Screen quality is further boosted by 4,320Hz PWM dimming, designed to reduce fluctuations in screen brightness to help eye comfort, and Honor’s “AI Defocus Display” feature. This periodically defocuses screen elements and adds a blue or yellow edge to objects, with the aim of protecting against eye fatigue during long sessions. I didn’t notice this helping but, in fairness, nor did I experience any eye strain while testing the Magic Pad 2.
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Honor Magic Pad 2 review: Performance and battery life
Honor’s previous 2024 tablet, the Pad 9, didn’t impress much in performance testing, as it used the relatively modest Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 chipset. Consequently, it’s great to see the Magic Pad 2 upgrade to the far superior Snapdragon 8s Gen 3.
This octa-core chipset is clocked up to 3GHz and delivered particularly impressive GPU benchmark results, eclipsing both the Pixel Tablet and the more expensive Huawei Matepad Pro 2024 in both the onscreen and offscreen portions. The iPad (2022) and OnePlus Pad 2 are both stronger overall but this is still a great result for the Magic Pad 2.
These figures translate to a decent gaming experience, even with higher-paced and graphically intensive games. I took Honkai: Star Rail for a spin, and it delivered a solid 30FPS with the quality set to high and managed 60FPS with the quality set to medium.
It’s a similar story in CPU benchmarking, with the Magic Pad 2 outpacing the OnePlus Pad 2’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 processor in the single-core benchmarks and even inching ahead of the iPad (2022) in the multi-core results.
The Magic Pad 2’s 10,050mAh battery performed very well in our testing, lasting for an impressive 16hrs 47mins in our standard looping video test – over an hour longer than the next-best result from Google’s Pixel Tablet.
While it impressed in the benchmarks, regular use was a slightly different story. After a day of general web browsing, writing, emailing, streaming and gaming, I found the Magic Pad 2 requiring a charge after around nine hours or so. Now, this is by no means bad, but it’s beaten by Apple’s M-Series chips hands down. Charging at least was solid – the provided 66W plug brought the battery from empty to full in around an hour and a half.
Honor Magic Pad 2 review: Software
MagicOS 8.0 looks and feels great. Built on Android 14, Honor’s latest operating system has some handy AI flex. Tools like Magic Portal make it simple to drag and drop any content on your screen into any other app, influenced by how you use the tablet. It’s a little like having a personal context menu and, at times, it’s really handy.
