Honor 200 review: Perfect balance of style and camera


Honor has spread its wings in India with several launches. The company recently launched the Honor 200 series in the country to expand its portfolio in the mid-range and premium segments. Although the Honor 200 Pro caters to the premium segment, it is the Honor 200 that will face the real heat in the Indian smartphone landscape. The company’s latest smartphone is priced at Rs 34,999 for the 8GB + 256GB variant and Rs 39,999 for the 12GB + 512GB variant.

Honor 200 offers some interesting features and a premium design. This time, the special focus is on the cameras, which have been co-engineered with Studio Harcourt, a photography studio known for its portraits. That said, is it enough to entice users to bypass the competition and go for it? Let’s find out in this review.

Honor 200 Design: Sleek and stylish

  • Dimensions – 161.5 x 74.6 x 7.7 mm
  • Weight – 187 grams
  • Colors – Chandni White and Black

Honor is one of the few brands that took phone designing quite seriously, even when they were active before the ban in India. Fast forward to today, and you’ll find pieces of the same design philosophy on the Honor 200. The smartphone looks unique and stylish in this price segment. I received the Moonlight White color option for review, and right off the bat, it looks elegant, which is a rarity in this price segment.

Honor 200 is available in two color options: Moonlight White and Black.

The wave design pattern on the back panel looks quite attractive and the oval shaped camera module adds some cherry on top. However, the camera module makes it shaky on flat surfaces. The frame is made of plastic but the feel inside the hand is quite comfortable, which is a bummer.

The handset is thin with a thickness of 7.7 mm and weighs 187 grams, which is on par with the competition. The only downside to the design is that it’s quite slippery, so you’ll need a case to go with it, especially since it doesn’t come with any official Gorilla Glass protection. Also, you don’t get an official IP rating, which is a deal breaker for me at this price point.

Honor 200 Display: Crisp and vibrant

  • Display – 6.7-inch 1.5K AMOLED curved display
  • Refresh Rate – 120Hz screen refresh rate
  • Other features – 3840Hz PWM dimming, 100 percent DCI-P3 color gamut, 4,000nits peak brightness

Honor’s latest handset is loaded with a quad curved display and offers crisp and colorful visuals. Moreover, you get 4,000 nits peak brightness, making it a bright display for use in outdoor situations.

honor 200 5g front gadget 360 Honor 200

The Honor 200 has an AMOLED display that delivers vibrant colors.

The phone offers a 120Hz screen refresh rate, which makes the whole scrolling experience fluid. The quadruple curved screen looks like a premium design while minimizing accidental touches. Coming to content usage, you will definitely love this device. While watching ‘Monarch: Legacy of Monsters’ on Apple TV+, color saturation was on point and darker parts of the show were no problem.

The phone also supports Widevine L1 with HDR10+, which means you can comfortably watch HDR content on Netflix on this device. You can get two different modes, Normal and Vivid, to meet your desired taste. However, I would recommend keeping it in Vivid mode to get the best output.

honor 200 5g port Gadget 360 Honor 200

honor 200 5g button gadget 360 Honor 200

The handset offers various options for customizing the display settings.

Another interesting feature here is the always-on display. The phone comes with two options for this mode: full screen and partial screen. Full-screen mode dims the lock screen version and you get a full-screen AoD, which is a fun feature.

The handset also has an in-display fingerprint sensor which works well, though the location is a bit lower than I would have liked. However, you can choose between animations, which are always fun to use.

Honor 200 Software: Bloatware-heavy

  • Software – MagicOS 8.0
  • Version – Android 14
  • Updates are promised – 3 years of OS updates and 4 years of security patches

Honor 200 is loaded with MagicOS 8.0 based on Android 14 operating system. The user interface is easy to get used to and offers some good levels of customization and features. The company claims to have added some AI features like Magic Capsule, Magic Portal, Magic Ring and more. Some of these features are useful, while others look like gimmicks

Magic Portal is a useful feature. The feature basically lets you drag and drop text, photos, and videos from one app to another. For example, you can copy your favorite text on Instagram by long-pressing the text until you see a blue color in the corner. Now, drag and drop the content into Notes or Gmail, WhatsApp, Notes and more. You also have a favorite location that allows you to save all screenshots and videos and access them anytime

On the other hand, the magic capsule seems to be the trick here. The company took inspiration from Apple’s Dynamic Island but forgot to be inspired by all the features it offers. At that time, you can also view the music playback and timer. Hopefully, the brand will add more features in the future.

Apart from this, the user interface offers a good level of customization. On the downside, the bloatware problem persists. So, you have double apps for email, gallery, app market, calculator, docs, etc. Thankfully, you don’t get spammy notifications from these apps, which is a blessing in disguise.

Honor 200 Performance: Suitable for daily use

  • Processor – Qualcomm Snapdragon 7 Gen 3
  • Memory – up to 12GB (LPDDR5)
  • Storage – Up to 512GB (UFS 2.2)

The Honor 200 packs decent hardware at this price. The handset is loaded with the same Snapdragon 7 Gen 3 processor as the Vivo V30, OnePlus Nord CE4, Motorola Edge 50 Pro and more. However, considering the competition at this price point, the phone’s performance is somewhat sub-par, and you can check it out in this synthetic benchmark comparison:

Benchmark Honor 200 Motorola Edge 50 Pro Oppo Reno 12 Pro Realme GT 6T
Geekbench 6 single core 1145 1142 1013 1843
Geekbench 6 Multi Core 3304 3124 2938 4756
AnTuTu v10 821,670 818,387 619,149 1,462,980
PCMark Task 3.0 12,723 13,730 12,806 19,517
3DM Slingshot Extreme OpenGL Maxed out Maxed out 5180 Maxed out
3DM Slingshot Maxed out 8393 6606 Maxed out
3DM Wild Life 5917 5394 3170 Maxed out
3DM Wild Life Unlimited 6043 5457 3162 11481
GFXBench T-Rex 60 116 59 60
GFXBench Manhattan 3.1 59 61 49 60
GFXBench car chase 38 32 29 60

In daily use, you won’t experience any problems or lags. Even with demanding tasks, the phone doesn’t throttle too much, which is a good thing.

As far as gaming is concerned, you can do most of the normal gaming on this device without too much stress. Call of Duty: Mobile with default settings at High and Very High graphics and frame rates respectively. Even with very high quality and maximum frame rate, I didn’t notice any frame drops. However, the phone gets a bit hot around the camera module. But it was not at an alarming level.

Honor 200 Camera: Almost top notch

  • Rear – 50-megapixel Sony IMX906 sensor with f/1.95 aperture + 12-megapixel ultra-wide camera + 50-megapixel Sony IMX856 2.5x portrait sensor
  • Front – 50-megapixel Sony IMX906 sensor with f/2.1 aperture

The camera is probably its biggest strong suit. The Honor 200 has an impressive camera setup that packs everything you need in a good camera-centric smartphone.

Honor 200 2x daylight (top), ultra-wide (middle), and normal (bottom) camera samples. (click to expand)

In daylight, the phone captures excellent shots with good dynamic range and vibrant colors. Photos were crisp and full of detail, although colors were slightly oversaturated in some cases. However, the ultra-wide angle lens was a misnomer, as the quality was often not up to par. You can see some detail loss in the corners in daylight shots.

Honor 200 portrait camera samples using Harcourt Color (bottom), Harcourt Vibrant (middle), and Harcourt Classic (top). (Click image to enlarge)

But the star of the show is the portrait sensor. The phone has a Sony IMX856 2.5x portrait sensor which takes really good pictures in various situations. Skin tones were normal, and the bokeh effect worked well. You also get three different Harcourt portrait modes: Harcourt Vibrant, Harcourt Color and Harcourt Classic. My favorite was Classic mode, which provided some really good output in a variety of lighting conditions.

Honor 200 low light camera model. (Click image to enlarge)

Coming to the low light performance of the Honor 200, the primary sensor again does a good job. Noises are kept to a minimum, and the phone is able to preserve colors in low light The ultra-wide angle was again not up to the mark as photos were less detailed and full of noise.

Honor 200 Battery: Impressive battery life

  • Battery Capacity – 5,200mAh (Silicon-Carbon)
  • Wired Charging – 100W Supercharge
  • Charger – 100W (not included)

The Honor 200 is one of the few smartphones in the market that offers a silicon-carbon battery. Compared to traditional lithium-ion batteries, silicon-carbon batteries hold a higher energy density and take up less space. This results in a slimmer form factor while maintaining high battery backup, which is the case with this device.

honor 200 5g port Gadget 360 Honor 200

The Honor 200 packs a 5,200mAh battery with 100W fast charging support.

Under normal usage, the phone easily lasts a full day with an average screen time of 6 hours. The phone lasted 28 hours and 27 minutes in our battery loop test, which was quite impressive. It also supports 100W fast charging. However, the charger must be purchased separately. We tested the charging speed with a 68W fast charger. The phone was charged to 37 percent in 15 minutes, 70 percent in 30 minutes and fully charged in 49 minutes.

Honor 200 Verdict

The Honor 200 is a good package if you’re looking for a premium camera phone in a mid-range price segment. The phone has a sleek and lightweight design that looks unique. The display is crisp and deals with content consumption. However, the camera takes center stage here and delivers some good results with its primary sensor and portrait camera, although the same cannot be said for the wide-angle sensor. The performance is decent, and you will not face any problems during daily use.

However, the phone faces stiff competition from Realme GT 6T, Motorola Edge 50 Pro, OnePlus Nord 4, Oppo Reno 12 Pro and more. So, if you are thinking of buying a camera-centric smartphone that offers consistent performance, then you can consider the Honor 200 device.



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