Honor X6a Review: A minimalist budget-friendly phone with standard features

November 25, 2023, 08:21 PM
by Shahriar Rabab

UNB News
Publish- November 25, 2023, 08:21 PM
Shahriar Rabab
Update- November 25, 2023, 08:34 PM

Honor X6a

The journey of Honor as a smartphone brand started with their entry into the budget-friendly and mid-range smartphone market. Honor launched the X6a on 28th July 2023 in India. The Honor X6a comes as an update over last year’s Honor X6. Let’s have a detailed look into it.

Key Specifications of Honor X6a

Design and Build Quality

The design of the Honor X6a is quite minimal. The device has a plastic frame and back with a glass front. The sensors protrude from the back panel. The frosted finish on the Cyan Lake variant refracts light which gives the smartphone its unique look. Those looking for an even more minimal option, the Midnight Black can be an option with a matte black finish.

Dimension-wise, the X6a comes in at 163.32 x 75.07 x 8.35 mm with 188 g of weight. The smartphone comes with standard ports and button choices including a headphone jack and a dedicated micro SDXC slot. The power button on the X6a doubles as the fingerprint scanner. The front of the device has a water-drop notch display with a sizable chin at the bottom. Being an ultra-budget smartphone, the large chin isn’t entirely unfounded.

Overall the flat style design with frosted finish adds a new dimension to the X6a.

The Display

The display on the Honor X6a is a 6.56-inch TFT LCD panel with HD+ resolution. The panel has a 720 x 1612 pixel layout with 260 ppi. However, the most distinctive feature of the display is the 90 Hz refresh rate. It’s great to see even ultra-budget smartphones are offering faster refresh rate displays.

The panel also supports up to 16.7 M colors. It has a slightly different aspect ratio at 20.15:9. It can be due to the large chin at the bottom which brings the screen-to-body ratio to around 83%. The multi-touch gesture support can accommodate up to 10 touch points at the same time.

Speaking of usability, the display looked great for a budget smartphone. The default color was a bit on the warm side but that can be easily calibrated from the settings. For anyone coming from a 60 Hz panel, the faster refresh rate would be easily noticeable.

The Camera

There is a triple camera setup on the X6a even though there are 4 distinct sensor housings on the back. One of the sensor spaces actually houses the flashlight which helps to bring that square symmetrical look at the back.

The main camera is a 50 MP f/1.8 wide-angle sensor with PDAF. The complementing camera modules are a 2 MP f/2.4 macro and a 2MP f/2.4 depth sensor. In effect, the X6a is carried mostly by the main camera as the macro and depth sensors aren’t very useful in any way.

Being a budget smartphone, the camera on the X6a was quite impressive. The main camera was able to capture some great shots in daylight conditions. One of the key issues with budget-friendly smartphone cameras is the loss of dynamic range. However, the X6a did a good enough job of preserving it throughout every shot. The portrait shots also came out pretty well. There were slight edge detection issues at times which will hopefully be solved with a software update.

Honor X6a

The low-light images had good exposure. However, the details were compromised and the images had noticeable grains and noise in them.

The videography on the X6a is limited to 1080P at 30 fps. The videos weren’t all that great as there were no stabilizing features. There’s also a 5 MP front camera which produced passable results.

Processor and Performance

The processor on the Honor X6a is Mediatek MT6762G Helio G36 based on the 12 Nm architecture. The G36 is Mediatek’s entry-level processor which can be considered slightly better than Unisoc Tiger T616. The octa-core processor has a 4x2.2 GHz Cortex-A53 & 4x1.7 GHz Cortex-A53 chip design with IMG GE8320 GPU.

The entry-level processor combined with an entry-level GPU means that the X6a isn’t really made for gaming. In the test, games like PUBG, Genshin Impact, and COD ran with hiccups here and there even at the base settings. The device also heated up pretty fast while playing online or 3D games.

On the flip side, day-to-day tasks like browsing the web, watching videos or social media were a breeze. The user experience was decent and snappy for casual use thanks to the 90 Hz refresh rate.

The X6a is running MagicOS 7.1 based on Android 13. MagicOS has its ups and downs with the bloatware but they have gotten far more manageable compared to past experiences.

Battery and Charge Time

The battery on the Honor X6a is 5200 mAh. The device supports up to 22.5 W of fast charging which can take the device up to 31% in 20 minutes.

Pros and Cons of Honor X6a

Pros:

-Minimal design
-Good camera module
-Great battery
-Has a 3.5 mm headphone jack
-Micro SDXC support
-90 Hz refresh rate panel

Cons:

-Bloatware issues
-Not ideal for gaming.

Honor X6a Official Price in Bangladesh

The official price of the Honor X6a in Bangladesh is 17,499 BDT.

Verdict

Honor X6a is an incremental update over last year’s X6. The smartphone brings minimal updates over the design and processor with the rest of the aspects remaining almost the same as before. On the whole, the X6a can be a good pick for those looking for a casual daily driver smartphone.