Honor Magic 7 Pro review - "Beauty on the outside, beast on the inside"

• The Honor Magic 7 Pro boasts beauty inside and out
• The battery keeps you playing for hours, with smooth gameplay that feels like a dream
• Too many AI features that might not be relevant to your gaming kit

Rugged edges, gunmetal blacks, and RGB lights on every available surface - with these kinds of aesthetics, it's not hard to spot a gamer-centric accessory from a mile away. But while other brands like Redmagic flaunt these neon-lit badges loud and proud, it seems like Honor is opting to go for a subtler approach, especially given the elegance of the Honor Magic 7 Pro.

At first glance, it certainly doesn't look the part when it comes to long hours of world-saving quests and hardcore PvP battles that wage on well into the night. Does this alleged "most beautiful phone" have what it takes to be your next gaming go-to under the hood?

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Table of contents:

• Honor Magic 7 Pro design and hardware
• Gaming experience and performance
• What's the verdict?

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Honor Magic 7 Pro Design And Hardware

Right out of the box, you can instantly tell how much love and effort was poured into making the Honor Magic 7 Pro a stunning beauty. Even just holding the phone in my hands made me feel like it was a true item of luxury, with its sleek curves, premium weight (at 223g), and not-at-all plastic feel. 

Mine came in a lovely silver-grey variant with a marble pattern on the back, the subtle Honor brand etched on one side to complement the matte finish. Don't expect any fingerprint-related woes here - gliding your fingers across the smooth surface won't leave a single trace, which is ideal for long hours of button-mashing that often come with sweaty palms.

Weaker grip with a twist

That said, the sleekness of it all comes at a price - there's absolutely no grip at all here, so you run the very real risk of dropping your prized beauty in the middle of a heated session. If and when it does slip from your grasp, there's at least the reassurance that the Honor Magic 7 Pro won't shatter into a million pieces or leave your beautiful phone a cracked and ugly mess. 

While it might look fragile, it actually boasts durable NanoCrystal Shield tech, SGS 5-Star glass drop resistance, along with IP68 and IP69 certifications that let you play through dusty winds raging around you or the occasional spilled coffee due to a rage quit gone wrong.

But perhaps what most people will notice upon feasting their eyes on this new flagship is its camera - an imposing set of four lenses that basically takes up more than a third of the back's overall real estate. I do have a bit of an issue with the way the camera is placed here (which I'll talk more about later on), but I suppose it needs that much space given the complicated tech chugging along underneath.

In particular, the AI Falcon Camera System has a 50MP Super Dynamic Falcon Main Camera, a 200MP Telephoto Camera, and a 50MP Wide Camera, with a superzoom function that, while fun, still needs a bit more work in my opinion (more on this later).

By the way, the package I received was the media review version, which means the commercial version that's on sale will likely have different inclusions in the box. Mine came with a simple USB-C cable and a SIM card ejector pin.

Gaming Experience And Performance

Now, that's all well and good, but how does it actually run when it comes to the heart of Pocket Gamer's reviews - mobile gaming?

Visually, the 6.8-inch LTPO Equal-Depth Quad-Curved Screen brings colours to life, topped with its resolution of 2800 x 1280 pixels and Super Dynamic Vivid Display. This doesn't mean you'll feel the dreaded eye strain after a few hours of wandering through Zenless Zone Zero's buzzing Sixth Street, though - the Natural Light Honor AI Eye Comfort Display takes care of all that, which supposedly simulates natural light to keep your eyes feeling cosy all throughout. 

Now, I can't claim to understand the science behind all this tech, but I personally didn't feel like my eyes were tearing up from the strain while testing this device. Maybe it does actually work - I can't say for sure - but I suppose they wouldn't have spent a big chunk of R&D on this if it weren't actually effective.

Quality of sound

One thing that did stand out to me compared to a previous Honor device I reviewed is that the Honor Magic 7 Pro's sounds are way more high-quality. I normally don't use my phone to listen to music without headphones or Bluetooth speakers, mainly because the output is usually pretty crappy. But here, listening to particularly bass-filled Lofi beats made me feel like I had a separate speaker on hand. 

It was a pleasant surprise to find that there's a dedicated menu for the sound effects and quality here - you can toggle the Premium Bass or opt for the 3D Surround Sound setting for a more immersive experience.

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That's apparently because of the Honor Surround Subwoofer built into the device - who does that, really? Honor does, apparently. It's no wonder the soundscapes in Resonance of the Ocean - from the seagulls soaring overhead to the waves crashing against the shore - felt more evocative than usual.

And the battery?

But the star of the show here, to me, is the massive 5270mAh Third-generation Silicon-carbon Battery, which happily gave me uninterrupted hours of gameplay without the need to charge up in between.

An hour of playing Etheria: Restart, for instance, only set me back by approximately 10%, and it didn't run hot at all. It did go up to 40.6 degrees Celsius while I was downloading and installing games, and 39.8 while charging (100W Wired and 80W Wireless) - which, by the way, took around 45 minutes to charge 60%.

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There are no lags or stutters here either, thanks to the Snapdragon 8 Elite Mobile Platform and 12GB+512GB memory. It also runs MagicOS 9.0 powered by Android 15 (and with Google Play installed), so it doesn't seem like it's going to follow in the footsteps of Huawei's HarmonyOS just yet.

What takes away from the experience, for me, is the clunky camera. The way it's positioned - not to mention its massive size that's smackdab in the middle of the backing - makes it a little awkward to hold up the phone while playing in landscape mode.

The camera also gets in the way of telescopic controllers - this means you can say goodbye to your GameSir G8 Galileo as the Honor Magic 7 Pro won't fit into the nested sections at all. 

What's The Verdict?

This is where things get a little bit shaky if you're in the market for one phone to rule them all, without extra dedicated gaming phones to lug around with you. The Honor Magic 7 Pro, while perfectly capable of hardcore sessions, puts a lot of focus on its AI capabilities that might not be a necessity for you. 

The camera is one thing - it boasts the AII-scenario Harcourt Portrait AI feature for pro-looking portraits along with the AI Motion Sensing Capture and HD Super Burst for action-cam-esque shots. It also features the jaw-dropping AI Super Zoom, which, when it was highlighted during the media demo, blew my mind.

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Imagine being able to take photos with up to 100x zoom and still have them looking crisp and clear, but the thing is - because it's AI-enhanced via the cloud - there are still little kinks that need ironing out, as you would expect from something that's AI-generated.

Superzoom

The superzoom kicks in once you hit 30x, but really, it's meant for natural landscapes and not for objects and people (don't spy on your neighbours, please). As you can see below, zooming in on my Neko Atsume collection generated a very unnatural look that, while clear, loses what the image really is (and adds a bunch of creepy cats to it, too).

And, again, all these AI features aren't really necessities for gaming, except maybe if you're using the AI Deepfake Detection feature to see if your guildmate is an actual person. It still functions perfectly well as an everyday phone, of course, but if you're not really big into AI, you're not gonna be able to maximise everything the device has to offer.

Overall, the Honor Magic 7 Pro is an AI-focused flagship that's beautiful inside and out. Little nitpicks keep it from being the ultimate gaming smartphone, but the powerful specs still make it a winner in my book.