The best Honor phones 2023

The Magic 5 Pro is proof that the flagship form Honor found in last year’s Magic 4 Pro was no fluke.

On display and battery life this phone can duke it out with the best, and the camera does enough to earn its place in that conversation too.

It’s strange that the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset runs a little cold compared to other 2023 flagships, and I’ll admit that the striking design didn’t really win me over – though you may prefer it.

This is an expensive phone by any measure, but if you can afford it then this is the best handset Honor makes.

The Magic Vs is Honor’s second-generation foldable, but it’s a much more polished effort than the first – and, unlike that phone, it’s gone on sale in countries around the world.

Priced to undercut the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 4, this is affordable by foldable standards. The hardware is still slick though, closing flatter than its Korean rival and packing a more powerful main camera.

You’ll have to live without water-proofing or wireless charging though, and Honor’s software doesn’t make the most of the form factor, not even using Android’s built-in foldable features. Hopefully that will improve with time, making this a genuine contender to the Z Fold line.

The Honor 70 is an accomplished mid-range phone, a confident step forward for the company after its breakaway from Huawei. With Google services and apps, a thoughtful and attractive design, strong performance, and good battery life, this is one of the better phones in this price range in the UK and Europe – sorry US friends.

It’s up against stiff competition from the likes of the Pixel 6a, Nothing Phone (1), and OnePlus Nord 2T, which are all a little bit cheaper and sometimes have an edge on hardware. Crucially, all three also run on slicker software, with better long-term support promised too.

But with a 120Hz display and very good main camera, the Honor 70 is still a solid choice.

The Magic 5 Lite is an affordable mid-ranger that excels most of all in how it looks, with a sleek, slender design that could belong to a phone at least twice its price.

Brilliant battery life helps the phone stand out too, though it’s let down a little by an older chipset (the same found in the older Magic 4 Lite, below), slow charging (with no charger in the box), and a camera that’s good but not great.

Still, if you want a phone that looks and feels like a flagship for a fraction of the cost, you could do an awful lot worse.

The Magic 4 Pro is a full-on flagship, with top specs in almost every respect.

That means a Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset, a 120Hz LTPO OLED display, and incredibly fast charging: 100W wired and wireless. The camera is committed too, with a triple lens setup including a powerful 64Mp periscope lens.

Still, this isn’t a perfect phone. There’s no IP rating, unlike some similarly priced rivals, and small flaws frustrate, like unreliable performance with unofficial chargers. Compared to other flagships, Honor’s commitment to only two years of software updates can’t quite compete either.

This is the most impressive phone Honor makes though, and with strong specs and a competitive price it’s well worth considering.

The Honor Magic 4 Lite 5G – also known as the X9 5G in some markets – is an impressive 5G device when it comes to performance.

There’s a lot to like. The battery life is good, the screen is huge, and it offers solid performance alongside its 5G connectivity.

It’s a shame that huge screen is LCD rather than OLED, but at this prices compromises have to come somewhere, and that’s the trade-off made for a 120Hz refresh rate. Inconsistent cameras hold it back a little further, as does the choice to ship the phone with the now-old Android 11, but overall this is still a capable cheap mid-ranger.

The Honor 50 was the company’s first phone to get a global release since going independent, and also the first to feature Google support. It was a great buy at launch, and is even better now that it’s dropped significantly in price.

The design and display are the biggest selling points here – the Honor 50 looks and feels great, and it’s both slim (7.8mm) and light (175g). The curved 120Hz OLED display is also one of the best you’ll find in any phone at this price.

The 108Mp rear camera is pretty strong, though the other rear lenses disappoint a bit. The selfie camera is still good though, and at 32Mp it’s one of the higher-resolution front-facing cameras around.

The Honor 50 Lite is a chunk cheaper than the regular Honor 50. If you can afford the upgrade it’s worthwhile, but if not then the 50 Lite isn’t a bad option.

The large 6.67in display is welcome at this price point (even if it only has a 60Hz refresh rate), and you’re also getting a decent 64Mp main rear camera and really fast 66W charging – genuinely impressive at this price point.

There’s no 5G support, and the design isn’t a match for its sibling, but for the price this really isn’t too shabby.