Honor MagicPad 3

The Android tablet market is a competitive space, with many brands trying to reestablish themselves to meet the surge in demand following the pandemic. Samsung dominates sales, as one of the brands that stuck to its tablet plans through thick and thin, rivalling Apple's commitment to the iPad.

- Chris Hall

But the past few years have seen an increasing number of Android tablets pushing into this space, seeing the tablet market as an opportunity to offer an alternative to a laptop for light work, while delivering a convenient and portable entertainment hub.

That's where we find the Honor MagicPad 3, sitting at the juncture of work and play, looking to offer everything you need in a neat package.

While it numerically replaces the Honor MagicPad 2, it's been repositioned, losing one of the MagicPad 2's best features: its OLED display. So is Honor's 2025 tablet worthy of consideration?

DESIGN

The Honor MagicPad 3 comes in two colours - grey and white - with a neat metal frame holding the composite rear in place. The tablet's back is textured, reminding me of some types of laminate kitchen counter.

Using a plastic material avoids both the weight of glass and the fingerprints it acquires, although some may feel that the result isn't as premium as some metal tablets that are available for less, such as the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 FE+.

But there's a solid feel to this tablet and it looks smart too, although I can't help feeling that the large camera module on the back could be smaller - but more on that later on.

Towards the bottom of the tablet there's a set of pogo pins which connect to the MagicPad 3 Smart Touch Keyboard which I used to write this review, as you'll see in various photos. It offers a nice chiclet keyboard action with trackpad, and has a full range of shortcuts to make using the tablet a little more fluid.