Honor X5c Plus Review

Honor is often associated with midrange and top spec models like the Honor 300 series and the Magic series. But… The post Honor X5c Plus Review appeared first on YugaTech | Philippines Tech News & Reviews.

Honor is often associated with midrange and top spec models like the Honor 300 series and the Magic series. But of course, the brand also offers more affordable models for those on a tighter budget. After all, not everyone can drop PHP 20,000 or up on a smartphone. Today, we’re looking at what could be Honor’s most affordable phone yet – the X5c Plus. But what does the Honor X5c Plus offer, and is it the budget smartphone you should consider in 2026?

Let’s find out. The design of the Honor X5c Plus reminds us of the older iPhone models, with the camera island situated in the upper left corner of the back panel. It might look like it features a triple camera system, but don’t be fooled. The X5c only packs a single main shooter, but more on that later. As for the rest of the back panel, our review unit is in the Ocean Cyan color, and it looks great.

There are wave effects on the panel with a subtle color shift design. We like the design, but some might prefer a cleaner look. I mean, style is subjective after all. It’s quite a big phone, and it’s not exactly the most ergonomic to use. The power button, which doubles as a fingerprint sensor and volume rocker, is situated a bit higher, making it a bit hard to adjust the volume when using the phone with just one hand.

Meanwhile, at the bottom, there’s a USB-C port, a loudspeaker, and a 3.5mm headphone jack. On the left side, there’s the dual-sim card slot with a dedicated microSD slot. At the top, there’s the secondary microphone. The back panel and frame are made out of plastic, but it’s not the cheap-feeling plastic. Even if you press hard on the back panel, there’s no flex. It feels very sturdy, and it seems like it would last a beating.

Even if the phone seems tough, unfortunately, the X5c Plus does not come with an official IP rating. With that, do not submerge this phone in water or expose it to the elements. Given the large size of the Honor X5c Plus, obviously it also features a large 6.74-inch display. It’s a rather basic display featuring a TFT LCD panel with 1080P resolution and a 90Hz refresh rate. One thing we immediately noticed are the thick borders all around.

It’s not symmetrical too, with the top and bottom being thicker than the sides. There’s also a teardrop design for the front camera, which makes the phone look dated. Despite that, it’s more than enough for watching videos on this phone. Even with just a 90Hz refresh rate, users can have a decent viewing experience with smooth animations. The colors aren’t the most vivid and can feel lacking, especially if you’re used to OLED or higher-end displays.

In addition, the viewing angles aren’t that great. Depending on the angle at which we view the display, the screen can look dark, or the colors may look off. It’s best suited when watching directly in front of the user. It’s also decent enough for playing games, but the 90Hz refresh rate might be lacking for some users. More on that later. As for the mono loudspeaker, it’s loud, but the sound quality isn’t that great.

Like the display, it’s decent at best when the volume is around 50-75 percent. The quality gets even more distorted when the speaker is maxed out. It ends up sounding blown out, and the balance between mid, highs, and bass is muddied. Not to mention, there’s the possibility of accidentally covering the speaker with our fingers. As for biometrics, it features a side-mounted fingerprint scanner.

It’s not exactly the most ergonomic, given the position of the power button. There’s also a face unlock option if you find the fingerprint scanner a bit of a hassle. Both work fast and are accurate. As mentioned earlier, the rear camera layout makes it seem like the Honor X5c Plus features a triple rear camera. However, it only packs a single 50MP main shooter. The other two are an auxiliary lens and the flash.

At the front, there’s a 5MP camera for selfies. We had our reservations about the camera, but we were surprised by how this phone captures images. It’s more than decent, especially when users leave it at 1x or 2x zoom. They’re sharp and feature decent contrast. However, there are times where the camera has a hard time focusing, especially when users try to take up close images. We also don’t recommend going beyond 3x zoom as the drop in quality is very noticeable.

While the quality is decent, the images sometimes look overly edited. The colors of the leaves look a bit too colorful, and appear unnaturally saturated. In low-light, the drop in image quality is quite obvious. There’s no dedicated night mode available either that can help improve low-light photos. As for videos, the X5c Plus records at a maximum of 1080P@30FPS. The quality is very similar to that of the images, where the colors can look overly edited.

However, there is no video stabilization option available. With that, the footage can look shaky, especially if users don’t have the steadiest of hands. Under the hood, the Honor X5c Plus packs a MediaTek Helio G81 chipset. Our review unit comes with 4GB of RAM and 128GB of storage, which is the only variant available for the Philippines. If storage is lacking, there is a microSD card slot available.

In terms of performance, it’s not exactly the most powerful chip available, but it can handle most of the productivity tasks available. Users can also switch between apps quickly to get work done. However, if we leave too many tasks running in the background, it starts to slow down. Close the apps, and it will run smoothly once again. When it comes to games, it’s better suited for playing lighter titles like Mobile Legends.

ML runs smoothly with the graphics set to medium, but there is some framerate drop when the graphics are maxed out. Even with just a 90Hz refresh rate display, users can enjoy a nice game of ML to kill time. While the phone can run more graphics-intensive titles like Genshin Impact, it’s not exactly the best experience. Even at the lowest settings, users will experience the occasional frame rate drops when just exploring one area.

It can be used to complete dailies, but that’s about it. It’s not a great gaming experience, but we do have to remember this is a budget smartphone. The same can be said for the benchmarks, which are listed down below. The Honor X5c Plus runs on MagicOS 9.0 based on Android 15. For those who have used an Honor smartphone before, it feels very much the same as before. However, there’s no AI features available on this phone, which is as expected.

That goes for Gemini as well. We think of it as essentially the barebones version of MagicOS 9, which we’ve come to like from Honor. It’s a clean and honest look, and more importantly, it’s easy to use. As expected, there is a bit of bloatware, but they’re easy to delete in the menu. Thankfully, we didn’t experience any ads either when opening up some of the local Honor apps. Some might feel disappointed with the lack of AI functions, but do remember that this is a budget smartphone.

Powering the Honor X5c Plus is a 5,260 mAh battery. It’s a slightly larger than usual battery, but we didn’t expect it to translate to a longer battery life. Unfortunately, this phone proved us wrong. Even after using it for an entire day for running benchmarks, playing games, and taking photos, the battery barely dropped. The benchmarks also proved a similar story, recording 20 hours and 33 minutes using PCMark’s Work 3.0 Battery Test.

It’s great to know that users won’t have to recharge the X5c Plus that often since it features slow charging speeds. This phone only features a 15W charging speed, which is really slow by today’s standards. As for connectivity, the X5c Plus features dual-band Wi-Fi, GPS, Bluetooth 5.1, and 4G LTE. No 5G here or eSIM support. Overall, there’s nothing too special about the Honor X5c Plus. It doesn’t have the durable capabilities of the X9d, nor does it have the AI functions we’ve come to expect from MagicOS 9 and 10.

The camera is decent, but the chipset is quite lacking, especially with only 4GB of RAM. Thankfully, it makes up for it with its impressive battery life. But the biggest advantage of the Honor X5c Plus? The price. It retails for only PHP 6,999, which is affordable considering what this phone offers. And for those really interested in the X5c Plus? There’s currently a promo price of PHP 4,999, which makes it a serious contender in the budget segment.

With that, there’s no doubt the Honor X5c Plus is an affordable phone that gets the job done. Just don’t expect too much from it. But what do you guys think of the Honor X5c Plus? Share your thoughts in the comments below. HONOR X5c Plus specs: 6.74-inch TFT LCD display, HD+ (1600 × 720) resolution, 90Hz refresh rate MediaTek Helio G81 processor Mali-G52 MC2 GPU 4GB RAM (+4GB HONOR RAM Turbo) 128GB internal storage, expandable via microSD (up to 1TB) 50MP main camera Auxiliary rear camera 5MP front camera Side-mounted fingerprint scanner Android 15 with MagicOS 9.0 Dual Nano-SIM 4G LTE Wi-Fi 5 Bluetooth 5.1 GPS, GLONASS, Galileo, BeiDou USB Type-C 3.5mm headphone jack 5,260mAh battery 15W wired charging Weight & dimensions: 167 x 77 x 7.89 mm, ~186g Color options: Ocean Cyan, Meteor Silver Contributing writer at YugaTech, covering the latest in technology news and reviews.

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