Latest news with #Redmagic
Yahoo
05-05-2025
- Yahoo
Redmagic 10 Air review: The gaming phone you can actually hold in one hand
Last year's Redmagic 10 Pro was one of the best gaming phones around with an unbelievable price point. I'm a fan of the Redmagic brand and while I disliked its take on Android, I enjoyed the premium hardware and the raw performance of the Snapdragon 8 Elite packed into that phone. I loved the $650 price tag even more, making it one of the best-valued powerhouse devices of the year. So when I got my hands on a brand-new Redmagic 10 Air, I was more than a little confused. After all, it looks almost identical to the Pro, but it is not as powerful. It uses an older Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip and has a smaller battery. It is also nearly the same price. Who is this phone for? I spent a few weeks with the Redmagic 10 Air, hoping to solve this riddle and understand what was behind Redmagic's thinking. I may have figured out the answer. There are three versions of the Redmagic 10 Air. The first version comes with 12GB of RAM and 256GB of storage and costs $549. The next step-up is 16GB + 512GB for $600. It comes in three choices of color: twilight, hailstone, and a special 'flare' version. The phone isn't available at any stores in the US, but Redmagic does have it available for free global shipping direct from their site. I've already touched on the older Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset inside the device. There's a 6.8-inch screen with 1.5K resolution and a 120Hz refresh rate. It has the same liquid metal cooling that we saw in the Redmagic 10 Pro, but this device has no fan. It has a smaller 6,000mAh battery and supports 80W fast charging. Finally, it supports GSM, LTE, UTMS, and 5G, and I had no issues using it on my provider's 5G network up here in Canada. When I first took the Redmagic 10 Air out of the box, I was surprised to see that it looked almost identical to the 10 Pro. But looks can be deceiving. The Air instantly felt more comfortable to hold in my hand. It is only 7.85mm thick, and the edges are just ever-so-slightly curved, so it didn't cramp up my hand the way the 10 Pro did. I instantly liked the feel of this phone. That sentiment would grow as I used it. Holding this phone was a refreshing change from the boxy and heavy 10 Pro. At only 205g, the 10 Air is light, but not too much. It still retains a bit of heft, so you know you're holding it. Even more impressive was how Redmagic kept the screen practically bezeless. I don't like bezels nor do I like curved displays, and Redmagic has once again ticked all the right boxes when it comes to displays. The screen is decent. I wasn't blown away by it, but I wasn't disappointed, either. 120Hz is more than enough to keep everything slick, like watching YouTube and playing games. My latest obsession is Magic: The Gathering Arena, and this phone kept up with all the flying graphics and crazy colors. The dual speaker system works. They didn't blow me away, but they didn't let me down either. I played a lot of Call of Duty: Mobile on this device, and the speakers did their jobs. I need to give a shout-out to the battery here. Despite constant use, it lasted me 18 hours on a single charge. I was impressed with the 10 Pro's battery life, and I'm glad to see the little brother carry on the family legacy. The included 80W fast charger quickly brought the battery back up to 100% in a pinch. I also enjoyed some of Redmagic's software tricks to push the phone further. Charge separation is a big one, where I could set a cutoff charge level and let the phone redirect power to use the device. So, if I was gaming while the phone was plugged in, it would power the game without affecting the battery. Problems with the device began almost as soon as I powered it on and went through the setup process. The older Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 was really showing its age. Software took longer to load than I am used to, and sometimes I had to swipe away an app and then relaunch it to get it to work. I've used plenty of devices with the 8 Gen 3, and that was a fast chip, so I'm not sure what the issue was with the Redmagic 10 Air. But it gave me problems from the get-go. The phone comes preloaded with Google apps and little else (I appreciate the lack of bloatware on Redmagic devices). So I loaded all my usual go-to apps when I was first setting up the device: Firefox, Fastmail, Obsidian, ToDoist, VLC. The device did not like that. Opening and using these apps was a headache. They were laggy, and Obsidian in particular never fully loaded, an issue, I assumed, with its on-device storage system. In the end, I had to remove all of these apps and use only the pre-installed Google apps. At least they worked. That said, gaming was never an issue. The CPU never gave me an issue once I was in a game. Many of the problems I faced had to do with launching apps, and I don't know why. I thought it could be an issue with its cores, so I ran a Geekbench 6 test on it. It scored 2293 in single-core performance and 7203 in multicore. Those were great scores, so the issue wasn't there. I still cannot pinpoint what was causing so many problems with third-party apps. But performance was not my biggest complaint — the in-screen fingerprint reader was. It never worked. Not once did it ever manage to read my fingerprint and unlock the device, even after a few tries. Eventually, I got in the habit of using a four-digit password to unlock it, like it was 2014 or something. The cameras on this device are not great. It has a 50MP main shooter and a 50MP wide-angle shooter. They work for still shots at close range, which is good enough to capture memories when needed. But zooming in on a subject turns the photo into a pixelated mess, and while video is fine at 1x and 2x zoom, anything else becomes unwatchable. But this device isn't for photographers. I think I figured out who it is for. The Redmagic 10 Air is not meant for hardcore gamers. It's not meant for professionals on the go or camera jocks. And because it costs more than the Redmagic 10 Pro, at least at launch, I don't believe it's meant for the budget-conscious market, either. Instead, I think I found the perfect customer for this device: older kids. Think about it. It comes with everything a teen or tween needs. Google's software suite is built right in. It handles gaming wonderfully. The cameras are good enough for the crazy way kids take pictures, and the speakers are perfect for YouTube. Best of all, it fits in slightly smaller hands. Plus, it won't break the bank for those working part-time (or their parents).
Forbes
11-04-2025
- Forbes
Android Circuit: Galaxy S25 Edge Disappointment, OnePlus Watch 3 Launch, Pixel 10 Pro Fold Plans
Taking a look back at this week's news and headlines across the Android world, including Galaxy S25 Edge disappointment, Pixel 10 Pro Fold details, OnePlus Watch 3 arrives, happy birthday Redmagic, CMD Phone 2 Pro announced, OnePlus's brave design choice, and Mediatek's updated flaghip chip… Android Circuit is here to remind you of a few of the many discussions around Android in the last seven days. You can also read my weekly digest of Apple news here on Forbes. Samsung may restrict the latest design flex to South Korea and China. The Galaxy S25 Edge is the fourth model in the S25 family announced at January's Galaxy Unwrapped event, but the only model not yet on sale. Given the presumably high manufacturing cost alongside the limited audience for such a fashionably thin and expensive device, the decision is understandable: 'It sounds like the Galaxy S25 Edge may share its fate with another limited-edition Samsung phone, i.e., the Galaxy Z Fold Special Edition, which debuted in Korea and China last year. Fortunately, the Galaxy S25 Edge should come to other markets down the line rather than staying limited to only two." (SamMobile) This week saw details on not only the Pixel 10 family pricing, but the future plans for the Pixel family over the next few years. In terms of devices, Google looks to be settled on a main line of the Pixel and Pixel Pro smartphones (with Pro and Pro XL models) in Q3, and the mid-range Pixel A Series in Q1. As for the Pixel Fold, it looks to have found a stable home: "It is also likely that the Pixel Fold model will continue to be released alongside the other Pixel flagship devices, as was the case in 2024 with the Pixel 9 series. This means we can look forward to seeing four Pixel devices released at the same time, every August, for the next few years. With the Pixel a-series launching in the Spring, as has been the case since the start of the Pixel a-series back in 2019 with the Pixel 3a series." (Android Headlines) OnePlus has released the OnePlus Watch 3 in the UK. Of note is the '60 second check-in' feature. This triggers the various biometric sensors to poll your body and offer a snapshot of data, including heart rate, ECG, blood oxygen, mental wellness, and temperature. As Matt Evans points out in his review, this is the current Wear OS many believe sets the standard: "As a Wear OS watch experience, functionally it performs as smoothly and as well as any Wear OS watch I've yet used, including the Google Pixel Watch 3. It's an option most Android phone users should consider, and it's sure to make its way into our best Android watches list in future." (OnePlus via T3). To celebrate its seventh anniversary of producing gaming phones, the Redmagic team have announced several special offers built around the current Redmagic 10, with flat discounts, bundles, and bonus discounts for returning customers. As for the Redmagic 10 itself, it has the high specifications a gaming smartphone needs, but that comes at a price: "For those looking to be as competitive as possible when playing, a new RedMagic phone is guaranteed to provide top-of-the-line hardware. But that competitive price comes with a cost… the number of software and security updates Nubia will provide. For me, this is the weakest point of the RedMagic 10 Pro package—it comes with just one Android update (taking the handset to Android 16 but no further), two years of UI upgrades, and three years of security updates." (Redmagic via Forbes). Nothing Tech's next budget-focused smartphone has been announced. Under the CMF brand, the CMF Phone 2 Pro will go on sale in the UK on April 28 alongside a refreshed set of accessories, including the CMF Buds 2, CMF Buds 2a and CMF Buds 2 Plus. While we don't have full specs for Phone 2 Pro, there are some intriguing possibilities: "Last year, the company released the CMF Phone 1, which sold for $199 and was a cool piece of affordable tech. Exactly what the meaning of Pro is in the name isn't clear — though I'd imagine it involves multiple cameras. Last year's model had two, so the Pro addition may indicate a third, as it did on the recent Nothing Phone (3a) Pro." (Forbes). Ahead of the OnePlus 13T launch in China, a significant design change has been announced on social media. While it has been attempted before (and reversed on subsequent handsets), OnePlus is once more looking to remove the iconic three-way Alert Slider: "Recently, we learned it will be a small phone with a 6,000+ mAh battery. And now, OnePlus has confirmed it will replace the signature 'Alert Slider' with an all-new button called Quick Key on this phone. A company executive revealed this new button on the Chinese website Weibo." (91mobiles). Mediatek has launched a mid-cycle upgrade to its flagship chipset. The Dimensity 9400+ bumps up the CPU speed and improves on the AI performance of the base model. Expect to see Vivo, Oppo and Realme phones use the new silicon, challenging Qualcomm and Samsung in the system-on-chip field. "The Dimensity 9400+ clocks its prime Cortex-X925 at 3.73 GHz vs 3.62 GHz on the regular Dimensity 9400. A Geekbench leak from earlier confirms its four Cortex-A720 cores get a boost to 2.4 GHz (vs 2.0 GHz). Otherwise, both chips are largely identical to each other on the CPU front." (Notebookcheck). Android Circuit rounds up the news from the Android world every weekend here on Forbes. Don't forget to follow me so you don't miss any coverage in the future, and of course, read the sister column in Apple Loop! Last week's Android Circuit can be found here, and if you have any news and links you'd like to see featured in Android Circuit, get in touch!
