The 200MP-packing Honor 90 launches in South Africa

Chinese technology company Honor has just launched its Honor 90 and 90 Lite smartphones in South Africa, following their MEA regional launch in Dubai earlier this year.

Honor’s devices enter South Africa’s smartphone market in the overpopulated midrange with the aim to claw some market share away from the regulars. To do that, it’ll need competitively priced devices that perform well in the key areas and whose shortcuts don’t make it obvious that you aren’t using a flagship. It’s no small task but Honor seems like it’s ready.

The Honor is all mine

The Honor 90, the more capable of the two new smartphones, does exactly what we just mentioned. Special attention has been paid to the device’s display, rear camera array, and battery – which are the specs many people first consider when picking a smartphone.

Here, you’re getting a 6.7in AMOLED display with a native resolution of a crisp 1,200×2,664. The 120Hz refresh rate is good to see although mostly expected for a midrange device and the HDR10+ certification should make supported content look great.

If you’re partial to snapping a pic or two for the Gram, the 200MP main camera sensor will probably sound appealing. It is set behind an f/1.9 lens with PDAF (phase detection auto focus) but no OIS (optical image stabilisation). Although, EIS (electronic image stabilisation) kicks in when shooting video.

On the back, you’ll also find a 12MP sensor that handles ultrawide and macro shots, along with a 2MP depth camera – because only having two rear sensors is a cardinal sin in 2023. Your selfies will come from the front 50MP snapper that can also manage 4K video calls, if you’re into that.

Battery life is another area where the Honor 90 shows promise. The 5,000mAh battery offers whole-day usage and is complemented by the included 66W charger. Honor says it’ll get you from empty to 20% in five minutes.

A Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 chipset is doing the heavy lifting. And not just any SD 7 Gen 1 but the ‘Accelerated Edition’, meaning CPU speeds will top out at a whopping 2.5GHz instead of the paltry 2.4GHz of the non-accelerated version. Sarcasm aside, moderate gaming shouldn’t be an issue and it also means 5G mobile connectivity is possible along with Bluetooth 5.2 and Wi-Fi 6.

Honor is bringing the 12GB RAM version of the Honor 90 to SA, despite the 19GB number you might see in the marketing. That refers to Honor’s use of what is essentially the same as a Windows page file and should be avoided as far as possible. It comes with 512GB of non-expandable storage.

Something a little lite-r

Joining the Honor 90 is its little brother, the Honor 90 Lite. This guy’s aimed more at the budget side of the market with stepped-down specs across the board. The 200MP main camera sensor of the 90 is halved in the Lite down to 100MP, the battery’s capacity is reduced to 4,500mAh and the charger has shrunk from 66W to 22.5W, and while the display of both measures 6.7in, the Lite swaps out the 120Hz AMOLED panal for a less-flashy 90Hz IPS affair.

Performance also takes a knock. Instead of the SD 7 Gen 1 chipset, the Lite ships with a MediaTek Dimensity 6020 SoC. It might not manage to reach the 2.5GHz of the SD 7 Gen 1 (maxing out at 2.2GHz) but you’re still getting two SIM slots, 5G mobile connectivity and Bluetooth 5.1 – no Wi-Fi 6 unfortunately. The chipset is joined by 8GB of RAM (you can ignore the 13GB) and 256GB of non-expandable storage.

The stuff you’ve been waiting for

By now you’re probably wondering what these cost. Whether that’s to laugh at an out-of-touch company with a stupidly-priced device, or because the spec sheet impresses you and you want to own one depends on you. But from where we’re sitting, we’re leaning towards the latter but we’ll need to wait until we can put them through Stuff’s rigorous review process before we can confirm that.

The Honor 90 will retail for R15,000 and comes bundled with the Honor Watch 4. The Honor 90 Lite will cost R8,000 and comes bundled with a set of Honor Choice Earbuds X5. Both devices will be available in the country from 1 September.