HONOR Pad 9 review

HONOR announced the Pad X9 16 back in July 2023. When I had my hands on it, it met the necessities like having loud speakers and an okay display. Now, in 2024, HONOR once again unveils their latest tablet with the HONOR Pad 9.

So, what do we think of this tablet — a tablet that has a great display, loud sounds, and gives you a bang for your buck. Read on and find out more.

Design and Construction

The HONOR Pad 9 has a metal frame with a matte back — similar to the Pad X9. It feels sturdy as is without a case, but I’ll always recommend one for your devices just in case.

The HONOR logo is spotted right on the middle of the device while the rear camera is right on top in the middle (if you have the tablet on landscape). I appreciate the design of the camera island here as the lens takes up most of the space this time compared to the Pad X9. You still see the words “AI Camera” below, but it’s not as loud so kudos, HONOR.

From a horizontal orientation, you have eight speakers: two on both sides of the Pad 9 while the other four are below. You can see the Type-C port on the right side too. The two microphones can be spotted above the HONOR Pad 9 along with the volume and power buttons.

I have my moments where I accidentally push the Power button instead of the volume rocker because of how close they are. Take note of that if that bothers you.

Display, Multimedia and Biometrics

With the HONOR Pad 9, you get a 12.1-inch IPS TFT LCD panel with up to 120Hz refresh rate and a 1.07 billion color gamut.

Color gamut is essentially the range of colors that a device can make so you can expect the HONOR Pad 9 to showcase colors that’s almost accurate to real life. Details are evident here too as you can spot the freckles and sweat in videos.

In the audio department, the Pad 9 has HONOR Histen that powers the eight speakers around the tablet. Most other tablets would go for up to 4 or 6 but we’re actually surprised that this one got 8.

This makes the device loud to the point I don’t feel the need in increasing the volume all the way up. It has great clarity but the bass is not as punchy as I want it to be.

The tablet has stylus support but you’ll have to purchase the pen separately. There’s not fingerprint sensor here to speak of either.

Performance and Benchmarks

Powering the HONOR Pad 9 is a Qualcomm Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 chipset with an Adreno 710 GPU. This processor came out back in September 2022 with four Cortex-A78 clocked at 2.2GHz and four Cortex-A55 with a maximum clock speed of 1.8GHz. Our review unit comes with 8GB of RAM and 256GB of internal storage although other options include up to 12GB of RAM and 512GB storage.

Just because it’s almost a two year old chipset, you shouldn’t doubt this guy’s capabilities.

I was able to play both Honkai Star Rail and Genshin Impact on Very High settings at 60 frames per second while Pokemon Unite was at its Highest graphics quality and frame rate.

For the most part, I haven’t experienced any lag with the tablet, but there are moments where the top part heats up. It only happens after extended periods of gameplay and it’s not that hot to touch so you don’t have to worry about that.

For benchmarks, here’s what we got:

AnTuTu Benchmark V10.2.4: 518,730

Geekbench 6:

• 941 – CPU Single-core Score
• 2,756 – CPU Multi-core Score
• 1,320 – GPU OpenCL Score
• 1,644 – GPU Vulkan Score

PCMark Work 3.0 Performance: 11,937

While not the most ideal gaming chipset, the Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 managed to meet our expectations.

Cameras

You have a 13MP for the rear camera while the selfie cam shoots using an 8MP. Don’t expect too much from a tablet camera as grain is evident in shots in well-lit environments, but it will get the job done.

As for the front shooter? It’s pretty decent for video calls if that’s what you’re looking for in a tablet, but I have yet to see the appeal in taking photos and videos with a large device.

Here are our sample shots and videos!

Front camera:

Rear camera:

Again, we don’t expect much camera quality for tablets since, for the most part, we only use it for casual video calls and the likes.

OS, Apps and UI

The HONOR Pad 9 uses MagicOS 7.2 based on Android 13. It looks like your everyday Android tablet UI with not that much bloatware which is pretty nice and clean.

And, if you’re looking to multitask with the tablet, it can support up to two floating windows, and a split screen together with one floating window. It does have Stylus support that can access the Pad 9 with its own gestures.

Though the Pad 9 can come with a keyboard, you need to have your Bluetooth on to access it. Some tablets don’t need to do this, but it’s just nitpicking.

Connectivity and Battery

An 8,300mAh battery powers the HONOR Pad 9. It took the tablet more than an hour to charge from 20% to 100% which is a decent charging speed for tablets. I was able to get some work done, watched videos and played games on the Pad 9 which lasted me the whole day. <

Our PCMark Work 3.0 Battery Life test yielded a result of 10 hours and 46 minutes while our proprietary video loop test where we replay a 1080p video at 50% brightness, 0% volume, and in airplane mode got a total of 9 hours and 53 minutes.

As for connectivity, we only have WiFi and Bluetooth here. No NFC or GPS for positioning here too.

Conclusion

The HONOR Pad 9 is a great contender to be your next tablet. From having a great display panel to a loud sound system, this is a great investment for those who need a tablet under 20K. The HONOR Pad 9 is priced at 15,999 pesos for just the tablet, but if you’re looking to grab the magnetic keyboard too, it will cost you 17,999 pesos. So, if you just want to game on the go with a large display panel, you can’t go wrong with the HONOR Pad 9.

What we like:

• Great display
• Loud sounds
• Decent performance

What we did not like:

• Not a punchy bass
• Subpar cameras
• No fingerprint sensor

HONOR Pad 9 specs:
12.1-inch 2.5K IPS LCD display @ 2560 x 1600 pixels, 120Hz refresh
Qualcomm Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 chipset
Adreno 710 GPU
8GB, 12GB RAM (+8GB HONOR RAM Turbo)
128GB, 256GB, 512GB internal storage
13MP f/2.0 main camera
8MP f/2.2 selfie camera
WiFi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac, 2.4GHz and 5GHz
Bluetooth 5.1
USB Type-C
Eight Hi-Fi speakers surround sound, Two microphones
HONOR Histen 3D Audio
MagicOS 7.2 based on Android 13
8,300mAh Li-Po battery, 35W wired
278.27mm x 180.11mm x 6.9mm (dimensions)
~555 grams (weight)
Space Gray