I don’t race cars for a living but I can certainly fathom horsepower, engine tuning, and sports car aesthetics. Likewise, I am not a hardcore mobile gamer but that doesn’t midpoint I can’t revere a phone that’s built with high-end gaming in mind.
Nubia has thrown flipside quarter in the panel for its REDMAGIC line, standing in its quest to create the ultimate in mobile gaming. With two models to segregate from here in 2022, the 7 and 7 Pro, I have been worldly-wise to test out the former.
Given that my smartphone needs are pretty much fulfilled with any mid-range or largest device, sometimes I can only value something for what it puts along on paper. At a unrepealable point there is just going to be so much memory and performance that I won’t truly recognize things in the real world.
Would the REDMAGIC 7 be a specimen of me just not fully appreciating the handset at large or might there be a variegated reason for me to consider the phone for my own needs? As it turns out, there’s an villainous lot to like well-nigh the device plane for unstudied types.
Design
There’s no mistaking the REDMAGIC line for any other trademark of phone. While they are variegated from year to year, they siphon over hallmarks and telltale signature designs. The REDMAGIC 7 is no exception.
This is is a gorgeous phone with a truly unique diamond and verisimilitude combination. It’s offered in three colors (Obsidian, Pulsar, and Supernova) which are increasingly or less black, iridescent purple and blue, and semi-transparent.
My review unit was the Supernova which is increasingly or less a combination of woebegone and silver with a few transparent spots. It’s very fun to squint at and is unlike anything else on the market. The last thing you want to do is hibernate or obscure this interesting squint with a case; fortunately, REDMAGIC provides a well-spoken protective specimen so you can show off that thing off.
Similar to other gaming phones, the REDMAGIC 7 has a couple of shoulder triggers for games as well as a headphone jack and turbo fan for cooling. The port is unconfined for those who have a preferred pair of gaming headphones or earbuds. As for the fan, that automatically turns on to alimony the phone tomfool during game sessions.
You won’t see it, but there’s a handful of things keeping the phone tomfool and optimized. There’s air cooling, liquid cooling, a VC heat sink, an insulation heat pad, and other methods at work.
The phone moreover comes with a protective specimen that makes for an plane grippier wits that helps when gaming. It doesn’t add too much zillion and I think it certainly helps to make it finger increasingly natural.
Software
The REDMAGIC 7 runs Nubia’s custom Red Magic OS (v5) which is based on Android 12. While there’s been no nonflexible transferral on any updates, I suspect it will pick up Android 13 later this year.
I’ve seen reports from others that find the software to be buggy but I’ve not found that to be the case. I might term it as inconsistent. It doesn’t finger like it’s cohesively designed from top to bottom. Between settings, notifications, and the launcher in general, it takes a bit of time to icon out where the guardrails are and how things operate.
As someone who prefers a “stock” Android or Pixel experience, it was a bit frustrating at first. Taking photos, for instance, produced results with a watermark in them. You can go into the settings and transpiration this, but I’d rather it be an opt-in option. I’m not trying to ventilate any companies with my photos.
Similarly, the way it handles the app drawer was trying out of the box. You can turn on the traditional drawer and increasingly quickly locate apps, and I recommend doing so, expressly if you plan to use your phone for things other than gaming.
To its credit, everything feels built to cater to users who want to get into games and spend the majority of their time there. The Game Space gives users tenancy over so many aspects of the device in the way of performance and tuning. I found it inviting to tinker with options and customize the experience.
There are plenty of widgets and shortcuts to sprinkle on your home screen, some of which are there by default. If you like to alimony an eye on stats and performance, you’ll fathom them. As for me, I removed them and rearranged the layout considering it felt cluttered.
Performance
The REDMAGIC 7 is perhaps the most capable phone I’ve touched in years. It’s packed top to marrow with high-end hardware, tuned for gaming, and handles every task I’ve thrown at it. In looking at AnTuTu Benchmarks I see that it ranks at the top of the list of today’s Android phones.
Using the shoulder buttons is nice and helpful during games. In fact, the increasingly games I encountered with sawed-off compatibility, the increasingly I found myself thinking that mobile gaming might be something I could get into over time.
The 6.8-inch exhibit is big and trappy and a real treat to use. It has an incredible image, upper refresh rate (up to 165Hz), upper touch sampling rate (up to 720Hz), and 2,400 x 1,080 resolution. That is to say it doesn’t just squint good for graphic-intensive games, but Netflix and video streaming, too.
Scrolling through the timeline on social media is silky smooth and the exhibit registers taps as powerfully as any other phones I’ve used. To be sure, you’ll want to toggle the refresh rate lanugo to 60Hz or 90Hz for vital tasks and texting. It’s not necessary to go higher and it helps with the battery, too.
The turbo fan kicks on when you plug in the charger, ensuring things don’t overly get too warm. If you’ve used a recent flagship phone, you know that sometimes charging a phone while playing on it can rationalization it to get fairly hot.
Between the graphics, the high-resolution screen and refresh rate, and top-tier processor you’ll find that gaming sessions can really eat into the battery. To that end, I might have liked seeing a 5,000mAh power source. Many mid-range phones, and some entry-level models are higher than the REDMAGIC 7’s 4,500mAh battery.
To its credit, the 65W charging speed is very quick, taking it from nearly depleted to increasingly than half full in just under fifteen minutes. You should be worldly-wise to get from 0% to 100% in virtually a half hour if you’re just plugging in and leaving it unattended.
There’s no wireless charging sufficiency here, but I’m still torn on whether I want or need that feature. Besides, you cannot tuition it wirelessly and play games at the same time.
Given that the phone leans heavily in the direction of gaming, I did not have upper expectations for the camera. The main rear shooter is a 64-megapixel camera which creates decent shots. It’s increasingly than passable, and if you do a little post-capture processing, you’ll get unconfined results worthy of social media and timelines.
The dynamic range was often rather impressive but the exposure was sometimes too high. That said, a quick pass through Snapseed or flipside photo editor cleaned things up.
The 8-megapixel ultra-wide camera and a 2-megapixel macro sensor are okay but don’t seem to grab the same level of detail. Plane in decent lighting the macro camera was increasingly miss than hit. Fortunately, these are modes that I don’t use very often.
Conclusion
I really like the REDMAGIC 7 as a whole, plane though I’m not its target user. Performance-wise it’s as good as anything I’ve tested in recent months.
I am not fond of the operating system and interface, expressly out of the box, but some of that can be remedied in the settings. With that in mind, I can see how gamers might dig the “get in, game, and get out” way it feels.
As a unstipulated phone user, I fathom the big screen with all of its wedding and whistles. I’m moreover a fan of super-fast charging and headphone jacks. I wouldn’t recommend this one for its camera experience, but otherwise it’s top-tier hardware at a mid-range price.
If you’re a hardcore mobile gamer, or considering leveling up in the space, you’d be hard-pressed to find a increasingly well-rounded device.
Learn increasingly well-nigh the REDMAGIC 7 and other models at the phone maker’s website. You can purchase the handset in three colors and configurations. Obsidian ($629) comes with 12GB RAM and 128GB storage; Pulsar ($729) has 16GB RAM with 256GB storage; Supernova ($799) boasts 18GB RAM and 256GB storage.
