MANILA - The HONOR Magic V2 is arguably the best-designed foldable phone on the market right now. It's not quite “the” perfect foldable, but it's definitely better than the current market leader in a lot of respects.

This is a gorgeous, sleek and powerful gadget that pushes the envelope of what a foldable phone can be.

STANDOUT DESIGN

The first thing you will notice about this folding phone is its almost full-size cover screen. While the most well-known foldable gives you an odd skinny screen, the V2 gives you an almost normal display. This is a screen that you can actually use, and not something you just look at for the notifications.

The next thing you will notice about this gadget is its slimness. Unfold it and you'll see just how ridiculously thin this thing is, with a depth of just 4.8mm. It makes you wonder how they were even able to fit a USB-C port in it. 

Folded up, this thing is still relatively thin, measuring just 10.1 mm –almost as thin as the iPhone 15 Pro Max which is 8.25mm. And it is definitely much less chunky than the 13.4mm thickness of the Galaxy Z Fold 5.

You can use two apps side by side on the HONOR Magic V2. Art Fuentes, ABS-CBN News 

For a foldable, it is also relatively light at just 237 grams, compared to the iPhone 15 Pro Max 221g, or the Z Fold 5’s 253g. While other folding phones feel chunky, like you're carrying two phones taped together, the V2 almost feels like you’re holding a normal phone.

The two halves also neatly fold together flat like a book, instead of like a binder with a gap in the middle. Kudos to HONOR for getting rid of that ugly gap.

What about the crease you ask? If you're watching a video, typing a document, or previewing some photos, you would hardly notice it. It's still there, but it's not as obvious as in other foldables. 

I also like how the included back protector includes a kickstand that lets you set the V2 neatly on your desk for full-screen browsing or media consumption.

FLAGSHIP SPECS

A Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 does the heavy lifting for the V2, along with 16GB of RAM and 512GB of storage–specs we have come to expect from a flagship phone. Yes, newer flagships now carry the Gen 3, but to be fair, the V2 was first launched in China last year.

It has an external OLED cover screen that’s 6.43 inches with a 2376 x 1060 resolution, while the inner foldable OLED screen is a massive 7.92 inches and 2344 x 2156. Both displays can run at 120Hz for smooth scrolling, animation and gaming. The screens pump out 1600 nits of brightness, which may not be the brightest on the market right now, but are still plenty bright in direct sunlight.

Our review unit in the purple colorway, weighs just 231 grams. Holding the two sides together is a titanium hinge that HONOR says allows it to be very light but very strong at the same time. HONOR however doesn’t mention any dust and water resistance rating.

Powering the V2 is a 5,000 mAh battery. I personally think that while this is good enough for a standard “bar” phone, a foldable phone with a much bigger screen could use much more juice. But a bigger battery would probably have also made it heavier and thicker. It comes with a 66W charger but doesn’t support wireless charging.

The V2 has 3 cameras in the rear – a 50MP main camera at f/1.9 with optical image stabilization (OIS), a 20MP telephoto camera at f/2.4 also with OIS, and a 50MP ultra-wide camera at  f/2.0. The ultra-wide has a respectable 0.5x zoom, but the telephoto only goes to 2.5x optical zoom, which may seem anemic to power users who are accustomed to 5x on a flagship. But it doesn’t personally bother me because I don’t really zoom to more than 3x in most cases.

As expected, the V2 has 2 selfie cameras–one on the cover screen, and another on the inner screen. Both are 16MP.

Both rear and selfie cameras can shoot 4K video, but only the rear cameras can shoot 4K at 60 fps.

PHOTOGRAPHY

HONOR’s phones have always been top-tier when it comes to photography, and the V2 continues that honorable tradition. 

Here are some sample pics taken by travel blogger Kara Santos while visiting La Union, and some I took while cycling around the UP Diliman campus.

When shooting landscapes, the colors are crisp, the details sharp, and the pictures have great contrast. Night shots are also impressive.

Selfies also come out great, but you may need some fiddling especially when shooting in high-contrast situations. In “against-the-light” conditions, the selfie camera can sometimes overexpose or underexpose you. 

If you want to perfect your “Gen Z” selfie, you can activate the cover screen while using the main camera system, allowing you a preview of your shot.

Videos are also pretty good, with great stabilization.

But as expected, if you go beyond the 2.5x optical zoom of the main camera, the quality drops.

PRODUCTIVITY

You can multitask, with two or more apps open. You can have two apps open side by side vertically, or split the screen horizontally. You can also have one app float like a window atop another app.

Content creators may also appreciate the AI Instant Movie feature in the Photo app which let's users create short videos using the pics and clips you shot, with templates and music for both vertical and horizontal video output.

Browsing Facebook can be weird sometimes as the cover screen and the inner screen may display different content. A vertical video on the cover screen may also look cropped to fir the dimensions of the inner screen.

A MUST HAVE?

When I travel for work, I usually bring a laptop, a phone (of course), a tablet, and (depending on how long the travel may be) an ebook reader. 

Theoretically, you can replace all those gadgets with a foldable phone like the HONOR Magic V2, paired with a portable wireless keyboard. Of course, nothing beats having a full laptop when it comes to work, but if you had to bring just one gadget, this would be it.

Just to drive home the point, I wrote this review on Magic V2, using an Apple Magic Keyboard. This shows that a good folding phone is more than just a fancy toy to brag about, it can also be a productivity device. 

And it can also let you mix work and play. While a 10-inch iPad is still better for watching videos, the 7-inch screen of the Magic V2 is also pretty good.

TRADE OFFS

Coming up with a well-designed foldable like the V2 however also means that HONOR also had to make some design compromises.

Other tech reviewers have pointed out that the Magic V2 does not specify any water and dust resistance rating.

Some have also criticized its lack of wireless charging, which has become an expected feature in flagship-level devices.

Still others point to the Magic V2's unflagship-like telephoto zoom, which is just 2.5x, compared to 5x in some flagships. But to be fair, the market leader in foldables tops out at just 3x zoom.

I hazard that making a phone so thin, while keeping dust and moisture seals, and wireless charging, must have been very challenging at the current state of engineering. Putting a 5x zoom may have also made it costlier. 

But while these gripes about lack of IP rating, wireless charging and a short zoom, are valid for a flagship “bar” phone, IMHO they don't really diminish the appeal of using a very good looking phone that turns into a small tablet.

The HONOR Magic V2 retails for P79,999.

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