Review Summary
Expert Rating
Honor has launched the Honor X9c smartphone in India. The name might suggest it’s an upgrade over last year’s Honor X9b (review), but a closer look at the spec sheet reveals a different story. In essence, the X9c is more of a variant than a true successor, with its larger battery being the only notable change. That improvement, however, comes at the cost of one fewer lens in the rear camera setup.
How well do those things make the Honor X9c fit into the current market landscape, where the capable iQOO Z10 (review) is available at the same Rs 21,999 price point? Then there’s the OnePlus Nord CE5 5G (review), which is slightly more expensive at Rs 24,999, but offers one of the best camera systems in this segment. Continue reading this review to find out.
Table of Contents
Verdict
The Honor X9c is worth considering for its durable and sleek design, large battery, vibrant display, and reliable performance for everyday tasks. That said, cameras are not its strongest suit, and for power users, there are more worthy options out there.
Sleek & sturdy design
| Smartphone | Thickness | Weight | IP Rating |
| Honor X9c | 7.98 mm | 189 grams | IP65M |
| iQOO Z10 | 7.89 mm | 199 grams | IP65 |
| OnePlus Nord CE 5 5G | 8.17 mm | 199 grams | IP65 |
We drove a car over the Honor X9b last year, and it survived. Its successor, the Honor X9c, carries the same sturdy design. The handset is SGS drop resistance certified, owing to its shock-absorbing material, called cushioning technology, which is rated to provide the display structural integrity against drops from up to 1.5 meters of height. Be that as it may, I wish the company had improved the IP rating of the device from IP65 to a higher IP68/69 rating that provides better protection against water and dust.
Moving on, Honor has made a few subtle design tweaks to the X9c. The circular camera module on the back now features slanted edges, giving it a more seamless and refined appearance. Additionally, the module is bordered by a coloured ring that matches the phone’s overall colour scheme, adding a cohesive visual touch. The central portion, housing the camera sensors and LED flash, remains solid black, providing a striking contrast. The ‘Matrix 108MP Sensor’ branding, carried over from last year, is now etched vertically at the centre of the module.
The Honor X9c is available in two colour variants: Titanium Black and Jade Cyan. We received the Jade Cyan variant for review, which features a marble-like pattern on the back that hints at its durability. The rear panel also has a matte finish, offering a comfortable and secure in-hand feel. The edges are smoothly curved, making it easier to grip the device. Overall, the new Honor smartphone is both sleek and stylish.
On the bottom edge, you’ll find a USB Type-C port for charging and data transfer. The phone also comes equipped with dual speakers, one at the bottom and one at the top, delivering stereo sound that remains crisp and clear even at higher volumes. The fingerprint scanner is underneath the display (positioned close to the bottom edge, which isn’t ideal) and is able to unlock the device quickly and accurately.
Bright, vibrant display
| Smartphone | Display | Peak Brightness |
| Honor X9c | 6.78 inches - AMOLED (Curved Display) | 4000 nits |
| iQOO Z10 | 6.77 inches - AMOLED (Curved Display) | 5000 nits |
| OnePlus Nord CE 5 5G | 6.77 inches - AMOLED | 1430 nits |
The Honor X9c features a 6.78-inch AMOLED curved display with 1.5K resolution, 120Hz refresh rate, 100 percent DCI-P3 colour gamut, up to 4,000 nits of peak brightness, and HDR10+ support. This is largely the same panel as its predecessor, with two key differences: a pill-shaped cutout and a significantly higher brightness ceiling. The latter notably improves legibility in bright conditions, particularly under direct sunlight. In my experience, the display is easy to read both indoors and outdoors, although it’s worth noting that most of the testing took place during overcast weather, and not the harsh, scorching heat of a typical Delhi summer.
Moving on, the pill-shaped cutout for the selfie camera appears to be inspired by the Honor 200 Pro, which features dual front-facing sensors for selfies and video calls. The Honor X9c, however, only houses a single selfie camera within that cutout, and it occupies just a small portion of the space. We’re just as puzzled as you might be about the purpose of the extra space in the pill-shaped design, which also makes the overall viewing experience less immersive. The Honor X9c does give users the option to hide the cutout by adding a black bar at the top in certain apps, but the bar is quite thick and noticeably reduces usable screen real estate.
Nevertheless, the Honor X9c provides a crisp viewing experience, with deep black and vibrant colours. The smartphone also ensures impressive viewing angles and Widevine L1 certifications for streaming content from Netflix and other streaming platforms with FHD resolution. The display is designed with eye comfort in mind, featuring up to 3,840Hz dynamic dimming and a Circadian Night mode, which automatically adjusts the screen’s colour temperature in the evening to reduce blue light exposure. That said, the Circadian Night feature needs to be manually enabled in the settings.
Tough-sell for photographers
| Smartphone | Primary Sensor | Secondary Sensor | Tertiary Sensor |
| Honor X9c | 108 MP Wide Angle | 5 MP Ultra-Wide Angle | NA |
| iQOO Z10 | 50 MP Wide Angle | 2 MP Depth | NA |
| OnePlus Nord CE 5 5G | 50 MP Wide Angle(79° field-of-view) | 8 MP Ultra-Wide Angle | NA |
The Honor X9c retains the same camera setup as its predecessor, featuring a 108MP primary sensor and a 5MP ultra-wide lens on the rear, along with a 16MP front-facing camera. However, the company has dropped the 2MP macro sensor for close-up shots that was present on the Honor X9b.
I’m left with a similar impression of the Honor X9c’s cameras as I had with the Honor X9b last year. The primary camera is at its best in well-lit conditions, producing contrast-rich images, but the overall detail and sharpness leave much to be desired, especially considering the phone’s price point. Portrait shots from the main sensor are equally underwhelming, offering average subject separation, noticeable edge distortion, and subpar detailing. The ultrawide camera doesn’t fare much better, delivering grainy landscapes with muted colours. While low-light and selfie shots are passable, the camera setup as a whole feels underpowered given the sub-Rs 25,000 segment, making the Honor X9c a tough sell for photography-focused users.
To provide better context around the Honor X9c’s camera performance, we’ve compared it against the OnePlus Nord CE5 5G, one of the best camera phones currently available under Rs 25,000.
Daylight
The Honor X9c leans towards cold tones, whereas the OnePlus Nord CE5 5G captures images with warm tones in well-lit environments. That said, despite offering a larger sensor, the Honor smartphone struggles with detail retention. The X9c’s images appear grainier than the OnePlus Nord CE5 5G, which also excels with vibrant, if not accurate, colours and dynamic range. The Honor X9c images appear relatively washed out.
Ultrawide
Images appear further washed out when switched to an ultrawide lens from the primary one on the Honor X9c. Detail levels take a hit as well, and shadow retention is virtually non-existent. In comparison, the OnePlus Nord CE5 5G handles ultra-wide shots more effectively, offering better contrast and dynamic range. Colours appear more vivid and appealing, giving the overall image a more polished look.
Portrait
Both smartphones default to 2x in-sensor zoom for portrait shots from their main camera, but neither nails colour accuracy or skin tones. The Honor X9c tends to introduce a slight purplish tint and produces overly contrasty images. In contrast, the OnePlus Nord CE5 5G delivers portraits with brighter tones, which leads to slight overexposure, but overall, offers better detail retention and improved edge detection. Its bokeh effect also appears more natural compared to the Honor X9c.
Selfie
Selfies on the Honor X9c also appear somewhat washed out, though the level of detail is relatively better. That said, the OnePlus Nord CE5 5G delivers more appealing selfies overall, with oversaturated colours and underwhelming dynamic range.
Low light (night mode)
In low-light conditions with Night Mode enabled, the Honor X9c outperforms the OnePlus Nord CE 5G in controlling light flare and delivering a more true-to-life scene. However, it still struggles to suppress image noise.
Performance ideal for basic usage
| Smartphone | Chipset | RAM |
| Honor X9c | Qualcomm Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 SM6450 | 8 GB LPDDR5 |
| iQOO Z10 | Qualcomm Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 | 8 GB / 12 GB LPDDR4X |
| OnePlus Nord CE 5 5G | MediaTek Dimensity 8350 Apex | 8 GB / 12 GB LPDDR5X |
The Honor X9c is powered by the Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 SoC, which is the same chipset that powered the Honor X9b last year. While it ensures decent performance for light everyday activities such as scrolling, streaming, browsing, and more, the handset lacks the raw performance and firepower that some of the latest smartphones bring to the table at a similar price.
The handset’s AnTuTu score, which analyses the overall performance, is the lowest among all smartphones we’ve tested this year. While its Geekbench scores, which assess CPU performance, are above average, they still fall short compared to most of its rivals.
That said, the handset manages to impress with its Burnout CPU throttle test, with 80 percent efficiency, but it is not meant for heavy usage. The Honor X9c stutters during multitasking, especially when several apps are running in the background. Additionally, its camera struggles to keep up with rapid-fire photography, falling short of the consistency offered by rivals like the OnePlus Nord CE5.
The Honor X9c can handle games, including graphically demanding ones such as BGMI, Call of Duty: Mobile, and Real Racing 3. We played all three games for 30 minutes each, and the device managed them without a significant drop in frame rate. However, during the process, it heated up by 14 degrees Celsius in aggregate, which is still quite impressive for a phone this sleek. That said, this doesn’t make it the most thermally efficient device out there in its segment. The Infinix GT 30 Pro (review) remains a leader at that, in our testing, and if you are a gamer, that’s the smartphone to get.
The Honor X9c will be a reliable option for casual gamers. The handset is equipped with 8GB of RAM and 256GB of non-user expandable storage.
Software needs refinement
| Smartphone | Pre-Installed Apps | Software Support |
| Honor X9c | 43 | NA |
| iQOO Z10 | 61 | 2 Years OS Updates + 3 Years Security Updates |
| OnePlus Nord CE 5 5G | 54 | 4 Year OS Updates + 6 Year Security Updates |
The Honor X9c runs Android 15-based MagicOS 9 out of the box. The software is intuitive, but lacks proper optimisation for the Indian market. For starters, the phone comes with the TikTok app pre-installed, which is still banned in the country. The app doesn’t work, and users have the option to uninstall it, along with eight other third-party apps. That said, the UI is nowhere close to stock Android and as feature-rich as some of the other custom Android skins.
The smartphone includes several AI-driven features such as Circle to Search, the Google Gemini voice assistant, and photo editing tools like AI Eraser and AI Recompose. While these tools handle basic edits reasonably well, their performance feels rather average. In more complex scenarios, such as adjusting shadows or removing distant objects, the results can appear unpolished, often leaving behind smudged or unnatural patches where the edits were applied.
That said, these are software-related issues and can be fixed with a future software update. The Honor X9c is likely to receive two major OS updates and three years of security upgrades, which is standard for the price.
Decent battery life
| Smartphone | Battery Capacity | Charging Support | Charging time (20% to 100% ) |
| Honor X9c | 6600 mAh | 66W Super Charging | 59m |
| iQOO Z10 | 7300 mAh | 90W Flash Charging | 43m |
| OnePlus Nord CE 5 5G | 7100 mAh | 80W Super VOOC Charging | 47m |
The Honor X9c features an upgraded 6,600mAh battery, up from 5,800mAh on its predecessor. Impressively, the OEM has achieved this increase without adding bulk, maintaining the same 7.98mm thickness and keeping the weight in check at 185 grams. This has been made possible by the adoption of advanced silicon-carbon battery technology, which offers higher energy density than the traditional Lithium-ion without being bulky.
However, the smartphone seems to be lacking optimisation by scoring relatively low in our synthetic benchmark and real-world tests. Phones with a 5,500mAh battery within the segment have scored higher than the Honor X9c in the PCMark battery test. Moreover, in our 30-minute YouTube video streaming and 90-minute gaming tests, the handset’s battery drained by 24 percent in total, which is higher than both OnePlus Nord CE5 5G and iQOO Z10.
Considering the Honor X9c isn’t designed for intensive workloads, it comfortably lasts a full day on a single charge. In our day-to-day usage, the phone consistently made it to the end of the day with around 30 percent battery remaining. When it’s time to recharge, the 66W fast charging support ensures quick top-ups, taking the battery from 20 to 100 percent in under an hour. While that’s respectable, the iQOO Z10 takes just 42 minutes to fully juice up its 7,300mAh battery using its 90W charger.
The Honor X9c comes with a special battery coating and power management system, which is rated to operate safely in extreme temperatures from -30 degrees Celsius to 55 degrees Celsius.
Final Verdict
The Honor X9c’s asking price of Rs 21,999 makes it cheaper than its predecessor, Honor X9b, which was launched at Rs 27,999. However, the market has become even more competitive since then, with smartphones like iQOO Z10 and OnePlus Nord CE5 5G (both Amazon exclusives), offering better value for money.
As a result, the Honor X9c may not be the first choice for users prioritising raw power or imaging capabilities. That said, if your focus lies elsewhere, like dependable day-to-day use and media consumption, the smartphone is worth a second look. The phone scores high with its sleek yet durable design, a vibrant AMOLED display, reliable performance for light usage, and a large battery packed into a slim and stylish frame.
Editor’s rating: 7.7/10
Reasons to buy:
- The handset is sleek, stylish, and durable against minor drops and falls.
- The large curved AMOLED display provides a vibrant viewing experience indoors and outdoors.
- Battery life is good for basic everyday usage, including browsing, streaming, and scrolling.
Reasons not to buy:
- The camera setup as a whole feels underpowered.
- Performance is relatively modest given the price and competition.
