Meet the HONOR 400 5G smartphone!
The HONOR 400 5G is tagged as “Your AI Phone” and boasts a 200MP camera with 6000mAh battery.
I used this smartphone for several weeks and tested its cameras, AI features, screen quality, gaming performance, connectivity, battery life, and more. There are a few quirks but the phone seems a great choice in this price range.
The HONOR 400 5G comes in a simple white box. Inside it are the smartphone itself with a pre-installed screen protector, a FREE transparent phone case, 80W charger, USB type-C cable, SIM ejector pin, and a couple of documentations.
Depending on the availability of freebies and promos, each phone may also come with a FREE Bluetooth speaker, handheld minifan, and TWS earbuds.
The HONOR 400 5G has a boxy design and sturdy build quality that make it look and feel like a premium smartphone.
It’s lightweight at 184 grams and feels solid when held in the hands. I’m inclined to call it a compact smartphone with its 6.55-inch screen but the design actually makes it just perfectly sized.
I have the Midnight Black color variant but there’s also a lighter-toned Desert Gold version. Both have matte glass back panels that do not retain smudges and fingerprints. The glossy camera island tends to lose its pristine look more easily though.
Speaking of the camera island, it has a unique trapezoidal shape with rounded corners. Just like the oval camera island of the HONOR 200 series, this gives the HONOR 400 5G an unmistakable identity and character.
At the bottom of the device are its USB type-C port, SIM card tray access, microphone and loudspeaker grille. There’s another speaker grille at the top for the stereo pair along with an Infrared blaster and another microphone.
In terms of durability, the phone has SGS 5-star drop resistance for the overall unit and IP65 dust & water resistance. It should survive accidental bumps or water splashes and can even be rinsed.
The HONOR 400 5G has a 6.55-inch AMOLED display with 120Hz refresh rate and 5000nits of peak brightness.
It’s a bright display with vivid colors, inky blacks, and smooth visuals with HDR support for Netflix. It’s a flat display so the size is just right for an immersive experience with no edge glare issue. This is one of the best-looking displays among smartphones in this price range.
Aside from the impressive screen quality, there are also several eye protection features including 3840Hz PWM dimming that eliminates flickering and Defocus eyecare for prolonged usage.
Another health feature is called Motion Sickness Relief. It reduces motion sickness caused by a moving vehicle by displaying blue dots in the screen that move based on the vehicle’s motion. I tried this feature since I’m prone to motion sickness and it did relieve the symptoms although my tests were far from scientific.
For audio, the device has stereo speakers that sound good for a smartphone. Vocals are clear and music has some dimension although it isn’t as loud as other smartphones even with 200% volume turned on.
The HONOR 400 5G is equipped with a 200 Megapixel main camera with Optical Image Stabilization and 12 Megapixel ultra-wide camera.
This dual rear camera setup can produce good-looking pictures in both daylight and low-light conditions. There are several shooting modes to choose from and AI imaging features to improve the results.
Here are several sample pictures:
As you can see in the sample pictures above, the pictures have vibrant colors, sharp details and decent dynamic range. Portrait mode also produces pleasing pictures of people with Harcourt Portrait effects.
Ultrawide pictures are sharp but its colors aren’t as vivid as the main camera and brightness is slightly reduced. It also has more grainy low-light photography but that can be dramatically improved by using the dedicated Night mode.
There’s no dedicated telephoto camera but the phone’s 4x zoom still produces decent pictures. Zooming in further up to 30x employs AI to fill details which can be hit or miss depending on the subject.
Ultrawide (0.6x)
Main camera @ 1x zoom
Main camera @ 2x zoom
Main camera @ 4x zoom
The HONOR 400 5G also has a 50 Megapixel front camera. It produces high-quality selfies in daylight and decent ones in low-light.
It has ultrawide capability of up to 0.8x and has slight beautification turned on by default.
For video recording, both the rear and front cameras can shoot up to 4K video resolution with good quality. If you prefer smoother 60fps videos, the resolution needs to be reduced to 1080p only.
The HONOR 400 5G is powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 7 Gen 3 chipset with 12GB of physical RAM and 512GB of storage.
This is the same setup as its predecessor, the HONOR 200 5G. It still holds up quite well but hardcore users might crave for a chipset upgrade.
Day to day tasks are buttery smooth such as opening apps, scrolling across social media feeds, browsing mobile websites, and the like. During my tests, there were no lags nor stutters even when quickly switching from one app to another.
HONOR 400 5G Mobile Legends FPS
In terms of gaming performance, the HONOR 400 5G achieved 117 fps in my gaming tests with Mobile Legends, 90 fps in Call of Duty Mobile (CODM), and 52 fps in Genshin Impact.
These are good results with a smooth overall gaming experience and no heating problem. However, hardcore gamers will surely crave for even better gaming performance.
Here’s a more detailed HONOR 400 5G gaming review.
The HONOR 400 5G is packed with AI features. It has the usual AI eraser and the more unique AI image enhancer, AI expand, and AI image-to-video.
That last one is its headlining feature which turns images to short videos. I use it to bring old photos to life including my elementary graduation picture and a picture where I caught a 4 kg fish but forgot to take a video.
Other AI features include subtitles for videos, real-time audio transcription, text recognition in images, and deepfake detection during video calls.
The future is indeed filled with AI and the HONOR 400 5G leverages its hardware with the latest AI features.
The HONOR 400 5G is a dual-SIM smartphone with 5G connectivity. It has fast mobile internet speeds in areas with good 5G signal coverage and better than average cellular signal reception.
It also supports Wi-Fi 6 networks, NFC, Bluetooth 5.4, and Infrared remote control function.
For security, the device has an under-display fingerprint scanner that works well. There’s also a face unlock feature using the front camera.
The HONOR 400 5G has a high-density 6,000mAh battery which powers the device for about a day and a half on a single charge with my normal usage. I’m usually left with 30% battery capacity at night.
Its battery life isn’t as impressive as I expected for the battery capacity but this is still above average among its competitors.
When playing games continuously, it lasts a little over 10 hours before needing a recharge.
Despite the large battery, recharging is still fast thanks to its 80W HONOR SuperCharge technology. It takes about 70 minutes to reach 100% battery capacity. The bundled charger might have a maximum output of 100W but the phone only supports up to 80W of charging rate.
The HONOR 400 5G is a straightforward recommendation for a smartphone. It has an impressive display, capable cameras even in low light, good gaming performance, long battery life, and fast charging.
If I had to nitpick, the phone’s chipset could be better but the current setup is a nice balance between price and performance without affecting other important features such as the cameras and display.
The HONOR 400 5G is now available in physical HONOR stores, authorized dealers, and official HONOR online stores.
