Honor 600 vs. 600 Pro

The age-old question – the Pro or the non-Pro? This time it’s either the Honor 600 or the Honor 600 Pro. The latter brings a handful of useful features and hardware upgrades over the regular Honor 600, but also adds another €300 to the bill.

Sure, you get a more powerful chipset and a telephoto camera, but the vanilla 600 gets you a long way at a much lower cost. It has the same flagship-grade display, same battery capacity, same main camera and supports 80W fast wired charging like the Honor 600 Pro.

Still, a comprehensive comparison requires a deeper dive, so let’s go look at the data and see which one is a better fit for you.

Table of Contents:

For starters, you can compare the complete specs sheets or directly continue with our editor’s assessment in the following text.

Size comparison

The two handsets share identical designs and build. Both have standard glass front panels, plastic backs and aluminum frames. The ingress protection is IP68/IP69K and even the available color options don’t differ.

However, the standard Honor 600 has a slight edge over the Pro as it weighs about 10 grams less. But let’s be honest here, we are splitting hairs.

Display comparison

There’s not much to comment on when it comes to displays. The two Honors share the same display panels, size and feature-wise. It really doesn’t matter which one you’d pick when it comes to picture quality.

Battery life

How about battery life? To our surprise, the Honor 600 Pro beat the Honor 600, despite its more power-hungry chipset. At least if you compare the Active Use Scores.

However, there’s a bit more nuance in the battery results. If you are mainly web browsing and streaming videos, the Honor 600 might be a better pick for you. The Honor 600 Pro is only better for longer gaming sessions, which is a bit strange considering that the Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset is considerably more powerful, and one would expect higher power consumption. But that’s another topic.

Bottom line is, take the Pro if you intend to game, otherwise the Honor 600 will do you better if your screen time is primarily web browsing or video streaming.

Note that we’ve tested the European Honor 600 and 600 Pro versions, which come with 6,400 mAh batteries, not 7,000 mAh like the international iterations.

Charging speed

Since the two Honors share the same 7,000 mAh battery and charging tech, 80W over a cable using an Honor SuperCharger, it’s no surprise that we got similar results in our charging tests. There’s no practical difference between the two devices in this regard – they charge equally fast.

On the other hand, the Honor 600 Pro supports 50W wireless charging, which is also pretty snappy. So if you like to keep your phone on a wireless charging stand or already have wireless charging accessories for your car, the Pro is the right choice.

Speaker test

The two speaker sets exhibit roughly the same loudness and tuning. They are not the best in their respective classes, but you don’t really stand to gain or lose anything if you go for the cheaper Honor.

Performance

Performance is the biggest gap between the Honor 600 and 600 Pro and probably the main reason why you’d want to spend a little extra for the Pro. It has last year’s flagship Snapdragon 8 Elite SoC, while the Honor 600 settles for a Snapdragon 7 Gen 4 silicon. The Elite is clearly a lot more powerful, but we will let the figures speak for themselves.

But before we get to the benchmark results, note the memory configuration differences. The Honor 600 starts from 8GB/128GB, while the Pro’s entry memory option is 12GB/256GB. Notably, the vanilla Honor 600’s base variant is practically the 8GB/256GB version, which is easier to find for some reason. However, it caps at 12GB/512GB, while the Pro is also sold in 16GB/1TB flavor.

Benchmark performance

Unsurprisingly, the Honor 600 Pro’s Snapdragon 8 Elite beats the Snapdragon 7 Gen 4 by a landslide. It earns more than twice as many points in key benchmarks, making it a much easier pick for gamers.

Then again, going for the more powerful chipset will also give you peace of mind in the long run. More powerful chipsets tend to age better, so in a way, the Pro can be considered as a more future-proof solution.

Both handsets are entitled to 6 major OS upgrades.

Camera comparison

Neither model changes much in the camera hardware compared to the previous model, and the differentiator between Pro and non-Pro remains the higher-tier model’s telephoto camera – the Honor 600 doesn’t have one. The 3.5x zoom module on the 600 Pro is the main reason to spend the extra cash, and if you find yourself zooming in a lot, that would be the wise thing to do.

The main cameras on the back feature 200MP sensors and 24mm equivalent stabilized lenses, though the vanilla model outputs its default files at 27mm, while the Pro uses its native field of view.

The ultrawide cameras are based on conventional RGB sensors (as opposed to a Quad Bayer type one) with a 12MP resolution, paired with 16mm lenses that feature autofocus.

The selfie cameras lack autofocus, but the combination of a 50MP sensor with a 21mm equivalent lens is easy to like – on both phones.

The 600 and the 600 Pro both have the Honor AI button that can be assigned to launch the camera app and act as a shutter release button.

Image quality

Daylight

While the two phones may have identical main cameras, the vanilla 600 takes slightly different pictures at 1x, starting with the already mentioned 27mm equivalent focal length on the 600 vs. the 24mm on the Pro – it’s a small difference, but it’s not unnoticeable.

Another subtlety is in the higher saturation, most visible in greenery, that the vanilla 600 tends to produce – both approaches deliver pleasing colors, and white balance is dependable on both phones, it’s just that the 600’s images might have a little extra pop. Dynamic range is wide on both, contrast is great. Detail is excellent too, with a bit of an advantage for the Pro in dimmer indoor conditions.

Daylight, main camera (1x): Honor 600 • Honor 600 Pro

Similarly, the Pro will get you a minor advantage in sharpness at 2x zoom, but the non-Pro is very good itself.

Daylight, main camera (2x): Honor 600 • Honor 600 Pro

Where the Honor 600 trails its more esteemed Pro stablemate to a significant degree is zoom in power beyond 2x. The Honor 600’s main camera does manage to put out good results at 4x in outdoor scenes – not pin-sharp, but still quite good – but sharpness does drop indoors. The Pro’s dedicated 3.5x zoom camera is obviously a major advantage when it comes to reach.

Daylight, telephoto: Honor 600 (main camera, 4x) • Honor 600 Pro (telephoto camera, 3.5x)

Both ultrawides capture solid outdoor shots and maintain good quality indoors as well. The Pro may have a miniscule advantage in sharpness outdoors, but that fades indoors where the shadow softening is about the same on both. The vanilla model still has a bit more punch in its colors, but hues are looking great overall. Contrast can be a touch higher than we’d like on both phones.

Daylight, ultrawide camera (0.6x): Honor 600 • Honor 600 Pro

Low light

At night, you can expect very good results from both main cameras. Images have accurate white balance and great colors. Admittedly, exposures do tend to be a little darker than we’d like, but that’s apparently Honor’s way, and even so, there’s still good shadow detail, and highlights are well preserved. The 600 Pro has a minor advantage in the darkest of scenes, we’ll give it that.

Low-light, main camera (1x): Honor 600 • Honor 600 Pro

Quality does drop at 2x, but we’d still consider the Honor 600’s results good – in absolute terms, but even more so for its class. If you want slightly better shots at 50-ish millimeter focal length, the Pro will give you those, but it wouldn’t be a massive difference.

Low-light, main camera (2x): Honor 600 • Honor 600 Pro

Zooming in to 4x isn’t really advisable on the Honor 600 in the dark, unless you’ll only be viewing the shots on the phone itself, or you’ll be sharing them heavily compressed anyway. That said, even at fit-to-screen magnification on a computer, you’ll probably be able to spot the blotchiness. That’s where the premium for 600 Pro will justify itself – if you plan to be shooting beyond 2x, particularly in low-light settings.

Low-light, telephoto: Honor 600 (main camera, 4x) • Honor 600 Pro (telephoto camera, 3.5x)

After dark, there’s a bit of noticeable difference between the two models’ ultrawides – the Pro tends to be a little cleaner, while the vanilla phone leans towards less noise reduction. Either way, you’d be getting great dynamic range and good color rendition.

Low-light, ultrawide camera (0.6x): Honor 600 • Honor 600 Pro

Selfies

Selfies in good light are very similar from the two phones, and they are indeed excellent. As light levels drop, the 600 will show a more noticeable drop in quality, and at night photos will be softer still – the Pro is meaningfully better at handling less than ideal light.

Selfies comparison: Honor 600 • Honor 600 Pro

Video quality

The Honor 600 can record video at up to 4K30 with its main camera and you have to switch to 1080p if you’d like 60fps capture – the 600 Pro would happily do 4K60 as well, which is where its telephoto maxes out too. Both ultrawides are capped at 4K30, with no 60fps modes even at a lower resolution and the selfie cameras can do 4K30 or 1080p60.

The vanilla 600 doesn’t support HDR video recording – the Pro offers HDR Vivid for all quality modes, and this just might be a differentiator.

Daylight videos from the main cameras are very good on both phones, with the vanilla 600 possibly being slightly sharper than the Pro. Both have accurate exposures, very good dynamic range, and great-looking colors. The plain 600 does fairly good quality 2x clips, but if you want zoom power, you’d be better off with the Pro’s 3.5x telephoto, naturally.

The ultrawides are about on par, with the 600’s footage being a little extra contrasty on top of the Pro’s already pretty expressive look.

Daylight video screengrabs, Honor 600: 0.7x • 1x • 2x

Daylight video screengrabs, Honor 600 Pro: 0.7x • 1x • 3.5x

At night, the 600’s main camera is on the noisy side of average, but there’s also plenty of detail to go with the grain. In comparison, the Pro does manage to extract a bit more from the shadows at 1x, and it’s cleaner too.

You just might be able to get away with 2x zoom on the 600, without winning any sharpness contests. The telephoto on the 600 Pro is again hard to rival in this bout, even if it’s not absolutely great in isolation –  it strikes a good balance between noise and detail, struggling a little with dynamic range.

Neither ultrawide is usable for video in the dark, so not a lot to choose there.

Low-light video screengrabs, Honor 600: 0.7x • 1x • 2x

Low-light video screengrabs, Honor 600 Pro: 0.7x • 1x • 3.5x

Verdict

At the time of writing, the price gap between the Honor 600 and 600 Pro with 256GB storage is about €300. The Pro costs nearly twice as much as the vanilla model. So anyone on a budget will likely pick the standard Honor 600.

In fact, the regular 600 makes a good case for itself by offering the same display and main cameras, better web browsing and video streaming runtimes and the same software support.

On the other hand, the Honor 600 Pro is a proper almost-flagship phone with much more powerful hardware. The telephoto camera is a huge advantage, and so is the twice-as-powerful chipset, which can be considered a future-proof investment. The added fast wireless charging is a nice bonus, too.

It’s hard to give you a definitive answer, because the price difference is quite big and so is the feature disparity. It depends on how much you plan on using a telephoto camera and whether a powerful SoC like the Snapdragon 8 Elite will be put to good use. If the answer to both is yes, then you might have to break the bank and get the Pro. Otherwise, the vanilla is perfectly fine, too.