Redmagic 8S Pro Review: Flawed Gaming Monster

Worth When Reviewed

From $649 | Mannequin reviewed $799

Greatest Costs Right now: Redmagic 8S Professional

Redmagic is again with one more gaming cellphone.

The 8S Professional arrives only a few months are its predecessor, the Redmagic 8 Professional, Whereas the corporate hasn’t sat on its laurels, with numerous tweaks and efficiency boosts on the brand new mannequin, there’s nonetheless room for enchancment.

Design & Construct

• Cumbersome, square-edged design
• Stable building
• No water-resistance score

The Redmagic 8S Professional is sort of a spitting picture of final yr’s 8 Professional. The scale are virtually equivalent, with the 2 gadgets measuring up like this:

• RedMagic 8S Professional: 164 x 76.4 x 9.5 mm (6.46 x 3.01 x 0.37 inches)
• RedMagic 8 Professional: 164 x 76.4 x 8.9 mm (6.46 x 3.01 x 0.35 inches)

Martyn Casserly

There’s solely 0.6mm distinction in thickness and each weigh in at a hefty 228g / 8oz, so that you’ll always remember that both of them is in your pocket. The brand new mannequin additionally has the identical 6.8in AMOLED show, Gorilla Glass 5 on the entrance (and again if you happen to select the Aurora color scheme), steel chassis, and basic feeling of high quality that impressed me because the system it replaces. 

The Redmagic 8S Professional is a beast. There are not any tender, curved edges on the body. As an alternative, it’s a pointy, virtually harsh building that convinces you that this can be a critical system. Wanting on the flanks you’ll discover quantity up and down buttons, an on/off button, plus the now-famous purple change that permits the Recreation House (extra on that later). This lets you arrange the pair of set off buttons. 

USB-C is of course the order of the day on the subject of charging, with help for as much as the 65W charger that comes within the field. There nonetheless isn’t a water-resistance score, primarily because of the massive openings on the edges of the system for the cooling system.

Turning the cellphone over reveals the identical triple digicam system because the earlier mannequin, all lined up vertically. There’s additionally a round cutout that exhibits the spinning fan contained in the system, replete with RGB lights to make all of it look fairly. You received’t see it – after all – if you happen to’re taking part in a recreation, however I fairly just like the opulence of it. The cellphone additionally has lights beneath among the areas on the rear which gentle up when a message has been acquired. Good.  

Martyn Casserly

My assessment mannequin has the Aurora end, which is definitely a glass again that exhibits off among the innards. It’s not fairly as attention-grabbing as you may suppose, as all of the parts are enclosed, nevertheless it does look cool. You too can get the Redmagic 8S Professional in Platinum and Midnight color schemes. 

Within the hand the 8S Professional is an imposing cellphone. Heavy however nicely balanced. It’s true that every one that tumbler makes it a little bit of a fear on the subject of dropping the factor. There’s a case within the field, however with a view to accommodate the fan, exhaust ports and the set off buttons, a lot of the sides are uncovered. It feels sturdy, however I wouldn’t need to have it slip from my palms onto a tough floor.  

Display & Audio system

• 6.8in AMOLED, 20:9, 120Hz show
• Stereo audio system and three.5mm headphone jack
• Below show selfie digicam and fingerprint sensor

The show stays the identical as on the 8 Professional, which implies you get a really good 6.8in AMOLED panel with a 2480 x 1116-pixel decision. As this can be a gaming cellphone, there’s the anticipated naked minimal 120Hz refresh price (not as excessive as a few of its rivals, together with Redmagic’s personal 7) plus the height brightness is rated at 1,300 nits. Ramping it as much as its highest setting and disabling auto-brightness, I noticed a really respectable 1141 nits in my exams. 

Martyn Casserly

Colors are nicely represented on the show, together with the sharpness you’d anticipate of an higher mid-range cellphone. It additionally has the brightness to stay simply legible open air in brilliant sunshine. And that’s good for gaming on the go.

The whole lot is saved easy because of the 120Hz refresh price, however the Redmagic 8S Professional can intelligently choose 90Hz or 60Hz in response to the actions you’re enterprise, all to make sure power effectivity and first rate efficiency. It can’t go any decrease than 60Hz, although, as some flagship telephones can.

The panel has a contact sampling price of 960Hz, once more making it very responsive for gaming or on a regular basis use. 

Wanting carefully on the show, you’ll discover that there’s no notch or pinhole for the front-facing digicam. It is because the Redmagic 8S Professional has continued with the under-display digicam that the 8 Professional had. Whereas this causes just a few points with digicam efficiency, it does make the 6.8in show good for watching content material or taking part in video games as there are not any interruptions within the graphics.

There’s additionally an under-display fingerprint sensor, however like with the 8 Professional I discovered it to be fairly temperamental. 

The panel is protected by Corning Gorilla Glass 5 and it additionally comes with a pre-fitted display protector. The latter proved to be simply scratched, even when it got here into contact with onerous surfaces. I’d say you’d be higher off eradicating it totally and counting on the display itself or shopping for a tempered glass protector if you happen to’re fearful about harm.

There are stereo audio system which give loads of quantity. Their placement, at both finish of the handset, means they’re fairly straightforward to dam whereas taking part in video games or watching motion pictures, however that’s onerous to keep away from with any cellphone. Spatial separation is first rate, with bass a bit missing however at the least current. 

If you would like the highest quality sound, the three.5mm headphone jack supplies the flexibility to make use of wired headphones or there’s at all times Bluetooth 5.3 for wi-fi options. 

Martyn Casserly

Specs & Efficiency

• Overclocked 3.36GHz Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset
• Upgraded ICE 12.0 cooling system
• Most 16GB/512GB configuration

As you’d anticipate from a smartphone aimed toward hard-core gaming, the processing energy of the Redmagic 8S Professional is spectacular. It makes use of an overclocked 3.36GHz Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset, the most recent and best accessible on the time of launch, aided by a devoted Crimson Core 2 gaming processor.

The latter is there to take care of audio processing, haptic responses and RGB lighting. The thought is that syphoning off these duties permits the primary processor to do the heavy lifting unencumbered by trifling duties. Whether or not or not that really works, the 8S Professional performs very nicely in day-to-day use, albeit with some software program glitches that I’ll cowl later. In fact, it comes into its personal when taking part in video games. 

Firing up the likes of Genshin Affect and Asphalt 9: Legends and settling down for a gaming session proved to be very pleasant. The 8S Professional handled all of the motion easily, even on the best settings. I didn’t discover any lag or slow-downs throughout my time with the system, and the massive display is a pleasure to make use of.

You too can map the set off buttons on the highest edge (when in panorama) to execute numerous actions that might in any other case require tapping the display. These work very well, thanks in no small half to their 520Hz sampling charges. 

Redmagic has revamped the cooling system this time round, with the upgraded ICE 12.0 system. This consists of a 2068mm3 double-layer super-large vapour chamber cooling plate, new duct construction, cooling gel, a layer of graphene beneath the show and the 20,000rpm fan.

This additional deal with thermals was definitely worth the effort because the 8S Professional stayed reasonably cool even beneath the fairly intense graphical calls for that I put it via. Clearly, if you happen to play for a very long time then issues do get a bit heat, however by no means to the scorching temperatures that might have you ever fearful in regards to the parts. The fan is quiet, however you’ll discover it because of the uncommon nature of a cellphone having one within the first place. 

Martyn Casserly

Right here’s how the Redmagic 8 Professional fared in our exams.

Redmagic 8S Professional benchmarks

There are two totally different configurations of the 8S Professional, with the Midnight livery having 12GB of LPDDR5X RAM and 256GB of UFS 4.0 storage, whereas the Aurora and Platinum fashions double the capacities to 16GB and 512GB. 

Cameras

• 50MP, f/1.88 (vast) 
• 8MP, f/2.2, 120 ̊ (ultrawide) 
• 2MP, f/2.4 (macro) 
• 16MP under-screen selfie digicam

The cameras on the 8S Professional are equivalent to the 8 Professional, so that you get three lenses to play with. The primary shooter has a 50MP Samsung GN5 sensor with an f/1.88 aperture. In well-lit situations, the photographs it produces are good, however the software program processing results in oversharpening that may make issues look a bit synthetic at occasions.

It additionally has the silly default setting that was so annoying on the 8 Professional, the place a watermark is utilized to all pictures. That is simply modified, however actually needs to be off from the beginning.

Colors are wealthy, if considerably oversaturated, and the 8S Professional does a good job of autofocusing and publicity in most pictures. 

When ranges drop, the devoted Evening mode shocked me with some beautiful pictures that held a superb quantity of element whereas holding again on the noise. You’ll want regular palms to get sharp pictures, so I’d advocate leaning the cellphone on a wall or another flat floor when taking the shot and if you happen to do you need to be fairly pleased with the outcomes. 

Martyn Casserly

Switching to the ultrawide lens will increase subject of view to 120°. It’s an identical case to most different ultrawide cameras we’ve seen at this form of value although, the place you lose among the color and sharpness. Once more, images are nonetheless usable.  

You’ll discover all kinds of additional modes accessible within the bizarrely named Digital camera-family part, together with macro (for mediocre close-ups), Star path (astrophotography), doc scanning and a devoted one for taking ID images – this features a headshot define overlay that will help you place the topic correctly. Most are enjoyable, however I believe they’re unlikely for use that a lot. 

Video high quality on the 8S Professional tops out at a whopping 8K at 30fps however do not forget that you’ll want a monitor (or TV) that helps this stage of element. Sadly, I didn’t have one whereas testing the 8S Professional, so I can’t confirm it’s as crisp because the numbers counsel. I’d advocate utilizing the more-storage-space-friendly 1080p/60fps setting, because the footage was completely acceptably and advantages from digital picture stabilisation that did a good job of smoothing out any bumps as I walked alongside.

Autofocus was additionally first rate and audio was clear all through, if a bit quiet. The 8S Professional additionally has a 4K/60fps mode, which is equally good if you happen to’re planning on utilizing the cellphone for extra broadcast-standard movies, plus there’s 1080p/240fps for sluggish movement. 

The selfie digicam lets the aspect down. This was the identical with the earlier cellphone and Redmagic hasn’t improved issues on the 8S Professional. Because of the under-display place, all pictures are foggy and tender. It’s merely one of many worst selfie cameras I’ve ever used. If selfies are essential to you, then keep away from the 8S Professional in any respect prices. But when, like me, you by no means take selfies, it may be ignored when you benefit from the beautiful, uninterrupted show. 

Right here’s a collection of pictures taken with the Redmagic 8S Professional:

Battery Life & Charging

• 6000mAh battery
• 65W quick charging
• No wi-fi charging

One other hold-over from the 8 Professional is the huge 6000mAh battery. Technically it’s two 3000mAh cells working collectively, and oh how they work nicely. Getting via a standard day of social media, cellphone calls, listening to podcasts, net searching and the occasional recreation normally left me with loads of juice at bedtime. Heavier gaming periods clearly eat into this, however even then I might recover from 4 hours of strong taking part in earlier than reaching for the charger. 

Martyn Casserly

Charging again up once more is quick, with the supplied 65W charger taking it from flat to 100% in round 35 minutes, with a fast 15-minute top-up replenishing 58% of the battery. There’s no wi-fi charging accessible, so if that’s your most well-liked technique of powering up a cellphone then you can be disillusioned. 

Software program

• Android 13 with RedMagic OS 8.0
• Recreation House
• Nonetheless some annoying bugs

The Redmagic 8S Professional runs Android 13 with the Redmagic OS 8.0 pores and skin on high. It’s a really customisable platform, permitting you to essentially tinker with the look of icons, themes, in addition to how the cellphone behaves. If you would like plain Android, then this isn’t the cellphone for you, nevertheless it does have its charms.  

Sadly, there are additionally bugs that should be ironed out to make the expertise higher for day-to-day use. I had a number of apps shut down unexpectedly, with audio apps usually stopping playback randomly. I up to date the software program and checked the apps themselves, however the issues appeared particular to the cellphone as I didn’t have the identical points with different telephones I had available.

Martyn Casserly

The Recreation House characteristic is spectacular and is enabled by sliding the purple change on the sting of the cellphone. With this on it provides you numerous methods to customize your expertise, together with connecting exterior gadgets, managing screenshots and quick-launching video games. Swiping in from the aspect whereas in recreation opens up all kinds of choices, settings and monitoring info too.

There’s a critical quantity of freedom accessible, so if you happen to’re a devoted cellular gamer you’ll be in heaven with the 8S Professional. 

Worth & Availability

The Redmagic 8S Professional will probably be launched on 3 August 2023. After that date, that is how a lot it’ll price:

• Redmagic 8S Professional (Midnight) 12GB/256GB – $649/£579/€649
• Redmagic 8S Professional (Platinum) 16GB/512GB – $779/£689/€779
• Redmagic 8S Professional (Aurora) 16GB/512GB – $799/£709/€799

Nonetheless, an early hen supply within the US and UK means you pay $1/£1 to have the ability to buy a day earlier (2 August) and get a free $30/£30 Redmagic voucher. The latter will probably be legitimate for 3 weeks after the official launch.

However even if you happen to don’t make the most of this supply, the priciest mannequin remains to be less expensive than the likes of the Asus ROG Telephone 7 Final which, whereas good, is way more costly at $1399 / £1199 / €1399.

For extra options, see our roundup of the very best gaming telephones.  

Verdict

The overclocked chip, quick storage and beneficiant quantity of RAM make sure the 8S Professional has improbable efficiency – precisely what you need from a gaming cellphone. That is enhanced by the set off buttons, efficient cooling system, glorious battery life and devoted software program options.

It’s additionally an ideal platform for media consumption because of the beautiful show and the shortage of a punch-hole or notch to spoil issues.  

As an on a regular basis cellphone it’s rather less interesting. The system is heavy, has no water-resistance score, common cameras and selfies are laughably unhealthy. Software program bugs persist, however these might be fastened with updates.

In the end, if you happen to’re on the lookout for a robust gaming cellphone that doesn’t price the Earth, then the Redmagic 8S Professional is simple to advocate. .

Specs

• 6.8-inch AMOLED show, 2480 x 1116 decision, 20:9, 120Hz refresh price, and 960Hz contact sampling price.
• Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 processor (overclocked at 3.36GHz)
• REDMAGIC OS 8.0 based mostly on Android 13.
• 12GB or 16GB LPDDR5X RAM.
• 256GB or 512GB UFS 4.0 storage
• 50 MP, f/1.88 (vast) 
• 8 MP, f/2.2, 120 diploma (ultrawide) 
• 2 MP, f/2.4 (macro)
• 16MP selfie digicam
• 520Hz contact delicate shoulder set off buttons
• ICE 12.0 cooling system
• 20,000rpm cooling fan
• Below-display fingerprint sensor
• Bluetooth 5.3
• Wi-Fi 7
• NFC
• GPS
• Stereo audio system
• Twin haptic motors
• USB-C charging port
• 6000mAh battery with 65W quick charging.
• 3.5mm headphone jack
• 164 x 76.4 x 9.5 mm (6.46 x 3.01 x 0.37 in)
• 228g/8.04oz