megapixel ultrawide camera, and a 180-megapixel 2.5x optical sensor.
Additionally, the main camera has an automatic variable aperture of f/1.4 – f/2.0 which allows the camera to capture more detail in lower light situations.
It has 2.5x optical zoom and up to 100x digital zoom. The main sensor can capture clear and solid photos in the daylight with good colour consistency. At 5x zoom, the camera can still capture fine details from a certain distance.
But at times, the camera will choose the wrong subject to focus on so be sure to tap on your screen first before capturing a picture.
As for the 100x zoom, chances are no one is going to use it as much due to the unusable picture quality. But this is common in any smartphone brand. Video recording is limited to 10x zoom.
At night, the camera struggles to capture moving subjects a bit as you might notice occasional blurs in some photographs.
Quality starts to take a nosedive after over 5x zoom unless you are close enough to your subject for it to capture the details instead of taking pictures from the other side of the street.
MagicOS 8.0
One trick that the Honor Magic 6 Pro can do now is part of the Magic Portal. When you select something on your screen and then long-tap it, you can drag it off to the side of the screen. When you do, this function intelligently recommends your needed services.
For example, if you tap and hold on to a photo in an app or website, and drag it to the portal, you'll get options like Instagram, Gmail, or Slack. If you select an address and drag it to the side, you'll get maps as an option. If you select a text, you get options like Gmail, notes or Google Search.
Personally, I would prefer it if the Magic Portal fully opened the apps instantly instead of putting them in a mini window first. But this is merely nitpicking, and one can get used to the feature with prolonged usage.
A slight problem that I have with the mini window is that the touch screen may have difficulty detecting my finger if I want to highlight sentences or do editing on the Instagram story.
The phone also lets you use a split pull-down gesture to get the control centre and settings when you swipe down on the right side of the phone or notifications when you swipe down on the left side.
However, considering the phone's fairly large size, trying to access the notification can be quite a handful if you're right-handed. But you can still swipe left and right to swap between the notification and control centre.
Performance
The phone is packed with the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 smartphone processor by Qualcomm which includes the Adreno 750 graphic processing unit, the latest in its 700 series.
The rule of thumb that people generally use is that if a smartphone is equipped with the latest chipset, gaming and other tasks should be a breeze.
This is exactly the case with the Magic 6 Pro after testing various games that are considered graphically demanding and battery hungry.
Even after one hour of non-stop gaming, the 5600 mAh second-generation silicon-carbon battery drained about 17 per cent from full charging.
For your information, Honor was the first brand to introduce the world's first silicon-carbon batteries instead of using traditional lithium-ion batteries.
It was said that silicon-carbon batteries have a higher energy density compared to lithium-ion batteries.
This means that manufacturers can fit a higher battery capacity in the same size battery or slim down a device without reducing the capacity at all.
Honor claimed that it would help in situations when your smartphone is on low charge and starts draining the battery faster to continue drawing the same current.
Reports stated that the battery also comes with Honor E1, a battery management chipset for energy efficiency enhancement, to the Honor Magic 6 Pro.
The 5600 mAh demonstrates exceptional low-temperature performance, users can play video for up to 81 minutes at -20 degree Celcius with just 10 per cent battery level remaining.
A gaming and videography test was also conducted with the Honor Magic 6 Pro on a 30 per cent battery and rest assured, you can use it for almost an hour before needing to charge it.
However, results may vary depending on the battery health. New tests must be conducted after months of usage.
Durability
IP68 Rated water and dust resistance, armed with Honor NanoCrystal Shield, a five-star certification for SGS Glass Drop Resistance Ability in multiple scenarios, and able to withstand the cold. What more could you want in a durable phone?
During the phone's reveal event, guests were impressed with the amount of abuse that the Honor Magic 6 Pro took without a scratch.
From slamming it on the table to scratching the screen with knives and various tools. Safe to say you can even use it as a chopping board.
Verdict
If you're looking to purchase the Honor Magic 6 Pro as your first flagship phone, here are a few things to keep in mind.
Is it worth upgrading from low-end to flagship? An easy yes. As the name suggests, low-end smartphones do not offer the best specifications in many aspects.
This includes durability (if we compare it with the Magic 6 Pro), camera, performance, charging speed, battery life, and even phone features.
Whereas flagship lineups regardless of which brand will always try to keep up with the latest technology in chipset, user interface, and camera technologies.
How about upgrading from mid-range to flagship? This depends on what you are looking for in a smartphone.
If you're heavy on gaming but don't mind playing on lower graphic settings, most mid-range phones nowadays can offer a smooth experience.
If you're a daily photographer looking for a phone that enables you to tweak more settings than a regular smartphone ever could, a flagship might do the trick.
Putting aside the camera and performance, the difference in sound and display is not too significant between the two categories if you're not nitpicky about the minor details.
Always remember that for it to be a bang for the buck, one must fully utilise all the features included in flagship phones.
Considering everything, the Honor Magic 6 Pro is a significant upgrade compared to its predecessor.
