The Honor Magic 8 Pro Is My First Big Phone Disappointment of 2026

I will begin off with this shot above of a avenue in Edinburgh. At first look, it is nice — the picture has an honest publicity (albeit with overly brightened shadows) and correct colours. It is truly one of many higher photographs I’ve taken with the telephone. 

However a more in-depth look exhibits that issues begin to disintegrate. An disagreeable hazy halo surrounds the tower block, together with digital artifacts, the place the telephone is clearly making an attempt to each scale back picture noise whereas additionally rising the sharpness. 

Punch into the iPhone’s picture, and it is clear that Apple is processing the main points much less. There may be virtually no fuzzy halo across the tower and no artifacts from noise discount or sharpening. The small print on the brickwork look higher too. 

Switching to the Honor’s ultrawide digicam would not assist issues, with extra haloing across the tower and particulars which have a bizarre oil portray impact because of the digital sharpening. 

Once more, this picture above seems nice. It has a strong publicity and a colour stability that I truly suppose seems fairly good. 

However once more I see proof of heavy-handed digital processing, with the sky trying virtually minimize out in opposition to the sides of the buildings. If it seems like I am nitpicking, it is as a result of I’m. This telephone is pricey, and an elite price ticket ought to include elite efficiency.

We could take a look at some extra examples? After all!

The small print on this sundown scene truly do not look as overcooked as within the earlier photographs, however the Magic 8 Professional has brightened the shadows a lot that it is misplaced a variety of the great temper and drama that was current within the second. 

It isn’t that the digicam cannot take a very good shot — the {hardware} is greater than succesful. Take a look at this instance. The JPEG above has suffered by the hands of the telephone’s processing, with unnaturally brightened shadows, crunchy particulars and overly vibrant colours. 

And above is identical scene, taken as a DNG uncooked picture utilizing the telephone’s Professional mode and adjusted in Adobe Lightroom. I’ve maintained the great depth of the shadows, added virtually no additional picture sharpening and stored the colours at a pure stage. I truly actually like this shot and it goes to indicate that this telephone is completely able to taking good images — it is the picture processing within the digicam that is going too arduous. 

Living proof, I took the shot above overlooking Edinburgh utilizing the three.7x telephoto lens. It is overly vibrant — each within the highlights and within the shadows — whereas the noise discount and sharpening have resulted in crunchy particulars that look disagreeable, particularly when considered shut up.

But the DNG uncooked file above seems nice. I’ve barely touched this one because it did not want a lot. The drama of the sundown has been maintained with sturdy shadows and particulars that have not been destroyed by software program. 

Pushing the zoom to its 10x hybrid produced the decent-looking picture above of a lighthouse. However guess what.

That is proper, the Magic 8 Professional’s picture processing (left) has given it harsh, crunchy particulars that look disagreeable in comparison with the extra pure look of the iPhone 17 Professional’s picture (proper).

I did say I might taken some that I like, and certain, these images above are fairly respectable and never overly troubled by picture processing, for my part.

However at evening, the picture processing demon exhibits its hand but once more. The picture above is overly saturated with particulars misplaced in some areas on account of noise discount whereas different areas have been over sharpened. Perhaps it is a one off?

Nope! The colours have been significantly ramped up within the picture above whereas the noise discount and sharpening have once more had their enjoyable with the main points. 

Here is how the iPhone 17 Professional dealt with the identical scene. It is extra pure.

And here is a bizarre one — the software program smoothed out a variety of element on the buildings, giving them an unnatural clean look, however but there’s nonetheless an enormous quantity of picture noise within the sky and the darkish elements of the river. 

It isn’t tremendous simple to see, however it’s even produced these odd sq. patches the place the colours have shifted, presumably an error in how the telephone processes completely different elements of the scene. 

The iPhone 17 Professional’s shot has higher dealing with of noise and better-looking particulars. I do favor the extra cyan tone of the sky within the Honor’s shot, however that is me actually greedy at straws in looking for some positives. 

And one other instance of the telephone producing bizarre noise artifacts.

Nighttime outcomes from the ultrawide digicam are roughly in-line with what I noticed from the iPhone. The Honor’s publicity is slightly higher, however unsurprisingly, its particulars look far too digitally sharpened. 

And at 3.7x zoom, the Honor’s shot is barely brighter and better distinction than the iPhone 17 Professional’s, however sure, particulars do not look as pure. In all actually, although, neither telephone has precisely excelled right here. 

Secure to say then that I am disillusioned with the Magic 8 Professional’s digicam efficiency total. Like many telephone producers, Honor is leaning more and more arduous into its software program processing to beat the restrictions of small smartphone digicam sensors. However this telephone is an ideal instance of issues going approach too far. The DNG uncooked recordsdata I took present that the {hardware} is able to taking handsome photographs with pure publicity and clear particulars. Those self same photographs look, to my eye, actually terrible when the telephone’s picture processing has had a go on them.

Pictures is, after all, a subjective matter, and what may look good to at least one particular person can look terrible to another person. So certain, possibly you like hyper saturation and shadows which might be barely there. However a number of the larger issues — just like the picture noise in evening scenes or the blurring of particulars that ought to be clear — are goal indicators of dangerous picture processing. So, Honor, I am begging you immediately now: You could have an ideal digicam right here — please cease ruining it along with your software program. 

Honor Magic 8 Professional: Show and processor efficiency

Shifting on to one thing extra constructive now, I do just like the telephone’s 6.71-inch show. It is vibrant and vibrant, which makes it simply seen underneath harsh outside sunshine and permits colourful YouTube movies to pop properly. It is pretty for gaming, too, because of its max 120Hz refresh price that may dynamically shift to 1Hz to assist scale back the load in your battery. 

The telephone is powered by Qualcomm’s newest Snapdragon Elite Gen 5 processor, which places in a number of the greatest scores we have ever seen on our benchmark exams for each processor efficiency and graphics processing. It feels extraordinarily zippy in on a regular basis use. Enjoying demanding 3D video games like Genshin Affect was no downside in any respect, even once I cranked the settings to the max. 

Honor Magic 8 Professional: Software program and AI additions

The telephone runs Android 16 at its core, over which Honor has slapped its personal Magic OS 10 interface. It capabilities mainly like every model of Android, however you will see that some additions thrown in, principally within the type of AI instruments, together with ones like Google’s Gemini we’d see on different Android units.

The AI Pictures Agent permits you to use generative AI to upscale, recompose or take away objects from a picture or remodel it into just a few restricted types together with “Cartoon” or “Animation,” which I’d have assumed are the identical factor. Does it work? Effectively, I will allow you to choose.

Here is my unique selfie taken with the telephone.

And here is what the telephone’s “Cartoon” AI software has finished to me. I do not even want to consider a sarcastic quip; it very a lot speaks for itself. 

Elsewhere, you will discover instruments like an AI settings agent, the place you possibly can ask how you can do issues like dim your display brightness, and an AI Reminiscences software, which largely appears to be a repository for screenshots. You will even have Google’s AI instruments like Gemini Reside, Gemini Superior and Circle to Search, the latter of which will be accessed via a devoted button on the aspect of the telephone. The button, nonetheless, may also be programed to open and function the digicam — very like Apple’s digicam management button — and I discover it extra helpful in that kind.

Honor has mentioned that the telephone will obtain seven years of software program and safety assist, that means this telephone ought to nonetheless be good to make use of during to 2033.

Honor Magic 8 Professional: Battery life and charging