Honor 200 Pro review

Versatile triple setup, main cam shared with the flagship

The Honor 200 Pro has a promising triple camera on its back that consists of the Magic6 Pro's main camera, flanked by an autofocusing ultrawide and a 2.5-ish times telephoto unit. Selfies are also well taken care of, courtesy of a high-res actual camera and a depth-sensing sidekick.

The main camera uses a 1/1.3" sensor that Honor refers to as Super Dynamic H9000, which should be a version of the OmniVision OV50H, tailored to Honor's preferences (or straight up the same sensor, only called differently). It's got a 1.2µm pixel pitch, 4-cell (Quad Bayer) filter array, and 2x2 OCL PDAF. The lens is stabilized.

Honor's specs mention that the telephoto camera uses the Sony IMX 856 sensor, but information on it is scarce, and they don't help much themselves. The lens has a 68mm equivalent focal length and an f/2.4 aperture, and it's stabilized.

The ultrawide camera is a bit more of a modest affair, though it does still feature autofocus, enabling a macro mode for close-ups.

• Wide (main): 50MP Super Dynamic H9000 (OmniVision OV50H: 1/1.3", 1.2µm - 2.4µm), f/1.6, 27mm, multi-directional PDAF, Laser AF, OIS; 4K@60fps
• Ultrawide: 12MP, f/2.2, 16mm, PDAF; 4K@30fps
• Telephoto: 50MP Sony IMX 856, f/2.4, 68mm, PDAF, OIS; 4K@60fps
• Front camera: 50MP, f/2.1, 21mm, fixed focus; 4K@30fps

Honor makes a moderately big deal out of the 200 Pro's portrait mode. They've collaborated with the renowned Paris photo studio Harcourt to emulate the characteristic look of their black and white portraits, though there are also color modes, fret not. We'll delve a little deeper into that later on.

Daylight photo quality

Main camera

The Honor 200 Pro's main camera captures great photos in bright daylight. Detail is generally very good. Dynamic range is good as well, the auto white balance inspires confidence, and the default 'vibrant' color profile delivers pleasing levels of saturation.

Daylight samples, main camera (1x)

There are also a couple more shooting profiles that alter some image parameters. 'Authentic' cranks up the contrast and saturation dials and introduces some vignetting. Conversely, 'Natural' tones things down a bit, but not quite as drastically as Authentic dials it up.

Daylight samples, main camera (1x), Authentic

Daylight samples, main camera (1x), Natural

The full-res 50MP mode doesn't make a world of a difference in terms of captured detail. It does, however, have a wider field of view - the EXIF data reads 24mm vs. the 27mm of the regular 12.5MP shots.

Daylight samples, main camera (1x), 50MP

The 2x button in the viewfinder is a bit of an odd choice given the 2.5x actual zoom camera. Shooting at 2x returns unremarkable results - the 1x 50MP mode images look nicer when viewed at 1:1.

Daylight samples, main camera (2x)

We also got to spend some time with the Honor 200 Pro in Paris, so here's a handful of photos from the French capital.

Daylight samples, main camera (1x)

And a few 2x zoom shots. Oddly enough, a lot of these have markedly better pixel-level detail than what we got in our usual local shooting locations.

Daylight samples, main camera (2x)

Telephoto camera

Moving on to the telephoto camera, we're seeing some excellent images with great detail (and, yes, some of that graininess). The dynamic range is good, and the color rendition is likable, too, if not quite a perfect match for the main camera.

Daylight samples, telephoto camera (2.5x)

Unlike the main camera, the telephoto's full-res mode doesn't change coverage compared to the 12.5MP regular resolution mode. It's labeled as 3x in the viewfinder, and it says 69mm in the EXIF data, which is sort of like 3x when counting from the 24mm reported focal length of the main camera in full-res mode. Yes, it's kind of a mess with the numbers, but they are not all that important, really.

The detail improvement is not huge, but we do think there's some merit to shooting at 50MP on the telephoto when you want to get the absolute maximum out of this sensor.

Daylight samples, telephoto camera (3x), 50MP

Here's the Paris batch, too.

Daylight samples, telephoto camera (2.5x)

Ultrawide camera

The 200 Pro's ultrawide camera may not be overly impressive in terms of hardware, but it does still produce nice photos. Detail is very good in most of the frame, with sharpness falling off a tiny bit towards the extremes. Colors are great outdoors with natural subjects but can be a touch off indoors. Dynamic range is generally excellent.

Daylight samples, ultrawide camera (0.6x)

Super macro mode, close-ups

The Honor 200 Pro's main camera and telephoto can't focus all that close, so the Super macro mode leverages the ultrawide camera for close-ups. There are three zoom levels within it, the 0.6x being the same as Photo mode on the ultrawide camera, while the default 1x matches the main camera's field of view, and the 2x is, well, 2x zoom from there on. The 1x and 2x modes are obviously achieved by digital zoom.

The ultrawide camera can focus really close and that does help with getting good magnification. You do, however, run into problems with throwing shadows, distortion, shallow depth of field, and whatnot.

Either way, the 2x zoom shots aren't too good-looking when examined at 1:1, while the 1x ones are quite reasonable. The regular 0.6x images are the sharpest, of course.

Closeups, Photo mode

Closeups, Super macro mode, 0.6x

Closeups, Super macro mode, 1x

Closeups, Super macro mode, 2x

Portraits

We got to visit the storied Studio Harcourt in Paris that's perfected a particular style of black and white glamour portraiture and has been a go-to spot for celebrities or just regular wealthy folk to get their picture taken. Honor has collaborated with the studio and the 200 Pro includes an emulation of that signature black and white look in its Portrait mode, alongside two additional color profiles.

Studio Harcourt Paris (also, Honor 200 Pro main camera samples)

Main camera

We kicked off with the main camera, initially taking regular photos, in Photo mode, no Portrait action. Oddly enough, the Honor didn't do particularly well with its HDR in backlit scenes - that is to say, it exposed correctly for the subject, which is great, but didn't do a ton of highlight restoration, which isn't superb. Other than that, we got nice skin tones, no worries there.

Main camera (1x), Photo mode

Moving on to the actual Portrait mode, the selection of presets goes like this: Classic for the signature black and white look (which we didn't quite replicate in a studio environment), Color (which is a moody warm look), and Vibrant (basically regular color palette). The first two modes go for a 5:4 aspect ratio, which is how Studio Harcourt does their thing, while the latter is the native 4:3 aspect of the sensor.

The subject detection was excellent in our experience, the default blur level is well judged and looks natural with both distant and nearby backgrounds. While we didn't really do the whole studio setup, the black and white shots do have an appealing artsy look to them, and so too do the 'Colour' versions. Having the option to go for a generic color presentation is also welcome.

Main camera (1x), Portrait mode, Harcourt Classic

Main camera (1x), Portrait mode, Harcourt Colour

Main camera (1x), Portrait mode, Harcourt Vibrant

We'll say it now, but we also experienced it on the telephoto camera - the portrait mode would occasionally (more often than we'd like) fail to create a blurred background end result, even though it had shown it in the preview when taking the shot. We shot and reshot a few of these sequences to get full sets of samples, and we're not even sure we succeeded entirely.

Moving on to the 2x zoom level results on the main camera. It's a much better focal length and perspective for this type of shot, and the photos do look more like 'portraits'. There's some drop in fine detail when you look at them from up close, but the quality remains easily good enough.

Main camera (2x), Photo mode

Main camera (2x), Portrait mode, Harcourt Classic

Main camera (2x), Portrait mode, Harcourt Colour

Main camera (2x), Portrait mode, Harcourt Vibrant

Telephoto camera

The telephoto camera is likely what you'll want to be shooting your portraits on, though. For one, the 70-ish millimeter focal length makes for a comfortable shooting distance and flattering perspective. Then there's the fact that you won't be zooming in digitally from a wider camera. good as it may be, but instead you'll get the native field of view of the telephoto and the quality of a reasonably large high-res sensor.

Indeed, the photos have very good detail and life-like skin tones. There's the matter of the unenthusiastic HDR processing once again, though.

Telephoto camera (2.5x), Photo mode

You'll see here one example where the blur didn't kick in (the first scene). Other than that, the subject separation remains excellent, and the blur (where it does exist) looks very convincing. Great results overall, just not entirely reliable - check after capture and repeat if needed.

Telephoto camera (2.5x), Portrait mode, Harcourt Classic

Telephoto camera (2.5x), Portrait mode, Harcourt Colour

Telephoto camera (2.5x), Portrait mode, Harcourt Vibrant

Selfies

The selfie camera of the Honor 200 Pro captures wonderful photos. They've got plenty of detail, wide dynamic range and life-like skin tones. The one downside is the fixed focus, which limits your options for unusual framing, though it does work great in a wide range of reasonable shooting distances.

Selfie samples

Inspired by the rear camera portraits, we shot a few portrait samples on the selfie camera as well, even though the Harcourt treatment isn't available here. Those only come out at a 1x zoom level, as opposed to the 0.8x and 1x options for the regular photos (0.8x samples above). They do come out with good subject detection and believable blur levels, though messy hair against a contrasting background will expose their artificial nature.

Selfie samples, Portrait mode

Low-light photo quality

In low light, the Honor 200 Pro isn't too keen to do auto Night mode processing. With that in mind, the Photo mode results will tend to have harsher highlights than ideal, something you can typically remedy without much adverse effect by shooting in Night mode.

Alternatively, you can enable the AI toggle in the viewfinder in Photo mode, and that will call up the Night mode action for you. The thing is, the toggle is off by default and even if you enable it, it will still revert to being off the next time you launch the camera with the volume key shortcut. It will stay on if you launch it from the app icon, though - until the next double press. Sounds like something Honor may want to fix with a software update.

Main camera

As prefaced, the blown out highlights are probably the first thing you'd notice in the main camera's low-light shots. It's also probably their only flaw. Other than that, they're nicely detailed, with well-controlled noise, dependable white balance and pleasing levels of saturation.

Low-light samples, main camera (1x)

Night mode will help salvage those highlights and is generally a better idea in low-light situations. We're wondering a little why there isn't a more robust auto implementation.

Low-light samples, main camera (1x), Night mode

The 2x zoom level will have the same tonal properties as the 1x magnification - with the same relationship between Photo mode and Night mode. Detail is alright, but not really impressive in any way.

Low-light samples, main camera (2x)

Telephoto camera

The 2.5x telephoto camera's results in the dark are also subject to the AI/Night mode peculiarities. The default output is a bit lacking in dynamic range, with both clipped highlights and underdeveloped shadows. Night mode fixes both, especially the highlights, without introducing any real downsides. Either way, there's plenty of detail and the colors are on point.

Low-light samples, telephoto camera (2.5x)

Low-light samples, telephoto camera (2.5x), Night mode

Ultrawide camera

The ultrawide camera is particularly prone to highlight clipping in Photo mode. Its images tend to be pretty soft in general, too. Night mode helps on both counts, producing better exposures and meaningfully improving sharpness. We observed a few outliers here, like the fifth sample, where the Photo mode result already incorporates some level of auto Night mode, and the sixth sample, where Night mode didn't bring any improvement. Not the most reliable results, but still not a bad performance overall - when using Night mode, that is.

Low-light samples, ultrawide camera (0.6x)

Low-light samples, ultrawide camera (0.6x), Night mode

Video recording

The Honor 200 Pro can record video up to 4K60 with the main camera and the telephoto, while the ultrawide and the selfie camera max out at 4K30 (there's 1080p60 on the selfie camera, but the ultrawide just doesn't do 60fps). The default codec is h.264, but you do get the option to use h.265. There is always-on electronic stabilization available across all four cameras. Honor also claims that OIS helps the EIS on the main camera but there is no way of verifying that.

Video quality out of the Honor 200 Pro's main camera is quite respectable. 4K30 clips (with a bit rate of 40-46Mbps when using h.264) have good detail, excellent contrast and dynamic range and vibrant colors without going into extremes. 4K60 (50Mbps) is a bit softer, but otherwise the same. The ultrawide's clips are quite solid as well - detail is alright if a little smoothened in some areas, and things also look good globally in terms of dynamic range and color. The 3x zoom camera does an admirably, better than the similarly specced Motorola Edge 50 Ultra, for example. There's also no penalty here if you opt for the 60fps mode over 30fps.

Stabilization on the 200 Pro is very good. The main camera and the ultrawide do a fine job of ironing out walking shake. All three cameras pan smoothly too, but there's just a little bit of a tendency to creep too slowly towards the end of a pan - not a big deal, just an observation. Keeping the phone pointed in one direction will also result in very steady footage.

In the dark, the Honor's main camera captures good videos too. Detail is very good at the expense of some more pronounced, but still very much acceptable noise. Dynamic range and color reproduction leave little to be desired. The night mode for video that locks you into 1080p24 doesn't bring meaningful tonal improvements to our test scene, so it's probably only worth using in particularly dark environments. The ultrawide camera's output is on the soft side - in the shadows and well-lit areas alike. The zoom camera, meanwhile, struggles with exposure and dynamic range.

Video sample playlist