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Introduction
The Honor Magic 2 is one of several recent handsets that mark the return of the slider - bringing back a level of tactile interaction almost forgotten in these times of incessant tapping and swiping. The top slab holds the display assembly - a 6.4-inch AMOLED with minimal bezel, while the bottom is home to the rest of the bits like the battery, chipset and cameras.
Speaking of cameras, the Honor Magic 2 has no less than six of them. Admittedly, not all of them are strictly 'picture taking cameras' - the duo of 2MP modules that complement the 16MP selfie shooter are only used for depth detection. There's no such trickery on the back where you'll find three standalone units - a regular 16MP one, another 16MP one with an ultra wide angle lens, and finally a third, monochrome module.
There was a certain mechanical magic in the phones of old, but clamshells and sliders died out as regular displays gave way to touchscreens and physical keyboards became obsolete. A funny thing has been happening lately, however - the push for bezelless all-screen designs has forced engineers to come up with novel ways to arrange the stuff that typically goes above the display.
Those novel ways? The old mechanical ways of operating the phone with a slider.
The smartphone packs Huawei's own latest Kirin 980 chipset that you'll find in the Mate 20 and 20 Pro, so there's some 7nm magic for the Magic 2, too. With no less than 6GB of RAM and 128GB of base storage, there's hardly any grounds for complaint when it comes to the essentials. Add to that the Android 9.0 OS and the Honor slider is as current on the software side as it is on the internals.
Honor Magic 2 specs
- Body: Aluminum frame, glass back; 157.3 x 75.1 x 8.3 mm, 206g; blue, black and red gradient color schemes.
- Screen: 6.39" AMOLED; 19.5:9 aspect ratio FullHD+ (2340x1080px), 403ppi.
- Rear cameras: Primary: 16MP; f/1.8 aperture, 27mm equivalent lens, PDAF; Ultra wide-angle: 16MP; f/2.2 aperture, 17mm equivalent lens, fixed focus. Monochrome: 24MP; f/1.8 aperture, 27mm equivalent lens, PDAF.
- Front cameras: Primary: 16MP, f/2.0 aperture, 27mm equivalent lens; Depth sensors: 2x2MP, f/2.4 aperture.
- Chipset: Kirin 980 chipset, octa-core processor (2xA76 @2.6GHz + 2xA76 @1.92GHz +4xA55 @1.8GHz), Mali-G76 MP10 GPU.
- Memory: 6GB of RAM + 128GB storage or 8GB of RAM + 128/256GB of storage.
- OS: Android 9.0 Pie with Magic UI 2.0.0.
- Battery: 3,500mAh Lithium Polymer (sealed); Huawei SuperCharge 40W fast charging.
- Connectivity: Dual-SIM; LTE-A, 3-Band carrier aggregation, Cat.21 (1400Mbps/200Mbps); USB Type-C; Wi-Fi a/b/g/n/ac; GPS; Bluetooth 5.0.
- Misc: Under-display fingerprint reader; single bottom-firing speaker.
Staying current also means there's no headphone jack - sadly, such are the trends. And being ahead of the curve in terms of design has resulted in less room for the battery than on the Mates we mentioned. But then the bundled SuperCharge power brick is there for quick top-ups. What else is in the package?
Honor Magic 2 unboxing
The Magic 2 comes in a blue cardboard box with the phone's outline printed on top - with the slider mechanism extended, of course. We revealed the best bit in the contents - the Huawei SuperCharge fast charger, capable of supplying 40W of power to the phone. It takes a proprietary cable to do the trick and one is included.
There's also a USB-C to 3.5mm adapter bundled, which is the next best thing after actually having a 3.5mm jack on the phone. A nice treat awaits inside the sleeve that holds the warranty and other paperwork - Honor's thrown in a hard case to protect (but also hide) the shiny back.
Design and 360-degree spin
Clearly, if you're eyeing up the Honor Magic 2 it's for one primary reason - it's a slider! The display part on the top slides against the rest of it on the bottom with a very solid and positive motion.
There are hard stops at both ends of the slide, and you can't leave it mid-way - it's either fully collapsed, or fully extended. In the extended state you could try and bend one away from the other and it will give a little, but if you refrain from deliberate abuse, there's no reason to think it's particularly prone to breaking.
Now, one type of abuse it'll inevitably suffer is simply being opened and closed just for the fun of it - we know, we did it constantly. A couple of weeks of that in the office hasn't made it any wobblier or loosened up the bits and pieces, so there's that. We're not entirely sure how many actuations the mechanism will survive, but they better be a lot.
It takes just the right amount of effort to move the display down most of the times, but you might find yourself struggling for grip if your hands are cold and dry. The bundled hard case for the back isn't much grippier, but it's perhaps one better than the bare glass phone back.
Speaking of, the back comes with a shiny mirror gradient paint job that is quite the eye catcher. Of course, it attracts fingerprints like there's no tomorrow, so you'll want to do a thorough wipe-down before showing it off to your friends.
This whole slider thing isn't just for its own sake - rather, it's a consequence of the push for bezelless displays, which the one on the Magic 2 sort of is. A couple of millimeters up top and on the sides and a bit more on the bottom is pretty close to bezelless, in our book.
You might have noticed the distinct lack of a notch, meaning the selfie cameras are somewhere else - slide down the display and they show up underneath. That's a requirement for the face recognition to work, and we don't mind it one bit - not that we need a reasonable excuse for sliding it.
There's a very pleasing mechanical feel to unlocking the Magic 2 - the face unlock is almost instantaneous once you slide open the cameras, and you're fooled into thinking it's the slide that unlocks the phone. Almost. Oddly, there's no option for actually unlocking with the slider only - if you disable all types of security and slide the display down, it'll require a swipe to unlock - an opportunity missed right there.
Sliding the phone shut should perhaps lock it back but it doesn't and whether you are okay with that depends on how you look at it On the one hand, if you slide it open to unlock, you expect the opposite action to lead to the opposite result. On the other, you shouldn't have to keep it open to be able to use it - after all, that would leave you with more bezel than on any other phone, and that would be counterproductive. In any case, we didn't find an option for locking it by closing it, so all of the above were just pointless musings.
Now, in addition to the face unlock, there's also an under display fingerprint sensor - that's still cooler than regular fingerprint sensors, it's just that the slider took all the attention. Plus this particular under display sensor isn't very fast or reliable - we found it to be somewhat slow-ish and picky about finger orientation and pressure.
The rest of the controls are fairly typical - a power button on the right, slightly above the midpoint and a volume rocker above it. The buttons are on the small side, but the travel is good, and the click action is fairly positive so we didn't encounter problems using them.
The SIM card tray is on the left and our review unit is dual SIM. There's no microSD support, sadly, and even if the 128GBbase storage is plenty, a card slot would always be welcome. We can imagine, however, that internal space wasn't abundant due to the two-piece design, and the card slot didn't make it.
Down on the bottom you'll find the USB-C port in the middle, the only loudspeaker on the left, and the primary mic on the right. Up top, there's another mic and what we initially thought was an IR blaster, but it turned out to be an ambient light sensor. The eapiece gets a port on the top edge of the display slab so you can talk with the slider closed, but the actual sound driver is underneath.
The Honor Magic 2 measures 157.3x75.1x8.3mm, which isn't half bad for a 6.4-inch phone. It's particularly impressive how thin it is, given that two-piece build must have meant extra layers. It's objectively quite heavy at 206g, but it doesn't feel like it - probably it's just us being overhyped about the slider design.
6.4-inch AMOLED could be brighter, is accurate sometimes
The Magic 2 is equipped with a 6.39-inch AMOLED display that covers almost the entire front of the device. It's in a 19.5:9 aspect ratio with a 2340x1080px resolution resulting in a pixel density of 403ppi.
In our brightness test, the Magic 2 posted results typical of AMOLEDs - a maximum value of 433nits is to be expected. However, there was no boost in Auto brightness mode, where a lot of other phones can pump out more than 600nits when the ambient light calls for it. We measured a minimum brightness of 2nits - great for viewing in very dark surroundings without putting a strain on the eyes.
| Display test | 100% brightness | ||
| Black, cd/m2 | White, cd/m2 | ||
| 0 | 433 | ∞ | |
| 0.278 | 453 | 1629 | |
| 0.311 | 507 | 1629 | |
| 0.326 | 508 | 1558 | |
| 0.414 | 470 | 1135 | |
| 0 | 458 | ∞ | |
| 0.002 | 624 | 312000 | |
| 0.314 | 461 | 1468 | |
| 0 | 418 | ∞ | |
| 0.29 | 526 | 1814 | |
| 0.377 | 490 | 1300 | |
| 0.465 | 600 | 1290 | |
| 0 | 453 | ∞ | |
| 0 | 455 | ∞ | |
| 0.347 | 491 | 1415 | |
| 0.554 | 778 | 1404 | |
| 0 | 402 | ∞ | |
| 0 | 602 | ∞ | |
In our sunlight legibility test, the Magic 2 posted a respectable score for contrast, towards the top for its class. It actually fares better than the Mate 20 non-Pro, but that's to be expected given the inherent advantages of the AMOLED tech over LCD.
Sunlight contrast ratio
- Apple iPhone XS
5.171 - Apple iPhone X
5.013 - Huawei Mate 20 Pro
4.965 - OnePlus 5T
4.789 - Samsung Galaxy S8
4.768 - Samsung Galaxy S8+
4.658 - Samsung Galaxy S9
4.63 - Samsung Galaxy S6 edge+
4.615 - Samsung Galaxy S9+
4.537 - Samsung Galaxy Note9
4.531 - Apple iPhone XS Max
4.516 - Sony Xperia XZ3
4.502 - Motorola Moto Z2 Play
4.459 - Oppo R11
4.454 - Samsung Galaxy S7 edge
4.439 - OnePlus 3
4.424 - Samsung Galaxy S7
4.376 - Google Pixel 3
4.35 - OnePlus 6
4.321 - HTC One A9
4.274 - LG V40 ThinQ
4.256 - Oppo R15 Pro
4.251 - Samsung Galaxy Note7
4.247 - Samsung Galaxy A3
4.241 - Nokia 8
4.239 - Google Pixel 2 XL (pre-update)
4.234 - OnePlus 3T
4.232 - Google Pixel XL
4.164 - ZTE Axon 7
4.154 - Samsung Galaxy Note8
4.148 - Meizu Pro 7 Plus
4.147 - OnePlus 6T
4.138 - Samsung Galaxy S6 edge
4.124 - Samsung Galaxy A7 (2017)
4.124 - vivo V11
4.113 - Huawei Mate 10 Pro (normal)
4.096 - Samsung Galaxy Note5
4.09 - Huawei P20 Pro
4.087 - Xiaomi Mi 8
4.086 - Meizu 15
4.082 - Nokia 6 (2018)
4.052 - Google Pixel 2 (pre-update)
4.023 - LG V30
4.022 - Huawei Nexus 6P
4.019 - vivo NEX S
4.012 - Honor Magic 2
4.010 - Samsung Galaxy J7 Pro
3.998 - OnePlus X
3.983 - Vivo Xplay5 Elite
3.983 - LG G7 ThinQ (outdoor)
3.978 - Oppo R7s
3.964 - Apple iPhone 7
3.964 - Apple iPhone 8 (True Tone)
3.957 - Huawei P9 Plus
3.956 - Oppo Find X
3.954 - Meizu Pro 6 Plus
3.935 - Lenovo Moto Z
3.931 - Samsung Galaxy A7 (2016)
3.918 - OnePlus 5
3.914 - Samsung Galaxy C5
3.911 - Xiaomi Mi 8 SE
3.901 - Samsung Galaxy C7
3.896 - Samsung Galaxy A5
3.895 - Samsung Galaxy J7 outdoor
3.879 - Samsung Galaxy J2 outdoor
3.873 - Motorola Moto G6 Plus
3.865 - Samsung Galaxy A8
3.859 - Samsung Galaxy A8 (2018)
3.842 - Apple iPhone 6
3.838 - Microsoft Lumia 950XL
3.837 - Samsung Galaxy A6+ (2018)
3.834 - Sony Xperia XZs
3.818 - Samsung Galaxy A9 (2016)
3.817 - Motorola Moto X (2014)
3.816 - Samsung Galaxy J7 (2017)
3.812 - Samsung Galaxy A5 (2017)
3.804 - Samsung Galaxy J7 (2016) outdoor mode
3.802 - Xiaomi Redmi Pro
3.798 - LG V20 Max auto
3.798 - Sony Xperia XZ
3.795 - Samsung Galaxy A5 (2016)
3.789 - Apple iPhone 6s
3.783 - Meizu Pro 5
3.781 - Microsoft Lumia 650
3.772 - Xiaomi Mi 6
3.767 - Sony Xperia XZ1
3.765 - Samsung Galaxy J7 (2016)
3.756 - Nokia 8 Sirocco
3.745 - Sony Xperia XZ1 Compact
3.729 - Apple iPhone 8 Plus (True Tone)
3.725 - Oppo F1 Plus
3.709 - Vivo X5Pro
3.706 - Samsung Galaxy A3 (2017)
3.688 - Huawei P20
3.683 - Apple iPhone SE
3.681 - Huawei Mate 9
3.68 - Samsung Galaxy A7
3.679 - Sony Xperia XZ2 Compact
3.675 - Meizu PRO 6
3.659 - BlackBerry Priv
3.645 - Sony Xperia XA1 Ultra
3.597 - Apple iPhone 7 Plus
3.588 - Sony Xperia XZ2
3.58 - LG G6
3.556 - Apple iPhone 6s Plus
3.53 - Motorola Moto Z Play
3.526 - Samsung Galaxy J3 (2016)
3.523 - Samsung Galaxy J3 (2016) outdoor mode
3.523 - Acer Jade Primo
3.521 - Microsoft Lumia 950
3.512 - Oppo R7 Plus
3.499 - Nokia 7 plus
3.479 - nubia Z11
3.466 - Huawei P10 Plus
3.456 - HTC U Ultra
3.453 - Motorola Moto G6
3.448 - Sony Xperia XA2 Ultra
3.445 - Sony Xperia XA2 Plus
3.445 - Samsung Galaxy J7
3.422 - Motorola Moto G6 Play
3.419 - Meizu MX5
3.416 - LG V20
3.402 - Samsung Galaxy A6 (2018)
3.397 - Xiaomi Redmi Note 5 AI Dual Camera
3.393 - LG G7 ThinQ
3.39 - Huawei P10
3.379 - Samsung Galaxy J5 (2016)
3.378 - Oppo R9s
3.352 - Honor Play
3.349 - Honor 8 Pro
3.341 - Oppo F7
3.333 - Oppo R7
3.32 - Lenovo P2
3.316 - Archos Diamond Omega
3.305 - Honor 9
3.289 - Xiaomi Mi 5s
3.276 - Nokia 5
3.261 - Nokia 6 (Chinese version)
3.244 - Nokia 6 (Global version)
3.238 - Samsung Galaxy J2
3.235 - Oppo Realme 2 Pro
3.235 - Sony Xperia X Performance
3.234 - Xiaomi Mi Note 2
3.228 - Motorola Moto X Play
3.222 - Oppo F3 Plus
3.218 - BlackBerry KEY2
3.212 - Huawei Mate 9 Pro
3.206 - Huawei P9
3.195 - Xiaomi Mi Mix 2
3.19 - ZTE Nubia Z17
3.159 - Oppo R11s
3.153 - Lenovo Vibe Shot
3.113 - Honor 8X
3.113 - HTC U11 Life
3.108 - Motorola Moto X Force
3.105 - LG Nexus 5X
3.092 - HTC U11
3.089 - Xiaomi Mi A2 Lite
3.087 - HTC U12+
3.085 - Xiaomi Redmi S2 (Y2)
3.077 - Huawei Mate S
3.073 - Oppo F9
3.069 - Microsoft Lumia 640 XL
3.065 - Xiaomi Mi Max 3
3.061 - Xiaomi Pocophone F1
3.059 - Huawei Mate 20
3.052 - Huawei Mate 20 Lite
3.051 - Motorola One (P30 Play)
3.026 - Apple iPhone 6 Plus
3.023 - Asus Zenfone 4 ZE554KL
3.019 - Sony Xperia XA1
3.012 - Motorola Moto X4
3.012 - Oppo Realme 2
3.006 - Sony Xperia L1
2.994 - Sony Xperia X
2.989 - LG Q6
2.987 - Huawei P10 Lite
2.974 - Samsung Galaxy Note
2.97 - Xiaomi Redmi Note 6 Pro
2.966 - Huawei P20 Lite
2.952 - Xiaomi Redmi 5
2.951 - Huawei Mate 8
2.949 - Sony Xperia XA2
2.938 - Oppo Realme 1
2.932 - Razer Phone 2
2.932 - Xiaomi Redmi 4
2.92 - Xiaomi Redmi 3S
2.913 - Xiaomi Redmi 5 Plus
2.913 - Sony Xperia XA Ultra
2.906 - LG G5
2.905 - Huawei Honor View 10
2.896 - Xiaomi Redmi 3s Prime
2.893 - Xiaomi Mi 5s Plus
2.884 - Sony Xperia XZ Premium (sRGB)
2.877 - Sony Xperia XZ Premium
2.877 - Sony Xperia Z5
2.876 - Nokia 3
2.871 - Sony Xperia XZ2 Premium
2.867 - Xiaomi Mi 8 Lite
2.862 - Microsoft Lumia 550
2.851 - Nokia 3.1
2.837 - Realme U1
2.815 - Lenovo Moto M
2.813 - Nokia 7.1
2.804 - Xiaomi Redmi 3 Pro
2.803 - Sony Xperia Z5 compact
2.784 - Honor 10 (Vivid)
2.757 - Nokia 2
2.752 - Meizu MX6
2.751 - LG V10
2.744 - Huawei Mate 10 (normal)
2.742 - Motorola Moto G5S Plus
2.737 - Xiaomi Redmi 3
2.735 - Huawei Honor 7X
2.734 - Xiaomi Redmi Note 4 (S625)
2.714 - Meizu M5
2.71 - Xiaomi Mi A2
2.696 - Sony Xperia M5
2.69 - Xiaomi Mi A1
2.689 - Huawei P9 Lite
2.679 - Xiaomi Redmi 4 Prime
2.679 - vivo V7+
2.671 - Vivo V3Max
2.659 - Xiaomi Mi Mix
2.658 - Huawei Mate 10 Lite
2.654 - Oppo F5
2.653 - Doogee Mix
2.642 - Xiaomi Mi 4i
2.641 - Xiaomi Redmi 4a
2.635 - Sony Xperia Z3
2.618 - Xiaomi Mi 5X (Standard)
2.616 - Sony Xperia XA
2.609 - Motorola Moto G4 Plus
2.582 - Motorola Moto G4 Plus (max auto)
2.582 - Meizu M5s
2.58 - Xiaomi Mi 4c
2.574 - LeEco Le Max 2
2.567 - Microsoft Lumia 640
2.563 - Asus Zenfone 3 ZE552KL
2.563 - Huawei P Smart
2.563 - Xiaomi Mi Max 2
2.561 - HTC U11+
2.556 - Xiaomi Redmi Note 5A (Y1)
2.556 - Lenovo Moto G4
2.544 - Lenovo K6 Note
2.544 - Oppo F1
2.528 - Sony Xperia Z5 Premium
2.525 - Huawei Honor 7 Lite / Honor 5c
2.506 - Sony Xperia M4 Aqua
2.503 - BlackBerry Motion
2.494 - Oppo F1s
2.481 - Motorola Moto G
2.477 - Lenovo Vibe K5 Plus
2.473 - Huawei G8
2.471 - Huawei nova
2.467 - Sony Xperia Z
2.462 - Lenovo Vibe K5
2.459 - Meizu m3 max
2.447 - Xiaomi Mi 4
2.424 - Xiaomi Mi 5X (Auto)
2.417 - HTC 10 evo
2.407 - Huawei Honor 7
2.406 - Vivo V7
2.404 - Sony Xperia E5
2.386 - ZUK Z1 by Lenovo
2.382 - HTC 10
2.378 - Oppo F3
2.376 - vivo V5 Plus
2.371 - Meizu m1 note
2.362
Color rendition is a very odd affair with the Magic 2. It can reproduce the sRGB color space with a high level of fidelity - we measured a stellar average DeltaE of 1.6 and a maximum of 2.6. Only to get there, you need to select the Normal color mode, and fiddle with the custom temperature wheel and have a colorimeter to give you feedback along the way. We achieved these numbers with the settings as follows:
Display settings for most accurate rendition of the sRGB color space (that we achieved)
The Normal/Default preset does yield a respectably accurate rendition of the sRGB color space with an average DeltaE of 2.4, but the greenish whites (DeltaE of 5.4) spoil the look a bit. The rest of the Color/Temperature combos aren't accurate to any color space, and the out-of-the-box setting of Vivid/Default produces an average DeltaE of 6.0 against an sRGB target and 5.0 when trying for DCI-P3.
Honor Magic 2 battery life
The Honor Magic 2 packs a 3,500mAh battery, a smaller capacity than the Mate 20 (4,000mAh) and 20 Pro (4,200mAh). That said, the Magic's power pack is a bit bigger than the other high-end slider on the market, the Mi Mix 2 (3,200mAh), and 3,500mAh isn't too bad to begin with.
Indeed, battery life turned out more than good enough - close to 16 hours of looping videos is an excellent result and the 13:45 hours on the web is plenty as well, while a full 24-hour day of voice calls on a charge is more than some of us have clocked in during the last quarter. Factoring in the standby time, we got an overall endurance rating of 89 hours.
Our battery tests were automated thanks to SmartViser, using its viSer App. The endurance rating above denotes how long a single battery charge will last you if you use the Honor Magic 2 for an hour each of telephony, web browsing, and video playback daily. We've established this usage pattern so that our battery results are comparable across devices in the most common day-to-day tasks. The battery testing procedure is described in detail in case you're interested in the nitty-gritty. You can check out our complete battery test table, where you can see how all of the smartphones we've tested will compare under your own typical use.
The Huawei SuperCharge proprietary fast charging tech is another checkbox on the Magic 2's specsheet - the Mate 20 Pro has it too, but the plain Mate 20 doesn't, so Magic 2 > Mate 20 in this respect. With the bundled charger and cable the Magic 2 will go from 0% to 100% in 1:02h, while a 30-minute charging stint will leave you at 70% if you're starting from flat. Impressive stuff, if not quite Oppo's SuperVOOC level of impressive.
Loudspeaker
The Magic 2 has a single loudspeaker - a bottom-firing one. Even though the earpiece has a pass-through port on the display part of the slider, it's not being used to output sound when playing music or videos.
It may be just one, but it's plenty loud as it is, easily making it to the 'Excellent' bracket in our three-pronged test. It also sounds deeper and boomier than the majority of phones out there.
| Speakerphone test | Voice, dB | Ringing |
Overall score | |
| 68.6 | 73.4 | 72.4 | Good | |
| 68.1 | 73.2 | 73.7 | Good | |
| 68.3 | 73.8 | 75.8 | Good | |
| 66.5 | 72.0 | 79.8 | Good | |
| 69.4 | 70.9 | 79.9 | Very Good | |
| 67.1 | 72.9 | 81.6 | Very Good | |
| 67.8 | 70.0 | 84.2 | Very Good | |
| 68.3 | 72.7 | 81.8 | Very Good | |
| 67.2 | 72.5 | 84.5 | Very Good | |
| 70.7 | 73.8 | 80.7 | Very Good | |
| 70.3 | 73.4 | 83.8 | Very Good | |
| 71.7 | 74.4 | 81.6 | Very Good | |
| 71.0 | 75.4 | 82.9 | Excellent | |
| 76.9 | 74.8 | 79.3 | Excellent | |
| 72.5 | 73.6 | 85.2 | Excellent | |
| 75.6 | 76.0 | 81.1 | Excellent |
Audio quality
The Honor Magic 2's output proved to be of decent clarity - its stereo crosstalk reading was somewhat high with an active external amplifier, but the good news is that it barely dropped any further when headphones came into play, so it's actually decent for the case.
Headphones also caused some minor intermodulation distortion and dropped the volume from high to just above average, but all in all, few people will be unhappy with the output. Still, we've seen better from some competing flagships - particularly in the loudness department.
| Test | Frequency response | Noise level | Dynamic range | THD | IMD + Noise | Stereo crosstalk |
| +0.05, -0.01 | -93.4 | 93.4 | 0.0022 | 0.0078 | -61.3 | |
| +0.27, -0.10 | -82.9 | 92.1 | 0.0084 | 0.340 | -56.0 | |
| +0.02, -0.16 | -92.1 | 92.0 | 0.0017 | 0.013 | -85.6 | |
| +0.07, -0.07 | -92.1 | 92.4 | 0.0021 | 0.106 | -66.5 | |
| +0.03, -0.05 | -93.4 | 93.3 | 0.0010 | 0.0070 | -93.8 | |
| +0.17, -0.15 | -93.2 | 93.1 | 0.0056 | 0.245 | -61.1 | |
| +0.01, -0.02 | -91.2 | 93.2 | 0.0024 | 0.0080 | -88.7 | |
| +0.38, -0.21 | -93.1 | 92.5 | 0.0049 | 0.233 | -61.7 | |
| +0.01, -0.03 | -93.7 | 93.7 | 0.0017 | 0.0074 | -94.1 | |
| +0.03, -0.02 | -93.6 | 93.5 | 0.0033 | 0.046 | -93.2 | |
| +0.02, -0.15 | -94.3 | 94.3 | 0.0021 | 0.0069 | -94.3 | |
| +0.18, -0.13 | -93.7 | 93.6 | 0.0024 | 0.104 | -52.7 |
Honor Magic 2 frequency response
You can learn more about the tested parameters and the whole testing process here.
Android Pie and Magic UI 2.0
The Honor Magic 2 runs on a heavily customized Magic UI, v.2.0.0. It was an interesting switch that took place a month ago with Magic replacing Huawei's EMUI as the name of the custom launcher. You know, they call it Magic UI, but it's essentially still EMUI, in what's looking just like the 9.0 version we found on the Mate 20.
Obviously, it won't be to Android purists' tastes, but you should know better than to expect vanilla Android from Huawei/Honor. Our review unit came with a ton of China-specific software installed and no Google Play Services, but it was a straightforward process to install those from the Chinese app store.
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Anyway, the experience starts by sliding the display bit down to expose the front camera for the facial recognition. Pretty much as soon as the camera gets to have a look at your face, the phone unlocks. Obviously, if you wake the phone with the power button, there'll be no face unlocking - the camera is behind the display.
For those cases, you can use the under-display fingerprint sensor - yes, that one is under the display too, but not quite under-under as the camera. In our experience, the sensor isn't as quick as we'd like (not as fast as on the OnePlus 6t, for example) and requires a bit of a firmer press. It does the job, only it may take a couple of tries.
Security features
Magic UI, being EMUI in disguise, has Magazine lock screen, which cycles through a bunch of wallpapers (covers), so you see a different one every time you fire up the display. There's naturally plenty of customization options and features, smart rotation, and lift to wake. Themes are supported, too, and there is a lot to choose from.
Out of the box, there is no app drawer on the EMUI 9 - it's a single tier interface akin to iOS. However, if you prefer Android's usual two-tier layout, you can enable it from the Display settings.
Lockscreen • Covers • Homescreen • Homescreen styles • Themes
With the ultra modern bezelless design, it would make no sense to be all retro and use a navigation bar on the bottom. We saw Huawei's take on gesture navigation on the Mates, and it's present here on the Honor Magic as well. It goes like this - swipe up for Home, swipe up and stop midway for Task switcher, or swipe from the left or right edge of the screen for Back. If you are, however, unwilling to accept the current trends in UI navigation, the option for a nav bar is still there.
Gesture navigation
The notification shade is straight out of EMUI - it does the same things as any most standard implementations, with the usual Huawei take on the graphics. There's a brightness slider and a row of toggles, and you pull down again for more toggles.
Multitasking works in familiar ways too, with a slight modification due to the use of gestures. Swipe up and hold to access the task switcher and tap on the icon in the top right corner of the apps the apps that support multi-window.
Notification area • Toggles • Recent apps • Split screen
From the Phone Manager app, you can access shortcuts to storage cleanup, battery settings, blocked numbers, Virus scan powered by Avast, and mobile data usage.
Huawei's own Music app offers a way to listen to stored MP3s, while Huawei's Health app offers Google Fit syncing and step counting. The gallery is an entirely custom job too, but it has the usual chronological and albums views plus an AI powered highlights selection. There's a file manager app and a note-taking app. And if you don't like any of those - there is an abundance of alternatives in the Play Store.
Phone Manager • Music Player • Gallery • Huawei Health • Files
Synthetic benchmarks
The Honor Magic 2 is powered by the in-house developed Kirin 980 chipset. It's a cutting-edge SoC built on a 7nm fabrication process and no droid outside of Huawei's lineup can boast such a thing (yet). The same silicon is found inside the more expensive models in the Mate 20 series ('lite' version excluded), so effectively the Magic 2 has all the computational power Huawei can muster.
That comes courtesy of an octa-core CPU in a tri-cluster configuration (2x2.6 GHz Cortex-A76 & 2x1.92 GHz Cortex-A76 & 4x1.8 GHz Cortex-A55) and a Mali-G76 MP10 GPU. RAM options are either 6GB or 8GB, and we have the latter for this review.
RAM has little to no effect on CPU performance and GeekBench is our go-to benchmark for measuring that. The Magic 2's numbers are very much in line with what we got out of the Mate 20 and Mate 20 Pro, and that's some class-leading multi-core performance.
GeekBench 4.1 (multi-core)
Higher is better
- Honor Magic 2
9887 - Huawei Mate 20
9793 - Huawei Mate 20 Pro
9712 - Xiaomi Pocophone F1
9003 - OnePlus 6T
8977 - Samsung Galaxy S9+
8883 - LG G7 ThinQ
8865 - Sony Xperia XZ3
8607 - LG V40 ThinQ
8568 - Xiaomi Mi 8
8494 - Samsung Galaxy S9+ (Snapdragon)
8349 - Google Pixel 3
8146 - Google Pixel 3 XL
8088 - Honor Play
6696 - Huawei P20 Pro
6679 - Honor 10
6591
It would have been the same in single-core performance only there the oversized custom cores that Samsung uses in the Exynos 9810 chip in the Galaxy S9+ are still unmatched in the Android world. Even so, the Magic 2 is significantly more powerful in single-core tasks than the Snapdragon 845 competitors.
GeekBench 4.1 (single-core)
Higher is better
- Samsung Galaxy S9+
3771 - Honor Magic 2
3316 - Huawei Mate 20 Pro
3291 - Huawei Mate 20
3284 - Sony Xperia XZ3
2486 - Xiaomi Pocophone F1
2438 - Xiaomi Mi 8
2431 - OnePlus 6T
2431 - LG V40 ThinQ
2408 - LG G7 ThinQ
2395 - Google Pixel 3
2377 - Google Pixel 3 XL
2363 - Samsung Galaxy S9+ (Snapdragon)
2199 - Huawei P20 Pro
1907 - Honor Play
1899 - Honor 10
1894
When it comes to graphics, the Magic 2 puts out average numbers - for a high-end phone, that is. The Snapdragons of the day can achieve 10-15% higher frame rates in offscreen tests, and that either remains true in onscreen runs for the 1080p phones in this pool. Conversely, the higher-res models fall below the 1080p Magic 2 in onscreen tests.
GFX 3.1 Manhattan (1080p offscreen)
Higher is better
- Samsung Galaxy S9+ (Snapdragon)
61 - Xiaomi Pocophone F1
60 - OnePlus 6T
60 - LG G7 ThinQ
57 - Google Pixel 3
57 - Sony Xperia XZ3
56 - LG V40 ThinQ
56 - Huawei Mate 20 Pro
53 - Huawei Mate 20
53 - Honor Magic 2
53 - Xiaomi Mi 8
53 - Samsung Galaxy S9+
47 - Google Pixel 3 XL
44 - Huawei P20 Pro
40 - Honor Play
39 - Honor 10
37
GFX 3.1 Manhattan (onscreen)
Higher is better
- Google Pixel 3
55 - Xiaomi Pocophone F1
53 - OnePlus 6T
53 - Xiaomi Mi 8
50 - Huawei Mate 20
47 - Honor Magic 2
45 - Huawei P20 Pro
37 - Honor 10
37 - Honor Play
36 - Samsung Galaxy S9+ (Snapdragon)
34 - Sony Xperia XZ3
31 - LG G7 ThinQ
30 - LG V40 ThinQ
29 - Huawei Mate 20 Pro
27 - Google Pixel 3 XL
24 - Samsung Galaxy S9+
24
GFX 3.1 Car scene (1080p offscreen)
Higher is better
- LG G7 ThinQ
35 - Xiaomi Pocophone F1
35 - Sony Xperia XZ3
35 - Google Pixel 3
35 - OnePlus 6T
35 - Samsung Galaxy S9+ (Snapdragon)
35 - LG V40 ThinQ
34 - Xiaomi Mi 8
33 - Honor Magic 2
30 - Huawei Mate 20 Pro
29 - Huawei Mate 20
28 - Google Pixel 3 XL
28 - Samsung Galaxy S9+
28 - Huawei P20 Pro
23 - Honor 10
23 - Honor Play
22
GFX 3.1 Car scene (onscreen)
Higher is better
- Xiaomi Mi 8
33 - Google Pixel 3
33 - Xiaomi Pocophone F1
31 - OnePlus 6T
31 - Huawei Mate 20
28 - Honor Magic 2
26 - Huawei P20 Pro
21 - Honor 10
21 - Honor Play
21 - Samsung Galaxy S9+ (Snapdragon)
20 - Sony Xperia XZ3
19 - LG G7 ThinQ
18 - Huawei Mate 20 Pro
17 - LG V40 ThinQ
16 - Samsung Galaxy S9+
14 - Google Pixel 3 XL
12
We then turn to Antutu for a number to gauge overall performance, and the Honor handset is posting numbers towards the top of the pack and virtually identical to those from the Mate 20s.
AnTuTu 7
Higher is better
- OnePlus 6T
293994 - Sony Xperia XZ3
284555 - Honor Magic 2
274466 - Huawei Mate 20 Pro
273913 - Huawei Mate 20
273913 - Xiaomi Pocophone F1
265314 - Samsung Galaxy S9+ (Snapdragon)
264044 - LG G7 ThinQ
259393 - Google Pixel 3 XL
258244 - LG V40 ThinQ
254304 - Samsung Galaxy S9+
246660 - Google Pixel 3
233699 - Xiaomi Mi 8
217298 - Huawei P20 Pro
209884 - Honor Play
204876 - Honor 10
200440
Overall, a pretty predictable showing from the Honor Magic 2 and a predictably great one too. You could expect slightly higher numbers if you enable the Performance mode, but those won't be sustainable and will dip when thermal throttling kicks in. Plus it'll eat up into your battery life.
6 cameras total, sort of
The Honor Magic 2 is equipped with a total of six cameras, three on each side, but the front ones aren't all 'cameras', strictly speaking. First things first, though. On the back, there's a primary 16MP module with an f/1.8 aperture lens that has a 27mm equivalent focal length. An additional 16MP camera has you covered for ultra wide angle shots thanks to its 17mm equivalent lens (f/2.2 on this one). And then, there's Huawei's long-time favorite - a monochrome camera (24MP, f/1.8, 27mm).
Over on the front, there's yet another 16MP shooter and Huawei likes the 27mm focal length for its lenses, apparently - this one is too. The aperture is f/2.0. Which brings us to the other two supposed cameras - effectively, they're a couple of 2MP depth sensors, instead of actual standalone modules that you can take different pictures with. But it does bring the overall tally to 6, so the marketing team can be happy.
Anyway. The app UI is familiar from previous multi-camera Huaweis, though it is a bit simplified compared to what you'd get on, say, the Mate 20. There's an AI toggle in the viewfinder, and engaging it enables the scene recognition that will tell apart 60 different categories of subjects and tune settings accordingly.
The mode selector is on the bottom, and we have the usual gripe with Huawei mode selectors - you swipe left or right to change modes, but you can't swipe on the viewfinder, just on the selector itself. Swiping up and down doesn't switch between front and rear camera either, you have a button for that (admittedly, it's at the bottom within easy reach). Basically, you're still wasting the viewfinder by not having gestures enabled on it, except for pinch to zoom.
As for switching between cameras, a tap on the '1x' button in the viewfinder toggles consecutively the '2x' and the '0.6x' zoom levels, only the 2x mode isn't optical - there's no telephoto camera hardware. The '0.6x' is very real, though.
There's no quick way to engage the monochrome camera - it's one of the numerous modes in the 'More' pane on the mode selector, along with Panorama, Time-lapse, Light painting, and HDR, among others. And while we're at it, what's with the manual HDR mode when everyone else has some sort of Auto HDR already enabled?
There's a Pro mode here where you can adjust parameters yourself - ISO (50 to 3,200), shutter speed (1/4000s to 30s), exposure compensation (-4 to +4EV in 1/3 stop increments), and white balance (presets and specific temperature). You can also choose the metering mode (matrix, center-weighted and spot), and the focus mode (single, continuous and manual). If the phone thinks you messed up the exposure, an icon will pop up to warn you.
Since bokeh effects became all the rage, Huawei phones have had both a Portrait mode, and an Aperture mode, and these gradually diverged in their features. In Aperture you can choose the simulated aperture in the range from f/0.95 to f/16. Post shot, you can change the aperture and the focus point within the Gallery.
In Portrait mode you can enable and disable the background blur (why disable it if you've chosen the mode in the first place, though), but you can also fool around with the bokeh shapes - circles, hearts, swirl or discs. You can also opt for simulated lighting, and you can even add some beautification on a scale from 0 to 10.
Camera UI
Image quality
Daylight image quality out of the main cam isn't great. Detail levels aren't what you'd expect from a 16MP cam and there's a general softness to the photos. Dynamic range is about average - as in, it's not particularly wide. Colors are pretty nice, though - vivid, but not over the top.
Camera samples, AI off
One prevalent issue we observed in the Magic 2's photos that we hadn't seen to such an extent recently is weird color fringes in high-contrast out-of-focus areas - check out the green outlines in the tree branches in the second sample and the pink coloring of the building facade in the background in the third sample. Not good.
We flipped the switch to turn on AI mode and surprise-surprise, the blues and greens in landscapes didn't go out-of-this-world oversaturated like earlier Huawei AI processing tended to do. In fact, we observed mostly negligible differences.
Camera samples, AI on
We found it funny that the Magic 2 has a 'Watch' scene mode - the AI clearly recognized our pocket watch close-up. Not that it made much difference in the processing.
Watch close-up: AI on, watch mode • AI off
Looking at the numbers, the ultra wide angle cam appears to be the same as on the Mate 20 (not the Pro), but in practice it was a bit softer towards the edges. It's still very well corrected for such a wide angle lens on a phone and distortion, while visible, is nothing like what you'd get out of Galaxy A7 (2018), for example.
Camera samples, ultra wide
On to some black and white photos. The most detailed images from the Magic 2 will be from its monochrome camera - it's got the pixels and it lacks a Bayer filter. No wonder then that it can capture the true pattern of the blinds in the first scene below in some stunning detail.
Camera samples, black and white
In low light, the Magic 2 actually takes quite decent photos. Again, there's not much difference between AI and non-AI shots and even if they're pretty soft, noise is minimal, the exposures are nice, and there's no color desaturation.
Low-light samples, Photo mode, AI on
Low-light samples, Photo mode, AI off
Night mode produces noisier images, but more detailed ones - of static subjects, of course. Dynamic range is improved and highlights in point light sources are restored. There's inevitably a bit of a watercolor effect, but that's the price you'll need to pay.
Low-light samples, Night mode
The next step is to head over to our Photo compare tool, where you can see how the Honor Magic 2 stacks up against the competition in rendering our test charts. We picked the higher-end stablemate Mate 20, and the OnePlus 6T to get you started, but you can swap them out for any other two phones.
Honor Magic 2 against the Huawei Mate 20 and the OnePlus 6T in our Photo compare tool
Portraits
As we mentioned, the Magic 2 has two faux blur modes, with Portrait mode tailored to taking photos of people. We kept beatification off, and stuck with the default 'circles' blur shape. Subject separation turned out quite great and we're liking the gradual increase in blur the further the objects in the background go.
Portrait samples
Aperture
While Portrait mode focuses on gimmicky stuff like beautification and bokeh shape, Aperture mode lets you adjust the level of the blur by simulating different aperture values. It will give you more background blur than Portrait mode if you go for the wider apertures.
Aperture samples, people: f/0.95 • f/2.0 • f/4.0
Aperture samples, people: f/0.95 • f/1.4 • f/4.0
It's this mode that's best suited to isolating non-human subjects from distracting backgrounds.
Aperture samples, non-human subjects: : f/0.95 • f/1.4 • f/2.8 • f/16
Selfies
Slide open for some selfies. Only make sure you're closer to the phone than a full arm's length, because that's where the plane of sharp focus on this fixed-focus lens is.
Selfie samples: Exploring different distances
We do tend to default to arm's length shooting, however, so we can fit more in the frame, hence the out of focus samples below. Looking at fit to screen magnifications, you're likely to appreciate the true color rendition, but high-contrast scenes show that dynamic range is lacking.
Selfie samples
The selfie portraits have pretty great subject separation, though we imagine it would have been just as good with just the one depth sensor, instead of two.
Selfie portraits
Video recording
The Honor Magic records video in up to 2160p resolution, where only a 30fps frame rate is available - there's no 60fps mode. Then again, the proper Huawei flagships don't have it either, so why expect it here.
You get to choose between h.264 and h.265 codecs, but Huawei's processing has usually used very bit rates for h.264 anyway, so storage shouldn't be an issue. Specifically, the bit rate for 4K using the h.264 codec is 25Mbps (others are usually around 42Mbps), and it drops to 19Mbps for h.265. 1080p footage gets 10Mbps in 30fps and about 19Mbps in 60fps. Audio is always recorded in stereo at 192kbps.
4K video is nothing impressive, with detail levels in particular not quite up to par. Then again, the Mate 20 and 20 Pro weren't great in this respect either, so it would have been surprising if the Magic was any better. 1080p is about there as well, with the usual slight drop in quality when going from 30fps to 60fps.
The colors also tend be particularly drab, a bit more so than the already not very lively Mates. Add to that the marked difference in color rendition between the 1080p/30fps mode and 1080p/60 and 4K, and we'd say Huawei/Honor has some wrinkles to iron out in its video processing.
As we observed on the Mates, 4K videos from the wide angle camera have a frame rate below 24fps instead of the usual 30fps. They're reasonably detailed for what they are, but the dull colors are here to stay. Again, 1080p/30fps differs in its color science.
There is no electronic stabilization and video footage captured while walking is practically unusable.
We've also shot our test charts with the Honor Magic 2 and below you can find quick shortcuts to a comparison with the Mate 20 and the OnePlus 6T. You can obviously pick others from the drop down menus.
Honor Magic 2 against the Huawei Mate 20 and the OnePlus 6T in our Video compare tool
Competition
There are two separate types of competitors to the Honor Magic 2, at least the way we see it. In the first group we have other handsets that sport some sort of mechanical solution to the most pressing design issue of the day - what to do with the selfie camera if we want to have nothing but display on the face of the phone?
vivo NEX S • Oppo Find X • Lenovo Z5 Pro • Xiaomi Mi Mix 3
The vivo NEX S was the pioneer in pop-up cameras and is due for a replacement in a number of days. Even so, the original NEX still packs current hardware, having come out six months ago in June. The NEX deals with the issue at hand through a small motorized assembly that only needs to carry a single selfie cam.
Then there's the Oppo Find X, the latest generation Find phone that a lot of people thought was never going to happen. It puts all three of its cams on a motorized tray that also has to pop up every time you unlock the handset for the face recognition to work. Of course, the top-class internals go without saying.
Narrowly beating the Magic 2 by less than a week, the Xiaomi Mi Mix 3 is the other high-end mechanical slider you may want to get. Physically very similar, the Mix has a telephoto camera on the back vs. the Magic's ultra wide and monochrome extras, while being one depth sensor short of the Honor's 2 on the front is hardly a differentiator.
The Lenovo Z5 Pro is the third slider to come out of China, a day after the Magic 2. Again, virtually the same design conceptually, identically sized AMOLED display, dual-cameras front and back, and all of it at a little over half the price of the Honor slider. The catch? The Z5 Pro is more of a midranger, powered by the Snapdragon 710.
With the sliders accounted for, we can move on to the second group - the sensible choices. High on that list is the OnePlus 6T. Itself having a camera it can't strictly justify, the 6T does take much better pictures with the other one that does make sense, and its take on Android has much subtler customizations.
When it comes to cameras, it's probably the Xiaomi Mi 8 that'll give you the best image quality per dollar. It is, however, notably lacking in coolness factor - it's neither a slider, nor does it have an under-display fingerprint sensor.
Neither does the Galaxy S9+, but it's still the current Samsung flagship, the S-Pen-less one that is. All of its cameras are there for a reason, it's got a memory slot and a headphone jack, plus it's dust and water resistant. It's no slider though, clearly.
Another non-slider, and this one from Huawei's own lineup , the P20 Pro is still a very capable phone and even though its Kirin is a generation older than the Magic 2's we'd argue the P20's triple camera is much better than the Honor's triple camera.
OnePlus 6T • Xiaomi Mi 8 • Samsung Galaxy S9+ • Huawei P20 Pro
Verdict
Looking back on the time we spent with the Honor Magic 2, it's clearly not a bad phone. It's got a very good display, battery life is plenty, and... we may sound like a broken record here, but... it's a slider!
It has, however, failed us in an area we hold dear, and that's despite packing a ton of hardware - 6 cameras are fine and dandy, but the end results are merely passable. Alright, the monochrome photos are actually pretty nice, but that's 1 out of 6.
The thing is, you can never have it all. If you're after one of the coolest designs out on the market now, 5 out of 6 uninspiring cameras shouldn't stop you.
Pros
- It's a slider, how cool is that?
- Excellent battery life, 1-hour fast charging.
- All-round good display.
- Superb monochrome camera.
Cons
- Generally unimpressive image quality.
- Meh video quality, no electronic stabilization.
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