Il Magic4 Pro, announced at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, was the proverbial test bed for Honor: after all, after the separation from Huawei a year and a half ago, he needed to demonstrate that he could walk on his own legs. And also shake off the identity of an economic brand.
The result is an undoubtedly premium and quality product, in the materials, in the performances, in the excellent photographic sector: in short, a test passed. And outdated, however, it is also the psychological threshold of 1000 euros (1099, to be precise) required for the only version available in Italy, the one with 8 GB of RAM and 256 of memory (not expandable). Which are less than those proposed by an illustrious one competitor come il Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultrawith which it is able to compete, but still many more than those which the end user, fond of Honor or not, is used to spending on a product of the Chinese company.
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Honor Magic4 Pro, the look and features
Placement considerations aside, let’s go into detail: what does the Honor Magic4 Pro look like and how does it perform? It is a really good 5G phone, but also a beautiful one, with an OLED screen Ltpo (here we explain why this standard is the future of displays) 6.81 ”with refresh rate up to 120 Hz and a resolution of 2848 x 1312 pixels. The curved design is elegant, with steel side finishes and a rear body resistant (to shocks and also to water and dust, less fingerprints), really pleasant to the touch and also to the eye, in the Cyan version (a teal clear which makes it particularly well in the sun). Important thickness and weight, 9.15 mm e 215 grams, a little more by inserting it into the transparent rubber cover included in the box (along with a massive 100W charger), which are not conducive to one-handed use, but exudes refinement and solidity. The choice of inserting the two front cameras in a side band located on the left, a sort of spot in the brilliant screen, is more divisive: one is 12 MP and one is 3D, for facial recognition, which is instant and precise (as long as you don’t wear sunglasses), and selfies they are not in the least comparable to those unlined by the Vivo V23but it compensates with precise bokeh and a feature that automatically fires as soon as it detects a smile.
Under the body, high-level specifications beat: Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 octa-core processor, Adreno 730 GPU and the aforementioned 8 GB of RAM and 256 GB of internal memory (the only possible doubt, in short, concerns the color: black or cyan). Components perhaps less impressive than other top of the range, but still more than enough to guarantee excellent performance in the most disparate uses, from the use of multiple apps together with watching videos and starting the most expensive games in terms of resources: the uploads they are very fast, the touch is always precise (ditto the fingerprint recognition), the large screen offers bright colors and the two speakers, stereo, are located one in the lower part and one in the upper part of the Honor Magic4 Pro, which defends itself very well also on the audio side (both at the microphone level and when playing calls and videos). However, we found some overheating too much, especially by squeezing the photographic sector to the maximum (we talk about it below), and also the 4500 mAh battery, while resisting quietly for a whole day of intensive use, still requires some optimization: despite a first post-launch update, in complete stand-by with closed apps and Airplane mode, consumption seemed a bit too high. And charging also took a few minutes longer than the 30 declared.
We close with a consideration on the Magic UI, now in version 6.0 and based on Android 12 (with full support for Google apps, even if Android Auto continues to throw a tantrum from time to time): undoubtedly clean and very gesture-centric, it didn’t drive us crazy. Designed to be exploited even without the need to activate the triptych of keys (to go back, close and open apps in the background), it soon convinced us to disable all its peculiarities to return to a more classic setting. On the other hand, the various shortcuts available are highly appreciated. But it’s all a matter of taste and habits.
Honor Magic4 Pro, the photographic sector
The strength of the Honor Magic4 Pro, however, is the department dedicated to photographic and video production: we wrote “production” because, in addition to the components hardwaremuch has been done in terms of software and optimizations via artificial intelligence, with solutions and features designed to offer the end user, even the less savvy and experienced, tools to create small, large homemade masterpieces.
If in terms of front cameras we were more lukewarm, turning the device changes everything: first of all due to the arrangement of the same, set in a large circle positioned at the top of the phone, but perfectly central. This Eye of the Muse (as Honor calls it) undoubtedly catches the eye, including 3 cameras: a 50MP wide angle (f / 1.8), a 50MP ultra wide angle (f / 2.2) and a 64MP Periscope telephoto lens (f /3.5), equipped with 3.5x optical zoom, up to 100x digital, with a mix of optical and digital that allows you to reach imperceptible details without sacrificing too much image definition (but exceeding 80x, digital tricks are all noticeable) , also taking advantage of the presets and improvements of the AI (like the impressive Night Mode, a little artificial, but really working). However, it is in the more technical and complex modes that the Magic4 Pro really gives its best: the Pro and Super-Macro offer excellent possibilities, in the photo field, while the video one gives the feeling of having in your hands not a simple cameraphone, but a real professional video camera, at least once the final result has been viewed. The videos in 4K and 60 FPS were not enough, there is a Cinema mode that offers slo-mo, HDR 10+, 10-bit recording, the possibility of capturing frames at the highest quality during shooting (without sacrifices in terms of definition and with all the necessary stability), and even real LUTs, i.e. look-up tables: for the sake of synthesis and simplification, it is as if they were filters that intervene not in post-production, but before you start filminggoing to offer cuts, colors, lighting and FPD that give a truly cinematic feeling to your video.
In addition, the included editor allows you to cut and add additional filters with extreme simplicity, as well as backing tracks and frames, or even sets of filters and music that automate and make the process even easier. Then there is a Story mode that invites you to experiment even more, thanks to mini-clips, less than 15 seconds (just like a classic Instagram Story), divided in turn into mini-snippets of videos already set to music and edited where the user inserts images. And the pre-set does the rest.
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Honor Magic4 Pro, in conclusion
We anticipated it at the beginning: Honor Magic4 Pro is an absolutely premium and high-end product, and it is a positioning that has been earned with its concreteness. Not only in price, slightly lower than the competition, but higher than what the Honor user is used to spending, but also and above all in the specifications, absolutely level. The 1099 euros requested for the only available model are justified by high quality components and software solutions which, starting from the excellent graphics sector, demonstrate great attention to detail and the will to have their say in an increasingly market. crowded and saturated, especially in the upper ranges where competition is fierce. Photos, videos and performance are top notchand not to fully convince, removed some youth errors that can be solved via updates, it is only a battery not yet optimized enough (which still resists a full day of use), some overheating too many and a proprietary interface, the Magic UI 6.0, which did not particularly shine. For the rest, excellent connectivity (5G, dual SIM, USB-C video output and full support for desktop mode), exceptional screen and an original rear look.
What we liked
What we didn’t like