The Honor brand has been making a resurgence of late, particularly after Huawei handed the reins to a group of companies backed by the Chinese government in late 2020. This move was designed to allow Honor to continue selling its products where Huawei couldn’t due to trade embargoes. As a result, we’ve seen a handful of Honor smartphones with Google services launching in global markets over the past couple of years. The company is continuing its momentum as we approach the middle of the year by launching the new Honor 90 and Honor 90 Pro in China.
Honor’s announcement makes it clear that both Honor 90 phones will reach global markets imminently, though the manufacturer didn’t offer a specific timeline. They are decently packed in terms of hardware, which includes a 200MP Samsung ISOCELL HP3 primary rear camera. The Honor 90 Pro also includes a 32MP telephoto sensor and a 12MP ultra-wide unit. Meanwhile, the vanilla version retains the same 12MP ultra-wide unit but swaps the telephoto sensor for a smaller 2MP depth camera.
It’s quite difficult to tell the two phones apart at first glance, with the only indicator being the solitary 50MP selfie camera on the Honor 90, whereas the Pro model has its own implementation of Apple’s Dynamic Island, housing two cameras — a 50MP sensor and a 2MP unit — within its boundaries.
As you would expect, the Honor 90 Pro also gets the beefier Qualcomm Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 chip, whereas the Honor 90 is going with the Snapdragon 7 Gen 1. As per the company’s website, the Honor 90 packs a 6.7-inch (2664×1200) 120Hz OLED screen, while the Honor 90 Pro is equipped with a 120Hz 6.78-inch OLED panel featuring a resolution of 2700×1224.
The company says both phones feature its new 3840Hz Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) dimming tech, aimed at reducing the harm caused to the human eye due to screen flickering. This, per Honor, will offer a better viewing experience to customers even when the brightness is down. Furthermore, both screens also come with Circadian Night Display tech built in, reportedly “helping prevent interference with the body’s natural melatonin secretion.“
Both devices get a 5,000mAh battery underneath, supposedly enough to last a full day. Recharging it shouldn’t take long either, thanks to 100W wired charging support on the Pro model, with the cheaper model offering 66W charging. Honor MagicOS 7.1 is the UI of choice here, based on Android 13. A total of four colors are available for the new Honor 90 series, including Midnight Black, Emerald Green, Diamond Silver, and Peacock Blue.
A total of three variants are available for each model, letting customers pair 12 or 16GB of RAM with 256 or 512GB of storage space. The Honor 90 Pro will start from 3,299 CNY (~$470), while the vanilla model in the lineup can be picked up starting from 2,499 CNY (~$350). We expect the two smartphones to retail for a similar price when they are launched outside China.
