Introduction
If you’ve ever wondered what a true gaming tablet should be like – this is it – the Red Magic Nova! With powerful and appropriately cooled hardware, a comfortable size and a price of €500 it’s the best gaming slate out there right now!
Many people think of the iPad as a gaming tablet due to its relatively powerful hardware and great eco-system with tons of apps. However, Apple devices tend to have strange limitations or over-complications because they were made to be ubiquitous devices first and foremost.
Console games have already been ported to Android, and Red Magic Nova seems to be the best place to play them. It has a 10.9-inch LCD screen with high resolution and 144Hz refresh rate and runs on the most advanced version of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip SM8650-AC, and has Snapdragon Elite Gaming support. You can get it with up to 24GB of LPDDR5X RAM and up to 1TB of UFS 4.0 storage.
Red Magic created a 9-layer cooling system with 3D heat pipes, a circulation assist duct, a dissipative alloy, graphene, copper foil, thermally conductive gel, and a 20,000 RPM internal fan. This system should provide excellent stability during long gaming sessions. And this system is partially visible on the back, surrounded by some nice but attractive logos.
The tablet has an aviation-grade aluminum chassis with four stereo speakers around the frame. It has a large 10,100mAh battery that is capable of up to 80W fast charging, battery bypass during gaming, and the integrated fan can cool the battery so that it can speed up the charging process.
The price of the Red Magic Nova tablet starts at €499, which is less than any other powerful tablet in the current flagship crop on the market.
ZTE Nubia Red Magic Nova details at a glance:
- Body: 253.3×164.6×7.3mm, 530g; Front glass, aluminum frame, rear aluminum; RGB light on the back, built-in cooling fan (illuminated), aviation-grade aluminum frame.
- Display: 10.90″ IPS LCD, 144 Hz, 550 nits, 1800×2880 px resolution, 14.4:9 aspect ratio, 312 ppi.
- Chipset: Qualcomm SM8650-AC Snapdragon 8th Gen 3 (4 nm): 8-core (1×3.4GHz Cortex-X4 and 3×3.1GHz Cortex-A720 and 2×2.9GHz Cortex-A720 and 2×2.2GHz Cortex-A520); Adreno 750 (1 GHz).
- Memory: 256GB 12GB RAM, 512GB 16GB RAM; UFS 4.0.
- OS/Software: Android 14, RedMagic OS 9.5.
- rear camera: 50 MP.
- Front Camera: 20 MP.
- video capture: rear camera: 4K@30fps, 1080p@30fps; front camera:1080p@30fps.
- Battery: 10100mAh; 80W wired, 100% in 55 minutes (advertised).
- Connectivity: WiFi; BT; NFC.
- various: fingerprint reader (side-mounted); Stereo speakers (4 speakers).
The Red Magic Nova relies on an IPS LCD screen instead of OLED and this could be considered a potential deal-breaker. But given that this tablet is meant for hardcore gamers, most if not most people will really appreciate the LCD screen.
Unboxing Red Magic Nova
The Red Magic Nova comes in a cool gray box, which houses the tablet, a 9A-rated USB-C cable, and an 80W power adapter.
Nubia is also selling an optional keyboard and stylus if you need some of these to expand your tablet experience.
Optional keyboard and pen accessories
