Honor explained its new “dual flagship” approach today; both product lines, one being the regular number series and the other being the Magic V foldables, share the moniker “Magic.” There have been intriguing Magic Versus developments, but we’ll talk about them in another time.
Today’s main event was the introduction of the new Honor Magic5 and Magic5 Pro flagships.
The Star Wheel Triple Camera system is an evolution of the “Eye of Muse” camera ring design from the previous series. You need to be aware that the camera has switched to a triple 50MP arrangement after disregarding marketing jargon.
The primary module has a brilliant f/1.6 aperture and a 1/1.12″ bespoke sensor. In terms of light-gathering capacity, this is a vast improvement over the Magic4 Pro, which sported a 1/1.56″ sensor and an f/1.8 aperture. And Honor turned on optical image stabilisation for the primary camera (the Magic4 Pro skipped OIS). The f/2.0 aperture of the 50MP extreme wide-angle (122°) camera is also brighter than the f/2.2 aperture.
The periscope module has undergone major alteration. Instead of a 64MP sensor, it now sports a 50MP Sony IMX858 sensor. Using a brighter f/3.0 lens instead of f/3.5, the lens still provides 3.5x optical magnification and adds an Ultra Fusion Computational Optics technology to provide high-quality digital zoom up to 100x.
A variety of sensors, including a 3D ToF laser for focusing, a multi-spectrum sensor for colour temperature, and a flicker sensor, as well as sophisticated software functions, support the camera system. Users may record and edit videos on their phones using the IMAX Enhanced Movie Master. Speaking of recording 4K video, the phone can do it at 60 frames per second in either Magic-Log 10-bit log format or HDR10+.
If you glance around the phone, you’ll see its curved shape, which is said to have been influenced by Antoni Gaud’s designs. Gaud is the architect responsible for several daring and unique masterwork buildings in Barcelona, where MWC is held annually.
The 6.81″ display has four curved edges. The big LTPO panel has a 120Hz refresh rate. It features the same 1,312 x 2,848 pixel resolution as last year’s model, giving it a pixel density of 461ppi.
It can achieve a maximum HDR brightness of 1,800 nits with an enhanced design (close to double the 1,000 nits peak of the Magic4 Pro). It employs high-frequency PWM dimming at 2,160Hz when it needs to go down.
Also, the display has been tested for colour fidelity at two different brightness levels: 120 nits inside and 800 nits outdoors. This 10-bit panel is HDR10+ compatible. It also has a strong filmmaking background thanks to its IMAX Enhanced accreditation. The entertainment potential is additionally increased with stereo speakers with DTS:X Ultra.
Upper left corner of the front has a pill-shaped notch for a dual sensor. One is a 12MP sensor (f/2.4, fixed focus) for the selfie camera, while the other is a 3D depth sensor. This allows for 3D facial recognition, and the display also includes a fingerprint reader.
Time to talk about the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset, which controls everything. Honor equipped it with 512GB of UFS 4.0 storage and 12GB of LPDDR5X RAM. The phone comes pre-installed with Android 13 and MagicUI 7.1. While Honor also included a lot of proprietary hardware in the phone, this will just be a quick discussion.
The quarter from April to June will see the release of the Honor Magic5 line. The Magic5 Pro is available in Glacier Blue, Meadow Green, Coral Purple, Orange, and Black, whereas the standard Magic5 is available in Blue and Black.
The Honor Magic5 Pro is only offered in the 12/512GB variant, which costs €1,200 (about $1,270/£1,055/105,000). For €900 ($950/£795/78,500), the standard Magic5 (8/256GB) will be much more reasonable.