The Magic 5 Ultimate has been making buzz on the web since its recent release in China. It has not even been on the market for a month yet, it is already being counted among the best smartphones of this year. Nevertheless, with its impressive features, will it be better than the Apple monster that has long dominated the mobile sector? In this comparison guide, we will oppose the Honor Magic 5 Ultimate vs iPhone 14 Pro Max to find out which one is the best.
| iPhone 14 | iPhone 14 Pro Max | |
 | $675.00 | $1,449.00 |
Design and conception of the iPhone 14 Pro Max and the Honor Magic 5 Ultimate
Honor’s phone comes in two colors: black and orange. It measures 162.9 x 76.7 x 8.77 mm and weighs about 217 g. Its design includes a 3D nano-crystalline glass front (which increases the device’s drop resistance) and an eco-friendly leather back.
With an IP68 certification, the Honor Magic 5 Ultimate is waterproof, dustproof, splashproof(up to 1.5 meters deep for up to 30 minutes maximum). Its fingerprint sensor is located behind the screen.
Apple’s monster comes in a choice of colors: sidereal black, gold, silver and deep purple. It comes with a Ceramic Shield front panel, a matte textured glass back panel and adopts a stainless steel design.
It measures 160.7 x 77.6 x 7.85 mm with a weight of 240 g. According to Apple, the iPhone 14 Pro Max has an IP68 rating (up to 6 meters deep for up to 30 minutes), for resistance to splashes, water and dust.
Both devices offer fairly interesting designs. However, Honor’s phone is longer and thicker than Apple’s, while the 14 Pro Max is wider and heavier than the Magic 5 Ultimate.
Which one offers the better display between the Honor Magic 5 Ultimate and the iPhone 14 Pro Max?
With a rounded corner design on the screen, the Honor Magic 5 Ultimate features an LTPO OLED display and is 6.81 inches in size. This HDR10+ display offers a resolution of 2,848 x 1,312 pixels at 460 dpi along with a refresh rate of 120 Hz. Honor’s screen has a maximum brightness of 1,800 nits and has a glass or ceramic coating.
The iPhone 14 Pro Max is equipped with a Super Retina XDR display. This is an OLED screen with rounded corners and a size of 6.7 inches. It is an HDR10+ screen with a resolution of 2,796 x 1,290 pixels with a density of 460 dpi. Supporting ProMotion technology, the 14 Pro Max’s display can boast of an adaptive refresh rate of up to 120 Hz, True Tone display, a maximum brightness of 2,000 nits and an oleophobic coating to resist fingerprints traces.
The Magic 5 Ultimate offers a better display than the Magic 5 Pro. In fact, the latter’s screen was tested on DXOMARK and scored 151 points in first position in the overall ranking. The 14 Pro Max comes in second position with a score of 149 points for its display. The Magic 5 Ultimate will therefore be better than the 14 Pro Max in terms of display.
Honor Magic 5 Ultimate outperforms the iPhone 14 Pro Max?
The Magic 5 Ultimate’s cover shelters a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 SoC accompanied by an Adreno 740 GPU. This chipset is backed by 16GB RAM and 512GB UFS 4.0 internal storage. Honor’s phone is powered by an Android 13 system with MagicOS 7.1 interface.
The 14 Pro Max packs an A16 Bionic chip accompanied by a 5-core GPU. It has 6GB RAM coupled with internal storage of 128GB, 256GB, 512GB or 1TB. It runs on iOS 16, one of the most secure mobile operating systems.
The 14 Pro Max supports accident detection and allows emergency calls thanks to its emergency SOS functionality via satellite. With such functionality, it is possible to make emergency calls even in areas not covered by the cellular network. Both devices do not have a memory card slot and support 5G.
According to Nanoreview, the CPU of Apple’s smartphone is slightly more powerful than that of the Magic 5 Ultimate. Indeed the A16 Bionic got an overall Nanoreview score of 99 points against 97 points for the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2’s score, a difference of only 2 points.
On the other hand, the Honor Magic 5 Ultimate has considerably more RAM than the iPhone 14 Pro Max while the latter benefits from more storage space. Therefore, it is quite likely that the Magic 5 Ultimate will perform slightly better than the iPhone 14 Pro Max.
Camera Magic 5 Ultimate vs iPhone 14 Pro Max
The rear camera of the Magic 5 Ultimate includes three cameras of 50 MP each. There is a main wide-angle camera, an ultra-wide-angle sensor, and a telephoto periscope. The rear camera of the Magic 5 Ultimate is accompanied by a single LED flash. Honor’s smartphone is equipped with a 12 MP front camera supporting facial recognition unlocking.
The iPhone 14 Pro Max on the other hand has a 48 MP main lens, a 12 MP ultra-wide angle camera, a 2x 12 MP telephoto lens and another 3x 12 MP telephoto lens on the back. The 14 Pro Max’s rear camera comes with an adaptive True Tone flash.
As for selfies, the 14 Pro Max comes with a 12 MP TrueDepth camera assisted by a Retina Flash. This camera also supports facial recognition.
The Magic 5 Ultimate has the same triple camera module as its cousin, the Magic 5 Pro. DXOMARK experts tested the camera of the Magic 5 Pro and it scored 152 points, placing the Magic 5 Pro at the top of the list of phones that offer the best camera of the moment. The iPhone 14 Pro Max comes in 5th place with a score of 146 points. The Magic 5 Ultimate will therefore be as good as the Apple smartphone in terms of camera.
Battery and charging
Honor’s device comes with a non-removable Li-Po battery with a capacity of 5,450 mAh. It supports 66W wired charging, 50W wireless charging and 5W reverse wireless charging.
The 14 Pro Max has a built-in Li-Ion battery of 4,323 mAh. According to Apple, this one offers a battery life of up to 25h in video streaming, 29h in video playback, and 95h in audio playback. As for the capacity of the recharge, the battery of the 14 Pro Max reaches 50% of charge in about 30 minutes with an adapter of 20W or more.
The Apple smartphone also supports MagSafe wireless charging of up to 15W, Qi wireless charging of up to 7.5W as well as USB charging on a computer or using an AC adapter.
Price and availability of the iPhone 14 Pro Max and the Honor Magic 5 Ultimate
The Honor Magic 5 Ultimate was made official on March 6, 2023. At the time of writing this article, this phone is only available in China since March 20, 2023 at a price of 6,699 yuan (about €904). You can buy it on the official Honor website.
Its rival, the 14 Pro Max, was officially presented on September 7, 2022 and is available since September 16 of the same year. Here are the prices of the iPhone 14 Pro Max on the official Apple website
- 128 GB: €1,479
- 256 GB: €1,609
- 512 GB: €1,869
- 1TB: €2,129
Honor Magic 5 Ultimate vs iPhone 14 Pro Max verdict
In terms of design, both phones have something to attract customers. The major differences are in the other features. The Honor phone has the best display, the best camera, the best performance, a more powerful battery and faster charging.
As for the 14 Pro Max, it stands out from this versus as the most secure phone. This is not surprising, as security has always been one of Apple’s strong points.
In addition to being more affordable, the Magic 5 Ultimate is really one of the few phones to do better than the 14 Pro Max on several levels. However, unlike its rival, which has been available in France since last year, no date has yet been confirmed for the launch of the Magic 5 Ultimate in France.
See also :
- Honor has announced the Magic 5 Ultimate a rebadged Magic 5 Pro?
- Xiaomi 13 Pro vs iPhone 14 Pro :which one to choose?