The mid-range smartphone market in India has become a warzone. Every brand wants your attention, and every phone seems to come with some “flagship-level” spec to lure you in. Honor’s new X9c 5G takes a different route. Instead of chasing peak performance or camera bragging rights, it focuses on durability, battery life, and display quality, three areas most brands tend to overlook.
I’ve spent some time examining what the X9c 5G brings to the table and where it falls short. Here’s a deeper look at what I liked and what could’ve been better.
What I Liked about Honor X9C
1. A Design That Refuses to Crack
The Honor X9c 5G’s biggest flex isn’t its display or chipset, it’s its sheer toughness. This is one of the few phones under ₹20,000 that’s SGS drop-resistant certified, reportedly surviving falls from up to 1.5 meters (some tests claim even 2 meters). It uses shock-absorbing materials and carries an IP65 water and dust resistance rating, which adds an extra layer of security for everyday mishaps.
In hand, the phone feels premium — the curved glass, rounded corners, and smooth matte finish give it a design language far beyond its price. Despite its massive 6,600mAh battery, the X9c feels surprisingly light and balanced. The large circular camera module at the back gives it a distinct, almost flagship-like identity that aligns with Honor’s high-end Magic series.
If you’re someone who drops your phone at least once a week (and let’s be honest, that’s most of us), this kind of structural reliability is refreshing.
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2. A Display That Looks Way Above Its Price
Let’s talk about that screen. It features a 6.78-inch curved AMOLED display with a crisp 1.5K resolution and a smooth 120Hz refresh rate. It’s gorgeous. What’s even more impressive is its peak brightness of 4,000 nits, which is higher than many phones twice its price. Outdoors, under direct sunlight, everything stays clear and readable.
Color reproduction is vibrant but not cartoonish, and Honor’s 3,840Hz PWM dimming means flicker-free viewing even at low brightness levels. The addition of Circadian Night mode, which adjusts color warmth based on your sleep cycle, shows that Honor’s thinking about user comfort, not just numbers.
Yes, the curved edges can occasionally pick up accidental touches, but overall, this is easily one of the best displays you can get under ₹20K, period.
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3. A Battery That Just Keeps Going
The Honor X9c 5G packs a 6,600mAh silicon-carbon battery, which is larger than what most phones in this range offer. In real-world use, it comfortably lasts a day and a half of moderate to heavy use or two full days for lighter workloads.
Silicon-carbon batteries are more energy-dense than traditional lithium-ion ones, allowing Honor to fit more capacity without adding bulk. Charging is handled by 66W HONOR SuperCharge, which gets the phone to about 80% in under an hour.
It’s the kind of phone that lets you unplug without anxiety, and that’s rare in this segment.
What Could’ve Been Better in Honor X9C
1. Cameras That Struggle to Keep Up
On paper, the 108MP main camera sounds like a powerhouse. In practice, it’s more complicated. Daylight shots are decent but often overprocessed, with heavy contrast and saturated tones that make photos look a bit artificial. Fine details sometimes get lost in the sharpening.
Portrait mode isn’t much better edge detection can be sloppy, with subject outlines occasionally looking fuzzy or cut out. The 5MP ultrawide camera is clearly an afterthought: grainy, washed out, and lacking depth in low light.
This setup is fine for casual Instagram posts or quick snapshots, but not for anyone serious about mobile photography.
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2. Performance That Feels Just “Okay”
The Honor X9c runs on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 6 Gen 1, a 4nm mid-range chip that’s efficient but not particularly powerful. For everyday use — social media, video calls, light gaming it’s smooth and responsive. But once you start multitasking heavily or editing video, you’ll notice some stutters.
Compared to rivals like the iQOO Z9 Pro or Poco X6, both powered by stronger chips, the X9c feels a step behind. Its an AnTuTu score trails most of its competitors, and it’s not built for sustained high-load performance.
That said, Honor’s thermal management deserves credit; the phone stays cool even during long gaming sessions. It’s stable, just not fast.
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3. Software That Still Feels Foreign
The X9c runs MagicOS 9 based on Android 13, and it’s a mixed bag. The interface looks clean and fluid, but regional optimization feels lacking. The default Microsoft SwiftKey keyboard is clunky and hard to replace. The Power Saving Mode locks the screen timeout to 30 seconds and won’t let you adjust it. And the split notification shade swipe left for notifications, right for quick settings, can feel unintuitive.
Even in gaming mode, a simple edge swipe can bring up the multitasking menu despite Do Not Disturb being active. It’s not broken software, just not as refined or intuitive as Realme UI, OxygenOS, or Motorola’s near-stock Android.
Honor does add useful features like app cloning, privacy controls, and smart connectivity options, but MagicOS needs more polish to feel native to Indian users.
Quick Review Verdict: Should you buy Honor X9C?
The Honor X9c 5G isn’t trying to be the flashiest or fastest mid-range phone on the market, it’s trying to be the most dependable one. And in that mission, it succeeds more often than not. It’s a phone that feels engineered for real life, not just benchmark charts. The kind you can drop, forget to charge overnight, or use all day without worrying about heat or lag.
Its build quality and battery endurance are genuinely impressive, the display easily punches above its price, and the overall experience feels solid and reassuring. Yes, the cameras are inconsistent and the Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 doesn’t deliver flagship-level muscle, but the X9c isn’t built for spec-chasers, it’s built for users who want reliability first and flash second.
In a segment where brands often chase buzzwords like “Pro” or “AI-powered,” Honor has taken a more grounded approach. The X9c reminds us that a great smartphone doesn’t have to reinvent the wheel. It just rolls smoothly, day after day.
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