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Honor is set to release its first-ever gaming phone, the Honor Win, on Dec. 26. Ahead of its launch, I went hands-on with the upcoming smartphone and its unique turbo cooling fan, which aims to solve a crucial issue in gaming phones: heat. Every phone has to balance processor performance and the heat its chip generates. This is especially true with gaming phones, which can be played for hours at maximum performance.
Honor has equipped the Win with a fan to remove some of that heat, which would allow the processor to run at higher speeds for longer.
Gaming phone-makers such as Nubia and Asus (the companies behind the RedMagic 11 Pro and ROG Phone 9 Pro, respectively) have their own features focused on cooling, but neither company has managed to place a fan inside a phone that's rated for both water and dust resistance.
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The Honor Win takes on these heavyweights in the gaming phone category with a cooling fan design that doesn't compromise on the phone's durability. It doesn't feel like a brick either, despite the presence of a massive 10,000-mAh battery -- the largest phone battery that I've ever tested. That behemoth battery will allow you to game for hours on the Honor Win without it overheating, and the phone itself is as durable as a flagship phone from Apple or Samsung.
There is no word on pricing or a possible global release.
A gaming phone disguised as a premium phone
The Honor Win's cooling fan is placed alongside the camera module on the back, helping it blend into the design of the phone.
Prakhar Khanna/CNETThe Honor Win has a built-in fan to help dissipate heat quickly. Honor calls its cooling system "East Wind Turbo Cooling." We've seen a built-in fan before on phones like the RedMagic, but Honor placed it directly above the processor to provide better cooling efficiency. There's an air duct that blows cold air straight onto the chip. The Win's fan can spin for 25,000 rotations per minute and reduce the temperature by up to 7 degrees Celsius (44.6 F) during intensive gaming sessions, according to Honor. Its fan and air duct have a "10% increase in intake area compared to traditional cooling fans."
I will note that the ROG Phone 9 Pro's AeroActive Cooler attachment lowered its temperature by 5 C during a Fortnite gaming session in our review. Until now, the RedMagic 11 Pro's 24,000 rpm fan has had the fastest airflow of any phone.
I couldn't test the Honor gaming phone to its limits during my brief hands-on time. I look forward to comparing it to both Asus and Nubia's gaming phones and seeing if there's a noticeable difference.
I couldn't play intensive games for long durations during my hands-on, but I look forward to testing it to its limits.
Prakhar Khanna/CNETHonor says that as phone chips have become more advanced and mobile gaming workloads have intensified, the need to find better cooling solutions has increased. As a result, traditional vapor cooling chambers, like the one inside the iPhone 17 Pro Max, are approaching their limits. An Honor representative said that the Win's cooling system is based on the ones used in computers.
But, the fan isn't the most impressive part of this design. It's Honor Win's flagship-level durability. The phone is rated IP68, IP69 and IP69K for dust and water resistance. This means it can survive being submerged underwater for up to 30 minutes, withstand high-temperature water jets, like the new OnePlus 15, and prevent pocket lint and dust from entering its body.
For context, the RedMagic 11 Pro was the first gaming phone with a cooling fan to be water-resistant with an IPX8 rating, but it lacks dust resistance because it has vents that may allow dust particles in.
A huge battery without the bulk
That's sunlight hitting the back of the phone, not an Honor design choice. The Honor Win looks quite "normal" for a gaming phone.
Prakhar Khanna/CNETThe Honor Win packs a big 10,000-mAh silicon-carbon cell, but it weighs less than the iPhone 17 Pro Max. I couldn't tell that it had such a huge battery when I first held it in my hand. It's quite a bump from the RedMagic 11 Pro's 7,500-mAh battery, or the 7,300-mAh battery in the OnePlus 15.
At 229 grams, the new Honor phone is comfortable to hold and doesn't dig into my palm like the Galaxy S25 Ultra. It has flat sides, but the curved corners make it more handy to grab on to.
The Win has "Charge Separation" that works like bypass charging to power the motherboard directly from the charger without touching the battery. This reduces the heat buildup when you're playing games and allows the phone to deliver full-frame performance over long sessions. Charge Separation also helps extend the battery's lifespan.
While we'll have to wait for the phone's Dec. 26 launch for more information, an Honor executive revealed a number of other details on the Chinese social networking website Weibo. It has: A Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chip, three cameras and 16GB of RAM.
