HONOR X7d Review – The Most Affordable Water Resistant Phone of 2025

Most electronics tremble when facing a little water but this one’s a little different. Or so we may think.

The new HONOR X7d is designed for those who want a durable, all-around smartphone that can handle real-world spills, rain, and even the occasional dip.

At just PHP 9,999, the brand markets it as the most affordable water-resistant phone of 2025, featuring IP65M all-angle protection, a 6000mAh long-lasting battery, a Snapdragon chipset, and a 108MP AI camera, all packed in a sleek and sturdy body.

So without further ado, let’s get into it.

Design and Construction

At first glance, the HONOR X7d doesn’t look like your typical “rugged” phone. On the contrary, it’s far from it but this isn’t something new. HONOR has been boasting the rigidity for a lot of their more budget-friendly handsets in recent years despite the arguably premium look.

Our unit is rocking the Dessert Gold colorway, and to my eye it kinda looks more like an Original Glazed doughnut, or even some mango ice cream sitting in a tub, freshly taken out of the freezer.

It sports a matte back panel curved back with some HONOR branding situated on the lower center. Its camera module is kinda big with a very ala-fruitphone design but gets some textured gold-accenting around it, which adds some flare but can also cheapen the look depending on who you’re talking to.

Its midframe is made out of plastic with a metallic paint job. We get the volume rocker and power button that doubles as a fingerprint scanner on the right, an AI assistant button on the left.

Ambient light sensor and secondary microphone on top, and a dual nano SIM card tray, primary mic for calls, USB Type-C port, and a speaker grille that houses one out of two stereo speakers. Its pair can be found in the call earpiece right above the punch-hole selfie camera. 

The widely marketed IP65M resistance rating is interesting. 

Typically an IP65 rating means it can handle accidental splashes, rain, and even resistance to water jets, like a garden hose or even our toilet’s bidet.

The M refers to “moving water” which doesn’t necessarily mean we can immerse it in water. But HONOR says the phone should be able to withstand submersion of up to 0.5 meters for one minute.

They’ve done a similar thing before with the HONOR X7C, which we deemed should’ve been better marketed as splash-resistant despite the marketing videos showing the phone underwater most of the time.

If there’s anything to go by it’s, just because you can, doesn’t mean you should, because just like last year we don’t think water damage is covered in the X7d’s warranty either.

Another good thing to note is it’s also SGS 5-star drop-resistant certified, which means it should be able to survive drops from up to 1.5 meters.

Overall for design, it’s nothing spectacular, it’s an average entry-level phone design in 2025 that should be able to withstand accidents during commutes and even rain on a motorcycle.

The display bezels are kinda ugly with that chin at the bottom. 

Display, Multimedia and Biometrics

Speaking of display, it sports a 6.77-inch TFT LCD panel with a 120Hz refresh rate, and a peak brightness of 800 nits.

It’s nothing to write home about but it’s definitely decent. If only it had a better Widevine level perhaps? It utilizes Widevine L3, which basically means streaming videos on Youtube caps the quality to 1080p, and any other video streaming service like Netflix plays back in 720p or HD viewing with no support for HDR and alike.

So, if you want a phone that delivers the best video streaming quality available, this isn’t one of them.

Its redeeming quality here would have to be its stereo speakers, audio did come before video after all. They deliver more than decent quality with a sound stage filled with a lot of mids then highs, with little to no bass present. 

End-users can even max the volume out to 400% which pronounces the highs even more, which can come in handy when listening to instructional tutorials or even a podcast.

For biometrics, like I mentioned earlier, we have a side-mounted scanner that doubles as the power button and face unlock. 

The side mounted scanner is left-handed friendly, and both options accurately and quickly unlock the phone as expected. We still do believe that the fingerprint scanner is a more secure means of protection but in terms of unlocking methods both feel quick.

Camera

At the rear, the HONOR X7d comes with a 108MP main camera, and a 2MP depth sensor, with an 8MP camera in front for selfies. For a phone under PHP 10K the photos come out alright. It’s not replacing any DSLRs anytime soon if that’s how you wanted us to put it.

But like any other camera, lighting is definitely key. Photos taken in ample lighting conditions come out very usable for most purposes today. And low light camera performance is just okay.

The same can be said with Portrait Mode, better lighting equals better cutout, less light equals lesser results.

HONOR X7d Sample Photos

Oct 7 – 14, 2025

Video capture is another thing we can refer to as decent. Resolution caps at 1080p at 30 fps for both the front and back, with a useful Dual-View mode if users wanted to record themselves and what’s in front of them at the same time, but it does cap to 720p capture.

We also have AI tools like AI Eraser, AI Beauty, and AI Upscale to play around with in the edit that aren’t all too shabby either. I’ve personally tested AI Eraser with this photo because the telephone wires seemed a little distracting and the results speak for themselves.

OS, Apps and UI

The HONOR X7d comes with MagicOS 9 based on Android 15 out of the box.

It does come with pre-installed apps or suggested apps to download out of the box, that are all easy enough to uninstall if not needed. 

The AI Mobile Assistant button does feel a little gimmicky when we take the time to see what we can do with it. I mean, to someone like me it doesn’t really add much use or functionality to the phone since we can already do all those things without it.

But there is some novelty to it when you think about people who aren’t like me. Someone not as tech-literate like seniors or those who’d rather not be bothered. 

Don’t know hot to take a screenshot with your phone? –Press the AI button.

Don’t know how to turn on your flashlight? –AI button.

In that sense it is “kinda” useful. Either way, the phone is more than usable for almost any app, we did run into some issues with Vulkan benchmarks but it isn’t the biggest deal.

Performance

Under the hood, the HONOR X7d runs on a Qualcomm Snapdragon 685. A 6nm chipset found in many reliable mid range phones with clock speeds that go up to 2.8 Ghz.

Our unit is configured with 8GB of physical memory with an additional 8GB of virtual RAM and 512GB of internal storage. That storage capacity is great to have because we do not get expandable storage on this device.

For our benchmark results, It scored 511,048 points in AnTuTu and 10,096 on PCMark Work 3.0, which translates to smooth day-to-day use, quick multitasking, and reliable overall responsiveness. 

Storage speeds are pretty good in general, with read and write results of 1119.5 MB/s and 871 MB/s. While its 3DMark Wild Life score of 661 confirms that it’s not built for heavy gaming, casual titles and multitasking run with no problem. 

Specifically for gaming, lighter games like Mobile Legends ran with ease, and we only really got Genshin Impact to as much as low graphics settings set to 60 fps, which suggests it’s only really good for dailies.

Overall, the HONOR X7d proves efficient, cool-running, and surprisingly snappy for a phone under PHP 10K, which is perfect for everyday users who value stability.

Battery

Back to one of its real highlights. The 6500mAh lithium polymer battery with 35W HONOR SuperCharge.

It’s not the biggest capacity we’ve seen but boy is it big! We don’t get 3-day battery life like some are suggesting but we did get an impressive 16 hours and 27 minutes from our PCMark Work 3.0 battery test.

And a whopping 20 hours and 7 minutes in our video loop test. These are great scores especially with normal usage. 

Charging from zero to hundred percent with the included brick took just about an hour and a half.

In our opinion, this phone is pretty great in terms of longevity for motorcycle couriers.

Connectivity

It’s pretty basic in terms of  connectivity. 

We get WiFi 5 standards, Bluetooth 5.0, GPS, NFC, and only up to 4G LTE data connectivity. Oh and the USB Type-C is a 2.0 port.

Conclusion

Priced at PHP 9,999, the HONOR X7d stands out as another affordable smartphone, that can stand the test of the elements in a commute and everyday use.

It’s durable, powerful-enough, and battery life is pretty good. If you’ve ever lost a phone to water or accidental drops, the HONOR X7d in general, can handle those.

It’s interesting to see how much phone we can get from HONOR in 2025 with a piso shy of PHP 10,000. 

One thing’s for sure though, it delivers the essentials pretty well, making it a great affordable gift for someone who needs a basic smartphone, maybe for that inaanak or whoever.

What we LIKED:

• Drop resistance
• Good-enough STEREO speakers
• OS stability
• Battery

What we Liked LESS:

• Display
• Boring design
• Peak performance

HONOR X7d specs:
6.77-inch HD+ TFT LCD (1610 x 7208)
120Hz refresh rate, 800 nits (peak)
Qualcomm Snapdragon 685
8GB RAM
512GB internal storage
108MP main camera (f/1.75)
2MP depth
8MP front camera
Dual nano-SIM
4G LTE
Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac
Bluetooth 5
USB Type-C (2.0)
MagicOS 9 (Android 15)
6,500mAh battery
35W HONOR SuperCharge (wired charging)
IP65M
166.89mm x 76.8mm x 8.24mm (dimensions)
208g (weight)
Desert Gold, Ocean Cyan, Velvet Black (colors)