The Honor Magic 7 Pro brings the new Snapdragon 8 Elite to Europe

Honor has officially unveiled its latest flagship phone, the Magic 7 Pro. While not the first smartphone launch of 2025, the Magic 7 Pro does have the honour (heh) of introducing Snapdragon’s latest high-end chipset to the European market.

I’ve done a full rundown on what to expect from the Snapdragon 8 Elite but, in short, it’s set to be one of 2025’s most powerful processors, and will be turning up in plenty of flagship phones over the next few months. Its predecessor, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3, consistently delivered class-leading battery life, landing several handsets on our best phone battery life ranking. So, I’ll be paying close attention to see if the Magic 7 Pro delivers unprecedented stamina, alongside the expected improvements to performance scores.

Joining the 8 Elite inside the Magic 7 Pro are 16GB of RAM and 512GB of storage space. The battery is also a new silicon-carbon cell like the Honor Magic 7 Lite – though the capacity is a lower 5,270mAh. Charging is set at 100W wired and 80W wireless, which is faster than on the Honor Magic 6 Pro. The wired charging is said to take the battery from empty to full in just 33 minutes but you’ll need your own compatible charger as there isn’t one in the box.

The Honor Magic 7 Pro is fronted by a 6.8in OLED display with a 2,800 x 1,280 resolution and LTPO technology allowing for a dynamic refresh rate between 1 and 120Hz. The 4,320Hz PWM dimming makes a return from the Magic 6 Pro to help reduce eye fatigue, particularly when viewing the screen at low brightness levels.

Honor’s NanoCrystal Shield glass covers the display, adding a layer of scratch protection and drop resistance. This proprietary silica glass is said to be ten times more drop-resistant than regular glass; Honor was keen to show off exactly how resistant this glass is but I can’t talk about it just yet – keep an eye out for my upcoming hands-on review. Also on the protective front is a belt-and-braces IP68/IP69 dust and water resistance rating, which is about as robust a certification as a phone can currently get.

In a pill-shaped notch at the top of the display are the 50-megapixel (f/2.0) selfie camera and a TOF 3D sensor, which allows for more secure face unlocking, similar to Apple’s TrueDepth camera. The rear cameras are led by a 50-megapixel main camera with a variable aperture between f/1.4 and f/2.0. Joining this are the same 50-megapixel (f/2.2) ultrawide camera as the Magic 6 Pro and a 3x optical telephoto camera with an improved 200-megapixel resolution and an f/2.6 aperture.

While they are mechanically quite similar to the Magic 6 Pro’s photography loadout, the cameras have a new bag of AI tricks to play with. Most notable is the AI Super Zoom, which can be activated to clean up hybrid zoom shots between 30x and 100x, sharpening details and rebalancing the exposure.

If it’s as effective in practice as it looked in the demonstration, this could help the Magic 7 Pro compete with the upcoming Samsung Galaxy S25, which will likely offer two dedicated telephoto cameras and top-of-the-class zoom photography. The only caveat is that the AI Super Zoom feature isn’t handled on-device, so you’ll need an internet connection to use it, which isn’t ideal for activities like wilderness hikes.

Away from the cameras, there’s AI everywhere you look. The smart assistant is now Google’s Gemini, which includes the option to have a more natural, free-flowing conversation via Gemini Live, and MagicOS 9.0 adds things like live translation, notes transcribing and smart summaries – bringing it into line with where Samsung’s Galaxy AI was this time last year.

There are two colour variants of the Magic 7 Pro available: a standard black and the Lunar Shadow Grey pictured here. Both will be available to preorder from 17 January and, in an unexpected turn, both models cost the same as the Magic 6 Pro, coming in at £1,099. This has always been Honor’s secret weapon in competing with the Samsungs and Apples of the world, offering broadly similar specs for a slightly more palatable price.

I’ll have a first-look at the new camera features and a more in-depth exploration into the design and build in my upcoming hands-on review, with my final verdict coming soon after that. Be sure to check back in soon to see what I make of the Honor Magic 7 Pro, its new features and, of course, the Snapdragon 8 Elite processor.