I’m a firm believer that

Android tablets
don’t get the credit they deserve. While the Android OS itself provides a mobile-centric experience, it does so while offering a level of flexibility that you just won’t find on, say,

an iPad running iPadOS
. Custom home screen launchers, app sideloading, screensavers, and other PC-like tools and features are readily available on Google’s mobile software platform, with no need to jump through any extraneous hoops.

Unfortunately, many of the most interesting and competitive Android slates aren’t available for purchase in the US, which is a genuine shame. Yes, the

Google Pixel Tablet
, the

Samsung Galaxy Tab S9
series, and the

OnePlus Pad 2
are actively on store shelves, but there’s a whole world of compelling tablet computers that the American consumer base simply can’t tap into.

Take, for example, the

recently-released Honor Pad V9
. This mid-range tablet offers a ton of hardware and software goodness in a relatively affordable package. It starts at a base price of €450 or £400 in Europe, which translates to roughly $532 USD. I’ve had the chance to check out Honor’s price-conscious Pad V9 over the past several weeks, and I’ve identified four features in particular that help the device stand out from its peers.

Honor Pad V9

The Honor Pad V9 is an 11.5-inch Android tablet that ships with a speedy 144Hz refresh rate display, and offers a slim 6.1mm thin chassis.

1

It’s a super-slim computer

The tablet measures in at 0.24-inches (6.1mm) thick

One of the most striking aspects of the Honor Pad V9 is its unbelievably slim chassis. Measuring in at 0.24-inches (6.1mm), the V9 handily bests many other mid-range tablets in terms of svelteness. Aside from the far more expensive

Apple iPad Pro line
, you’ll be hard-pressed to find a tablet that’s significantly thinner than this. For reference, the OnePlus Pad 2 measures in at 0.26-inches (6.5mm) thick, while the base Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 comes in at 0.23-inches (5.9mm).

While not the absolute thinnest tech product I’ve ever held in my hand, Honor has done an excellent job of reigning in the Pad V9’s proportions. The tablet is well-built, too, with its machined aluminum exterior build, and its solid, clicky metallic buttons. Add in reasonably slim display bezels that are curved at the edges, and a decently distributed mass of 1.05 lbs (475g), and the V9 looks and feels more premium than its price tag would otherwise suggest.

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2

Its screen is silky smooth

Honor has outfitted the Pad V9 with a 144Hz refresh rate

Honor has outfitted the Pad V9 with an 11.5-inch 2800 x 1840 display panel, which can hit a typical brightness of 500 nits. Its IPS LCD-based technology isn’t quite a match for the deep, inky blacks found on most OLED displays, but it more than makes up for this with its support for high dynamic range (HDR), its IMAX Enhanced and TÜV Rheinland certifications (for cinema picture calibration and for eye comfort, respectively), and its 144Hz refresh rate.

This last specification is particularly notable. Aside from

gaming-first products
, we don’t often see displays refresh at a rate faster than 120Hz. To see such a silky-smooth panel shipping on a mid-range Android tablet is incredibly welcome in my eyes, and it makes rivals like the 60Hz iPad Air look laughable by comparison. No, it doesn’t make use of LTPO-based variable refresh rate (VRR) tech, but Honor does implement its own version of dynamic refresh rate at the system level.

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3

It runs MagicOS 9 out of the box

Honor’s skin runs atop of Android 15

Out of the gate, the Honor Pad V9 ships with MagicOS 9 running atop of

Android 15
. MagicOS is a rather heavy Android skin, taking liberties in its altering of the OS and its feature set. The iPadOS-inspired visuals are a bit too heavy-handed for my liking, but I’m a fan of the software suite’s wealth of useful tools and features.

My favorite addition is Magazine Unlock, which provides a steady feed of Windows Spotlight-like photos to enjoy on the lock screen. The

eBook
mode is a nice touch for when I use the tablet at night in bed, with its grayscale color tone making it easy on my eyes. AI tools like Magic Text (for text extraction) and Magic Portal (for context-aware screen search) are also on board, but I never use them, as I find Google’s equivalents to be more precise and more seamlessly implemented into the Android experience.

If you pair the Honor Pad V9 with the company’s optional Honor Magic-Pencil 3 (not included with the unit), then you can also take advantage of the inking capabilities increasingly being built into Android. I do wish the stylus came standard in the box — this would sweeten the overall deal just that little bit more for me.

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4

It’s a fairly affordable mid-range package

The Pad V9 starts at €450 or £400 (roughly $532)

At roughly $532 when converted at the time of writing, the Honor Pad V9 is quite an attractive package. The unit — which is available in white, gray, and violet colorways — is aesthetically pleasing, thin and lightweight, and chock-full of useful software features. The IMAX Enhanced display (as well as its eight-speaker stereo sound system) make for an excellent content streaming experience, which is an important consideration for an 11.5-inch-sized tablet.

Of course, being a mid-range product, the Pad V9 isn’t designed to be cutting-edge. Small concessions have been made throughout, like the lack of a

fingerprint sensor
, USB 2.0 speeds, and no cellular data option. Its Mediatek Dimensity 8350 isn’t exactly top of the line, with benchmark scores of 1,433 for single-core and 4,196 for multi-core on Geekbench 6. Even still, with 128GB of storage and 8GB of RAM in the base unit (configurable up to 512GB + 12GB), there’s quite a lot of computer here for the asking price. It’s just a shame I can’t pick one up on store shelves at my local Best Buy or Wal-Mart.

This device was provided to Pocket-lint by Honor.

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