So, the HONOR 90 5G just come out recently, and being a new device, a lot of people are probably curious to know how it fares in many aspects, including display, battery life, camera, and more. Most of which, you’ll find in our full review.
For this one though, we’ll focus on one aspect that probably a lot of potential buyers keep a keen eye on, that is gaming. Because, of course, if you’re going to pay PHP 24,990 for a phone, it better handle popular games and even some graphically demanding games well to a good extent, right?
Well, you’re in the right place. Because today, we’re going to put the HONOR 90 5G to the test and check if it’s a good phone to play your favorite games on.
For this test, we’ll perform a combination of synthetic benchmarks and actual gaming tests to see how the device will fare. We’ll check for any noticeable spikes in FPS and if the phone’s bigger vapor chamber can keep it from heating up too much.
HONOR 90 5G Specifications
| Display | 6.7″ FHD+ AMOLED Quad Curved Display, 120Hz |
| Processor | Qualcomm Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 Accelerated Edition |
| RAM | 12GB |
| Storage | 512GB |
| Rear Camera | 200MP Main |
| 12MP Ultrawide/Macro | |
| 2MP Depth | |
| Front Camera | 50MP |
| OS | Android 13 + MagicOS 7.1 |
| Battery | 5,000mAh + 66W HONOR SuperCharge |
One of the key upgrades for the HONOR 90 5G is the Qualcomm Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 Accelerated Edition, along with 12GB of RAM, which is even more than the HONOR 70 5G’s 8GB.
Just for a bit of a background, the Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 Accelerated Edition is a 4nm chip, which makes it more efficient than the 6nm Snapdragon 778G+. Its Adreno 644 GPU is also clocked higher vs the Adreno 642 GPU on the Snapdragon 778G+.
Now, of course, all these numbers wouldn’t make sense until we actually do some benchmarks.
Tools
Geekbench 6. One of our go-to benchmarking tools, Geekbench 6 can measure a chip’s single and multi-core performance, as well as GPU performance on Vulkan and OpenCL.
3DMark. We’ll be using 3DMark’s Wildlife Stress Test, to see how stable and consistent the Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 Accelerated Edition is when subjected to heavy graphics load for around 20 minutes.
Thermal Camera. Since the tool that we were supposed to use to show CPU and GPU temperature doesn’t work as expected, we will be using a thermal camera to check for the device’s surface temperature. Please note that the readings are not reflective of the chip’s actual temperature.
Games and Methodology
To cover multiple genres, we’re going to test Farlight 84, Real Racing 3, Diablo Immortal, Mobile Legends, and Honkai: Star Rail on the HONOR 90 5G. We’ll play each game continuously for 15 minutes and check the surface temperature before and while we’re playing.
The average FPS you’ll see on the charts includes everything from the game menus, loading screens, and say, hero/capsuler selection.
Synthetic Benchmarks
As a reference, the HONOR 70 5G scored 555052 in AnTuTu. It scored 815 (Single-Core) and 2897 (Multi-Core) on Geekbench. Just to remind you, the HONOR 70 5G was tested with older versions of these apps, so the actual scores could be a bit higher or lower if it was tested with the latest version.
3DMark Wildlife Stress Test
The HONOR 90 5G got a stability score of 99% in 3DMark’s Wildlife Stress Test, which means it was able to perform at a consistent level all throughout the test.
If you look at its FPS performance throughout the 20 test runs, you’ll notice that it was also able to perform at a very consistent pace for the best and worst run.
Farlight 84 (Avg FPS: 56.670)
In Farlight 84, the HONOR 90 5G manages to perform with good stability all throughout, retaining close to 60 fps for most of the time I was in-game.
Honkai: Star Rail (52.291)
Even at Low preset, I encountered a lot of noticeable stutters in HSR, especially when in battle. I would not call them game-breaking as the overall performance is still good for a demanding game, but you may have to even dial things down to Very Low, or just go for 30 fps instead of 60 fps.
Diablo Immortal (57.266)
While the data indicates that there were some fps dips in Diablo Immortal, I honestly did not notice them at all in-game. Overall performance is still consistent.
Mobile Legends: Bang Bang (84.326)
Don’t mind the dip in the 622-714 segment, as that was the victory part, where the game shows statistics. If you’re going to buy this phone mainly for Mobile Legends, you’ll have a great time.
Surface Temperature
| Game | Idle (°C) | In-Game (°C) |
|---|---|---|
| Farlight 84 | 35.1 | 38.2 |
| Honkai: Star Rail | 30 | 38.4 |
| Diablo Immortal | 29.4 | 43.6 |
| Mobile Legends: Bang Bang | 30.4 | 38.6 |
Using our FLIR One thermal camera, I was able to capture the devices’ surface temperature during testing. As you can see, the HONOR 90 5G managed to keep things cool with the exception of Diablo Immortal, which was the only game to make it
Is the HONOR 90 5G a Good Device for Gaming?
The HONOR 90 5G manages to perform well and consistent in most of the games I threw at it. Honkai: Star Rail is still a pain, but that title is known to be very demanding, so running it at its 60fps setting decently is still a good point. You can probably dial things down even more to get better performance.
HONOR have also done their homework with thermals. That larger vapor chamber is working its magic, as at no point in my testing did, I feel that things were too hot for comfort. As shown by the data, the device was able to keep the temperature in check very well.
The HONOR 90 5G 12GB+512GB is priced at PHP24,990 and is now available via HONOR Experience and Partner Stores, online via Lazada, Shopee, and TikTok Shop.
Emman has been writing technical and feature articles since 2010. Prior to this, he became one of the instructors at Asia Pacific College in 2008, and eventually landed a job as Business Analyst and Technical Writer at Integrated Open Source Solutions for almost 3 years.
