The new Honor X9d 5G is an Android 16-based phone that is a surprisingly good value.
Even though it’s a mid-tier device, its performance, durability and battery life seem to go beyond what you get in some high-end phones.
Starting with the basics, the Honor X9d 5G comes in a good size (162 mm x 76 mm x 7.8 mm) and is very light (approximately 195 g), which is surprising, considering the huge battery it houses.
The 8,300mAh silicon-carbon battery can give you days of power. With not much use, I didn’t have to charge the phone for almost five days. Using it more, I could easily go two full days without charging. And with the supercharge function, a good USB charger (66 W support) and quality cable, you can easily get on the road again in minutes.
You can also take advantage of this extended battery and the reverse charging function to charge other devices, including phones and earbuds.
The build is high quality and has a nice feeling to touch. The back is made of a textured polycarbonate that looks like leather grain, but still has a plastic feeling. It comes in three colours, and the review unit I received is reddish brown, with a golden metallic frame and photo lens trimmings.
The polycarbonate is important because it adds to the durability of this phone.
You see, the phone is designed for tough situations. It can survive drops from up to 2.5 metres, but most importantly, is the IP69K water and dust resistance, which protects it not only from water splashes and submersion and dust ingress, but also protects it from high-pressure water jets, something I haven’t seen in other consumer phones.
To test this, I had the phone with me during a hot shower, with the water jet pointing directly at the phone, from different positions. And yes, the Honor X9d 5G continued to work while inside the shower, including touch controls.
The 6.79”, 2640 x 1200 pixels OLED display is surrounded by a thin 1.3 mm bezel and comes with a screen protector already applied. It’s bright, reaching up to 6000 nits. It supports up to 120 Hz refresh rate, with an option to reduce this to 60 Hz to save even more battery life if needed.
The Snapdragon 6 Series processor with 12 GB RAM and 256 GB storage does a good job. The system is responsive and I had no problems with the apps I used. It starts apps fast and switches between them without trouble,
The Magic OS 10, based on Android 16, even received two updates while I had the phone for review, which is a good sign.
The phone supports New Zealand 4G and 5G networks, including the VoLTE feature, without which you wouldn’t be able to make voice calls. It also supports VoWiFi, a feature that allows you to use your Wi-Fi connection for voice calls, improving coverage and making it also cheaper when roaming overseas (depending on the network you are with).
It also supports Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.2 BLE with multiple sound codecs including SBC, AAC, LDAC, APTX, APTX HD and AptX Adaptive.
The main camera is impressive on the specs: 108 megapixels (F1.75) plus a 5 megapixel (F2.2) wide angle. While you can get pictures with up to 12000 x 9000 pixels, and 4K videos, it is limited to 10x digital zoom, and I thought the colours were a bit washed out, compared to other phones I had here.
The AI features work well, and I thought the image and writing tools did a good job without getting on the way.
The Honor X9d 5G is a rugged phone that looks anything but, with plenty of power and good performance.
You can find the Honor brand in New Zealand through major retailers, and the Honor X9d 5G is available now.
