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TechRadar Reviews
Reviews
- The Withings BodyScan 2, complete with cabled handle and premium build, might be the best smart scale of 2026
- Geekom A5 mini PC 2027 Edition review: Good value, well-made, and a decent user experience for those who aren’t excessively ambitious
- Control Resonant shows that sometimes bigger really is better
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The Withings BodyScan 2, complete with cabled handle and premium build, might be the best smart scale of 2026
Withings BodyScan 2 Body Scale: One minute review
Smart scales measure weight, body fat, muscle mass, and a whole host of other metrics through a collection of electrodes at the soles of your feet. The best smart scales are perfect for fitness enthusiasts, family health monitoring, and those who want to track changes to their body over time, but Withings wants to push the boundaries of what is possible in the smart scale category. Not satisfied with simple measurements like the ones listed above, Withings has launched the BodyScan 2, and it represents a significant step in innovation.
According to Withings, the BodyScan 2 is “the world's first longevity station. It is the only consumer device that transforms your daily weigh-in into a complete cardiometabolic assessment, revealing whether your lifestyle is adding or taking years off your healthy life.” This scale is all about trends over time and those who care about optimizing their health now, for the reward of future gains.
Building on the original BodyScan scale, version two introduces a number of new features and design changes. The display has been moved from the base to the handlebar, offering a more pleasing user experience. New features include SpO2 measurements, hypertension screening, heart and ‘vascular age’ estimations, and reporting on the risk of unstable glycaemia.
All of these improvements make the scale $200 / £100 more expensive than the original. That’s a significant increase given that even the most premium offerings from most other brands cost less than half the price, but I suppose electronics in all categories have been getting more expensive this year with the components crisis. And if you want access to the complete set of features, then you’ll have to part ways with $9.95 / £8.95 per month for a Withings+ subscription, making this a premium-only, money-no-object smart scale option.
That said, the BodyScan 2 offers the very best in features and build quality. The scale is able to track over 40 biomarkers and, through very clever processing, can report heart findings that no other scale is capable of. It also boasts a robust and premium build with the chassis being made from reinforced aluminum.
Withings has taken some of the most innovative hardware found in the best smartwatches and best smart rings and combined it with traditional smart scale technology. The result is one of the most advanced smart scales on the consumer market.
(Image credit: Future / Paul Hatton)Withings BodyScan 2 Body Scale: SpecificationsComponent
Withings BodyScan 2 Body Scale
Price
$599.95 USD / £449.95 GBP / $895 AUS
Metrics
40+ Biomarkers with 6-zone body composition analysis, Metabolic Assessment, Cardiovascular Insights, and a Calories Tracker
Dimensions
12.8 x 14.1 x 0.7 in / 325 x 357 x 18.5 mm
Weight
11.9 lbs / 5.4 kg
Material
Glass and reinforced aluminum
Display
LCD
Battery
Rechargeable Li-ion battery, USB Type-C
Connection
WiFi
(Image credit: Future / Paul Hatton)Withings BodyScan 2 Body Scale: Price and availability- $599.95 USD / £449.95 GBP / $895 AUS
- The specs justify the high cost
- More affordable alternatives exist
The BodyScan 2 is one of the most expensive scales on the market, period. At $599.95 / £449.95 / $$895 AUS, the scale is marketed at only the most serious of users who have the disposable income to match their health goals.
Unfortunately, the costs don’t end there. If you’d like to unlock the premium in-app experience, Withings+, then you’ll have to part with a further $9.95 / £8.95 per month. The membership provides clinical experts at your disposal, an AI health assistant to convert your history into future progress, and a long-term assessment of your aging.
The spec of the BodyScan 2 sets it apart from the rest of the competition. If you turn to the likes of RunStar, then you’ll find their most premium smart scale, the 8E Ultra, costing less than half the price of the BodyScan 2. This shows that unless you need features to measure and estimate heart age, vascular age, and risk of unstable glycaemia and hypertension, then you’ll be able to save a lot of money by going for one of the other options on our best smart scales list.
- Value score 4.5/5
- High-resolution LCD screen
- ITO Glass Platform
- Robust and durable
The BodyScan 2 exudes the premium build quality that you’d expect given its eye-watering price tag. The aesthetic is smart, professional, and well thought through. With a reinforced aluminum chassis, you also won’t have many concerns should it be dropped on a hard tiled floor or knocked against a sink pedestal.
At the heart of the experience is a 640 x 172px color LCD screen, which is bright, vibrant, and clear. With it, users can quickly and easily track their progress without even needing to launch the Withings app. This is neatly located in the retractable handle, if you choose to use it, so your data will be closer to your eye and more easily read.
The base is covered with a large-format glass platform that contains eight integrated Indium Tin Oxide (ITO) electrodes for high-precision accuracy and support for all foot sizes and up to 200 kg / 440 lb maximum capacity. The base features a black and blue hued striped pattern, which elevates the smart scale beyond looking like a glass slab.
Extruding out of the base is the smart retractable handle with an automatic locking mechanism. It works smoothly and reliably locks into position, and its length means it’ll cater to even the tallest of users. Withings has also integrated two buttons into the handle to allow for easy operation of the unit.
As well as housing the color screen, the handle comprises four stainless steel electrodes to take the total number across the scale up to 12. Through these sensors, the BodyScan 2 is capable of performing cardiometabolic assessments and a whole-body analysis.
- Design Score: 5/5
- Hypertension notifications
- Blood oxygen level measurements
- Heart age predictions
The BodyScan 2 represents a significant advancement in body tracking for the consumer market. It does, of course, continue to carry out the basics admirably, but beyond that, the scale introduces new measurements and features that have never been seen before in a home device. These features include hypertension, heart age, and blood oxygen level, with glucose resilience tracking coming soon.
First up, hypertension notifications. By analyzing patterns in the data collected by the BodyScan 2, Withings is able to detect signs associated with hypertension. The presence of these patterns is not a medical assessment that hypertension is present but rather the reporting of it as a heightened possibility, just like the best Apple Watches. If it detects a pattern, you’ll receive a notification through the Withings app.
Then there’s the heart and vascular age predictors, which are unlocked with a Withings+ membership. According to Withings, this is an indicator of the “heart's mechanical efficiency, based on how quickly your heart reacts to each beat and how effectively it pumps blood.”
The final new feature to mention is blood oxygen tracking, which is achieved through a multi-wave PPG sensor built into the handle. Through this infrared technology, the smart scale measures SpO2 in the same way as the best smartwatches. These three features provide a complete cardiometabolic assessment, which sets the BodyScan 2 apart from the competition.
- Features Score: 5/5
- Solid accuracy for basic metrics
- Variable vascular age results
- Cluttered Withings app experience
To provide a comparison set of measurements, I compared the BodyScan 2 with the RunStar 8E Pro. Both brands claim over 98.5% DEXA validation and deliver a similar set of metrics, although the BodyScan 2 offers the most.
Let’s start with the basics. The BodyScan 2 recorded my weight at 61.23kg and BMI at 18.2 compared to 61.4 and 19 on the RunStar. Comparative measurements continued across muscle rate, subcutaneous fat, visceral fat, base metabolism, and a number of other fat and mass metrics.
All readings are quickly available on the Withings app, which allows for deeper interrogation and tracking over time. Body composition data is displayed on a 3D graphic, which is engaging. I did, however, find it difficult to navigate around the Withings app with the sheer amount of data and features causing the interface to feel cluttered.
(Image credit: Future / Paul Hatton)As accurate as the BodyScan 2 is for basic measurements, it is not these metrics that would cause someone to purchase a BodyScan 2. I was much more interested in the new features, including blood oxygen level measurements and heart age predictions. To test SpO2 readings, I compared it to my Garmin Tactix 8 and found that its readings were similar and consistent.
(Image credit: Future / Paul Hatton)Vascular age reporting was less reliable. The first time I measured it, the app told me that my vascular age was four years older than my actual age. As you can imagine, that was a little bit of a shock. I measured it a week later, at a similar time of the day, and Withings reported only a one-year difference from my actual age. That’s a significant difference in a short space of time, which makes it difficult to entirely rely upon the findings and decide whether health changes are required.
Offering cardiometabolic measurements and estimations via a smart scale puts the BodyScan 2 at the forefront of the industry. They have introduced tech that has never before been seen in a smart scale, and the level of innovation is truly impressive. That said, I think we’re a few iterations off, seeing a smart scale delivering the necessary accuracy to make their estimations accurate enough to be relied upon to be highly accurate within some newer metrics, only a general trend indication.
- Performance score: 4.5/5
Category
Comment
Score
Value
The BodyScan 2 is extremely expensive, but for the money you get excellent build quality and a wide range of advanced features.
4.5/5
Design
A professional, modern-looking smart scale with a built-in LCD display. The retractable handle is well engineered and designed to endure years of use.
5/5
Features
This smart scale offers an array of advanced features, designed to provide a full cardiometabolic report.
5/5
Performance
Solid accuracy across standard metrics, although vascular age reporting was variable. The app is also a little cluttered.
4.5/5
RunStar 4E Body Scale: Should I buy?Buy it if...You want full cardiometabolic tracking from the comfort of your own home
The BodyScan 2 offers some of the most extensive body and heart tracking seen in any home device.
You’re taking GLP-1s and want to maintain body mass
The BodyScan 2 tracks lean mass across the whole body so you can see exactly where you’re losing mass and respond accordingly.
Don't buy it if...You’ll only be casually measuring your weight and a few other metrics
With full-body scanning capabilities and innovative heart tracking, the BodyScan 2 is only for the most serious of users.
You’re looking for a budget-friendly scale
At $599.95 USD / £449.95 GBP / $895 AUS, the BodyScan 2 is extremely expensive. Significantly more affordable alternatives exist.
Also considerRunStar 8E Pro Body Scale
A similarly DEXA-verified smart scale that’s significantly more affordable, although it tracks fewer metrics.View Deal
Vitafit Smart Bathroom Scale
A similarly priced smart scale with a comparable set of features. Boasts a slightly larger display and a more comprehensive app experience.
Vitafit Smart Bathroom ScaleView Deal
How I testedMy family (two adults and children) used the BodyScan 2 scale for several weeks. Having several family members made it possible to try out the multi-profile functionality, but most of the time I spent testing the scale using myself as a subject. I focused in on some of the new features that set the BodyScan 2 apart, such as vascular age and SpO2. Having the scale located in a busy family bathroom enabled me to determine the robustness and durability of the device.
First reviewed: September 2026
Categories: Reviews
Geekom A5 mini PC 2027 Edition review: Good value, well-made, and a decent user experience for those who aren’t excessively ambitious
Geekom A5 2027 Edition: 30-second review
Often, reviewing computer equipment has an odd, unexpected cyclical nature. Because many companies can’t be bothered with new nomenclature and launch new products with old names.
This is at least the third version of the Geekom A5 I’ve seen, and thankfully Geekom have decided to call this the 2027 Edition to segment it slightly from prior options.
Where the original Geekom A5 went after desktop-class performance on a budget, the 2027 Edition changes tack. Geekom has kept the same compact metal chassis, the same generous port selection and the same easy access to internals, but it has fitted a very different processor under the hood.
Out goes the AMD Ryzen 7 5800H, a 45-watt mobile chip that pushed hard for performance. In comes the AMD Ryzen 7 7730U, a 15-watt part that shares the same Cezanne silicon and Zen 3 cores but is tuned for efficiency rather than speed.
The result, on paper at least, is a machine that runs cooler and quieter, backed by a new IceBlast 3.0 cooling system that Geekom claims cuts noise to as low as 28dB at idle. Geekom is now pitching the A5 2027 Edition for 24/7 office and commercial use, rather than as a budget performance desktop.
The available SKUs offer two CPU options: a cheaper AMD Ryzen 5 7430U and a more powerful AMD Ryzen 7 7730U. All machines come with 16GB of DDR4 memory, but storage can be 256GB, 512GB or 1TB.
Memory is expandable to 64GB, and storage has actually grown more flexible, with room for two NVMe SSDs and a 2.5-inch SATA drive, but the second M.2 slot is the smaller 2242 variety.
What the A5 2027 Edition offers is a relatively affordable platform for general office use, but it lacks the expansion possibilities that the best mini PCs provide with technology like OCuLink, USB4 and Thunderbolt.
(Image credit: Mark Pickavance)Geekom A5 2027 Edition: Price and availability- How much does it cost? From $465/£446/€479
- When is it out? Available now
- Where can you get it? Currently, this machine can be obtained directly from Geekom or via online retailers
The A5 2027 Edition is sold in several bundles, and the number of SKUs varies by region. Most come with 16GB of RAM, but with different processors and storage.
The variations are complicated, so I’ve created a small table showing the options and prices for the US, UK and EU. Each region also has a discount code that improves prices by 10% in the US, 5% in the UK, and €50 off in the EU.
Global pricing for Geekom A5 2027 EditionCPU
RAM/SSD
USA price
UK price
EU price
Ryzen 5 7430U
16GB+1TB
$465
£449
€479
Ryzen 7 5825U
16GB+512GB
$499
N/A
N/A
Ryzen 7 7730U
16GB+256
$499
£399
€479
Ryzen 7 7730U
16GB+512GB
$549
£469
€549
Ryzen 7 5800H
32GB+512GB
N/A
N/A
€549
As you can see in the table, only three SKUs are available in all locations, and some 5800 series options are unique to the US and parts of the EU.
What needs to be acknowledged is that the prices of RAM and storage have skyrocketed in the past year, and given those increases, the price of this A5 doesn’t seem excessive. Though, considering that the memory and storage on these machines are replaceable, it seems odd that Geekom didn’t offer a barebones SKU.
It should be noted that the AMD Ryzen 7 5800H model was on the German and Spanish Geekom sites, but not on their French or Italian. Canada has the same SKUs as the USA, and Japan has the same, but with the Ryzen 5 7430U model removed. The older A5 had the 5800H, so these machines may not be the 2027 Edition, but older stock.
Curiously, via Amazon you can buy the AMD Ryzen 7 7730U 16GB+512GB for the same price as Geekom offers it (before the discount code), $549 or £469, but it comes in Rose Gold, not silver.
The two obvious competitor machines that use the same platform are the GMKtec NucBox M5 Ultra and BOSGAME P4 Ultra.
The GMKtec NucBox M5 Ultra can be found on Amazon for $599.99 or £609.96, but it comes with 32GB+1TB and the 7730U processor. A better value option is the BOSGAME P4 Ultra, which you can get on Amazon.co.uk with a voucher for £385, and it comes with 16GB+1TB and a Ryzen 7 CPU. The same machine is $519 on Amazon.com.
Therefore, if you want this platform cheaper, then BOSGAME is probably the right choice, but the GMKtec machines look better made, and the P4 Ultra can come with a single memory module, undermining its performance significantly.
- Value: 4 / 5
CPU:
AMD Ryzen 7 7730U (8 cores, 16 threads, 16MB cache, 2.0GHz to 4.5GHz)
GPU:
AMD Radeon Vega 8 Graphics (integrated)
RAM:
16GB DDR4 SODIMM (dual-channel 2x8GB, expandable to 64GB)
Storage:
512GB M.2 2280 PCIe 3.0 x4 NVMe SSD, plus free 2.5" SATA bay and M.2 2242 SATA slot
Ports:
3x USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A, 2x USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-C, 1x USB 2.0 Type-A, 2x HDMI 2.0, 1x 3.5mm audio jack, SD card reader
Networking:
2.5GbE LAN, Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth 5.2
OS:
Windows 11 Pro (pre-installed)
Base Power:
15W (TDP)
PSU:
19V 3.42A, 65W
Weight:
652g
Dimensions:
117mm x 112mm x 49.2mm
Geekom A5 2027 Edition: Design- Same enclosure again
- Easy access retained
- No USB4
Visually, the A5 2027 Edition is business as usual for Geekom. It reuses the same silver metal-and-plastic chassis as the original A5 and the Mini IT13 before it, with two USB ports and the audio jack on the front, the SD card reader on the left, and the rest of the I/O around the back.
One aspect of this design I especially liked is that all the ports are labelled correctly, revealing the USB specification and whether the port is designed for charging. Some makers just completely ignore these details, leaving ports alongside others with a completely different specification looking identical.
Internal access follows the same familiar pattern too. Four retained screws release the base, which stays tethered by a ribbon cable feeding the free 2.5-inch SATA bay underneath. The DDR4 SODIMM slots and the primary M.2 2280 NVMe slot sit inside, alongside a second, smaller M.2 2242 slot for a SATA SSD.
I wish the second slot was 2280-sized, but evidently there was insufficient space for it.
That gives the A5 2027 Edition a genuinely unusual triple-storage layout for a machine this size, and Geekom quotes a combined ceiling of around 7TB across all three. Not sure how that works, because the 2280 slot could take 4TB, I’ve seen 2TB on 2246, but SATA HDDs can be at least 5TB and SSDs to at least 4TB. Therefore, you could put more than 7TB in one of these machines.
What’s good about this system is that the internal access doesn’t require removing adhesive-attached feet, and the memory is socketed, allowing for easy upgrades.
(Image credit: Mark Pickavance)The only caveat with the memory, other than the lower bandwidth of DDR4 compared to DDR5, is that to get the best performance, the memory upgrades need to be in pairs.
So if you want more memory, sticking one 16GB stick alongside an existing 8GB module isn’t ideal. It might work, but it will reduce the memory mode to single-channel. Therefore, if you want more RAM, two 16GB or 32GB SODIMMs are the path to follow, leaving you two 8GB modules to re-home.
There are 48GB DDR4 modules available, but the maximum RAM on this platform is 64GB. At the time of writing, a 32GB DDR4 SODIMM is typically around $250, making that upgrade about the same cost as the system. But should the AI bubble burst (or rather, when), then that might be a more realistic proposition.
My disappointment is that there is no USB faster than USB 3.2 Gen 2, even though the platform has plenty of unused PCIe lanes. There are at least five USB ports with this specification plus a single USB 2.0, but not a single USB4 or USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 port. I understand the resistance to putting USB4 controllers on older platform technology, but the market has outgrown USB 3.2 already.
Overall, as I’ve come to expect from Geekom, this is a well-made mini-PC which delivers a decent user experience for those who aren’t excessively ambitious from a performance perspective. It isn’t a massive evolution from earlier, but it seems decent value for money in these difficult times.
- Design: 4 / 5
- AMD Ryzen 7 7730U
- New Barcelo-R silicon with a lower power ceiling
- IceBlast 3.0 cooling
The headline change in the A5 2027 Edition is its processor. The AMD Ryzen 7 7730U carries a similar die and Zen 3 cores as the 5800H in the original A5, with the same 8 cores, 16 threads and 16MB of L3 cache. Where the 5800H was a Cezanne design, the 7730U is one of four Barcelo-R chips that AMD made before moving on to the Rembrandt-R architecture.
The biggest change between these chips is the power envelope, cut from 45 watts to 15 watts.
That is a significant reduction, and it shows up directly in sustained clock speed. Our CPU-Z capture shows the new chip running at 3470.7MHz under its default profile, down from the 4364.5MHz we saw on the outgoing 5800H with the same tool.
The smaller 65W power brick that ships with the 2027 Edition, down from the original's 120W unit, reflects how much less power headroom this design now needs. Geekom backs the lower TDP with its IceBlast 3.0 cooling system, said to improve cooling efficiency by around 42 per cent over the previous generation and to keep core temperatures under 72 degrees Celsius after an hour of sustained heavy load in a 30-degree room.
Geekom quotes noise levels as low as 28dB at idle and around 32dB under heavy load, figures that make the A5 2027 Edition a genuinely quiet machine for a desk or reception area.
The trade made here is performance for silence, which, depending on the working environment, could be the right or wrong choice.
Storage and memory remain DDR4 rather than the faster DDR5 found in newer Ryzen designs, and the M.2 slot is still limited to PCIe 3.0, so NVMe throughput is capped in the same way it was on the original A5. Port-wise, the story is also unchanged: still no USB4 or Thunderbolt, with USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A and Type-C as the fastest connections on offer.
That this system comes with dual HDMI 2.0 outputs and an easily accessible SD card slot on the side offers genuine potential for marketing displays, especially considering how cool it all runs.
(Image credit: Mark Pickavance)What needs to be said is that this isn’t especially new technology. The processor was first launched in Q1 of 2023, which will shortly make it four years old. Fabricated on the older TSMC 7nm FinFET technology, it can’t hope to offer the same levels of efficiency as the latest Ryzen parts, which use TSMC N4P FinFET.
To be clear, there is little wrong with the older chips, and AMD evidently still holds a significant stock of them, but better, more efficient technology is available for those willing to invest in it.
These devices offer significant performance increases in CPU-, GPU-, and NPU-related tasks, have better technologies (USB4, etc.) and larger caches.
But they don’t have upgradable memory, as they use LPDDR5X-8533 surface-mounted memory, or similar, and their default power consumption is greater, leading to fan noise.
The computing platform in the A5 2027 Edition might not be full of youthful enthusiasm, but it's more than adequate for many office tasks.
- Features: 3.5 / 5
Mini PC
Geekom A5 2027 Edition
Geekom A5
CPU
AMD Ryzen 7 7730U
AMD Ryzen 5 7430U
Cores/Threads
8C 16T
6C 12T
RAM
16GB DDR4 (2x8GB)
16GB DDR4 (2x8GB)
SSD
512GB SSD
512GB SSD
Graphics
Radeon Vega 8
Radeon Vega 7
3DMark
WildLife
7346
6796
FireStrike
3504
3259
TimeSpy
1390
1288
S.Nomad
1111
1086
Cine24
Single
86
71
Multi
479
421
Ratio
5.58
5.96
GeekBench 6
Single
1993
1910
Multi
7712
6503
OpenCL
16050
14325
Vulkan
14539
13895
CrystalDisk
Read MB/s
3736
3208
Write MB/s
3186
2290
PCMark 10
Office
6709
5296
WEI
Score
8.1
8.1
It was originally my intention to compare this A5 with the 5800U-powered one, but when I looked at the data, that prior model came during a transition where I was switching from Cinebench 23 to GeekBench 5. And I no longer have that hardware to retest.
What I can say is that in the data I do have that maps between the two, the 5800U was more powerful, but it used more power and fan noise was audible.
What I did find in my data pile was an older A5 that used the AMD Ryzen 5 7430U CPU, and those benchmarks mapped to what I used on the A5 2027 Edition and provided some interesting context between the two.
It’s not exactly a revelation that a CPU with more cores and a better GPU is going to run faster, but that’s the narrative running through these results. But it also hints in the Windows Experience Index that for a person running Office applications on these systems, the difference might not be significant, or even noticeable.
In this respect, the A5 2027 Edition is a punchier option, but it's hardly leaving the older A5 with the Ryzen 5 platform in the dust. For those wanting to minimise the cost of these systems, there might be something useful to take from these results for them.
As an aside, I recently reviewed the BOSGAME P4 Ultra, which uses the same CPU as the A5 2027 Edition but performs worse than the old A5 with the Ryzen 5 CPU. How is that possible? It is when you deliver the 16GB of RAM in a single module, reducing the bandwidth of the system by 50%. As an example of the impact of doing this, the WildLife score on the P4 Ultra is only 4961.
The lesson from these scores is never run one of these systems in single-channel mode, unless you like your computers to run slowly for no good reason.
- Performance: 3.5 / 5
I would consider the Geekom A5 2027 Edition as a refresh rather than a generational leap. Geekom has kept everything that made the original A5 easy to recommend: the compact metal chassis, the simple internal access and the strong port selection, and layered on a genuinely useful third SATA storage option.
What it has not done is make the machine dramatically faster. The move from a 45-watt to a 15-watt processor trades outright performance for lower noise, lower heat and, Geekom claims, lower running costs over years of continuous use.
For buyers who want a quiet, always-on machine for general office work, that trade could be exactly right. For anyone chasing the best possible performance per pound, the original A5, while now harder to find new, made a stronger case.
Should you buy a Geekom A5 2027 Edition?Value
Pricier than the original A5 at launch, but that's to be expected.
4 / 5
Design
An effective design that doesn't need to change
4 / 5
Features
Four-year old tech, but still useful
3.5 / 5
Performance
Slower than the 5800U A5s, but not terrible
3.5 / 5
Overall
A quieter, cooler machine aimed at 24/7 office duty rather than raw speed.
4 / 5
Buy it if...You want a quiet, always-on office machine
With its 15-watt chip and IceBlast 3.0 cooling, the A5 2027 Edition is aimed squarely at desks, reception areas and back offices where a quiet machine matters more than outright speed.
You need some local storage flexibility
With three storage slots that include an NVMe drive, a 2.5-inch SATA bay and a second M.2 SATA slot, this machine gives you more expansion room than most mini PCs at this price.
You want the fastest machine for the money
The lower 15-watt power limit means the 2027 Edition is likely to trail the outgoing A5 and rival machines that still use 45-watt silicon, once benchmark figures are confirmed.
You need Thunderbolt or USB4
As with the original A5, the fastest connection on offer is USB 3.2 Gen 2. Anyone relying on Thunderbolt peripherals or displays will need to look elsewhere.
GMKtec NucBox K16
Another AMD NUC built around the Zen 3+ Ryzen 7 7735HS, offering a genuine generational step up in performance over either A5 model, in a similarly compact and upgrade-friendly case. It costs more, but comes with 32GB of RAM and 512GB or 1TB of storage.
Check out our GMKtec NucBox K16 review
Geekom A5 2025 Edition
Geekom's prior model uses the AMD Ryzen 5 7430U and is cheaper than the newest model, while being a similar low-power and low-noise offering. Power consumption is even lower due to the lower clock speeds, but it uses the same chassis and has the same storage options.
Check out my Geekom A5 2025 Edition review
For more professional hardware, we've reviewed the best business computers.
Categories: Reviews
Control Resonant shows that sometimes bigger really is better
How do you approach a sequel? Do you refine the predecessor’s mechanics and stick with the main character? Well, Control Resonant chucks those out the window.
Review infoPlatform reviewed: Xbox Series X
Available on: PS5, Xbox Series X|S, PC
Release date: September 24, 2026
Instead of an open-zone map like the first game, Resonant goes full open-world. You play as Dylan Faden, old protagonist Jesse’s brother, who was (mostly) freed from the Hiss’s evil influence towards the end of the last adventure.
Now, Jesse has disappeared somewhere in an otherworldly Manhattan, and it’s his job to find her.
Like brother, like sister(Image credit: Remedy)Control Resonant’s story is markedly improved over its predecessor. The sibling bond between Dylan and Jesse provides an emotional anchor to latch onto. Learning about their childhoods through the main missions was engaging enough and made it much easier to follow this time around. It kept my attention in ways that Control didn’t.
The small cast of support characters also smartly keeps the character development focused mainly on Dylan. Zoe De Vera is assigned as Dylan’s handler, and I like how their relationship starts off rocky with her viewing him as just a tool to fight the Hiss. But as the story progresses, Zoe starts considering Dylan as more than that, asking him personal questions about his favorite music.
Emily Pope returns from the first game and acts as an important linchpin for Dylan to discuss Jesse. As Emily helped Jesse throughout the entirety of Control, Dylan can confide in Emily, giving him hope he’ll eventually find his sister. These powerful relationships make Resonant a less lonely trip.
As someone who’s fascinated with sci-fi and the occult, Resonant plays around with common tropes to great effect. In one particularly memorable main quest, Dylan is tasked with figuring out what happened to a missing crew, and its implementation of time dilation and alternate timelines really had a grip on my attention. It’s moments like these that make Resonant’s story emotionally satisfying, but narratively absorbing too.
Go big or go home(Image credit: Remedy)Going from Control to Control Resonant feels similar to how Final Fantasy 7 Remake transitioned to Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth. It’s a high-risk endeavor, as creating an open world can add a lot of unnecessary bloat compared to a more streamlined experience.
Thankfully, Resonant’s exemplary art direction and traversal mechanics make its distorted version of Manhattan a treat to run around in. Rather than the brutalist architecture of the first game that took place entirely indoors within the Oldest House, Resonant doubles down on the more kaleidoscopic and parallactic aspects in the open world.
As part of the main quests, you’ll also be given objectives to find “Faults,” which are areas where remnants of Jesse could be residing. While they’re not very combat-heavy, they offer a lot of story exposition exploring Dylan and Jesse’s background. At the very end, you’ll be awarded a new way for Dylan to move around.
These include being able to shift his gravitational orientation around so the wall next to him becomes the floor, or the intriguing take on the traditional grappling hook, which looks more like an invisible magnet pulling Dylan by the waist.
Best bit(Image credit: Remedy)Like the first game's massive brutalist skyscraper, the weird, twisted version of Manhattan in Control Resonant is an absolute joy to explore full of striking views.
Control Resonant is also reminiscent of Elden Ring, in that you’re able to tackle tough side bosses called Resonants all across the Big Apple. By defeating them, Dylan is able to unlock more of his offensive move kit. You’re incentivized to go for it, as it’ll give you more options to fight against the Hiss and other enemies.
You only need to take out a few to advance the story, but afterwards you can actually complete it without taking the rest of them on if you want. This open-endedness comes in handy if you get stuck on a certain story boss. You can explore more, get stronger, and return later.
There are also plenty of other interesting activities to tackle, and these often bring a more down-to-earth tone to Resonant’s paranormal twists. In a multi-part side quest, Dylan is trying to help a girl find her way home from an alternate dimension. And he has to play “spot the difference” with different taxi cabs to take the right one back. There’s another side quest where Dylan helps a colleague find their invisible cat, which ends up in the cat actually helping out against a mini-boss fight in a humorous conclusion.
These side quests reflect Dylan’s altruism and the guilt he harbors for his actions from the first game, allowing him to redeem himself in small, yet meaningful ways. They also reward massive amounts of EXP and useful ingredients to unlock new skills and abilities.
Close quarters combat(Image credit: Remedy)As opposed to the first game’s third-person shooter gameplay, Control Resonant is a melee-focused action game. It’s an interesting switch-up that certainly helps this sequel differentiate itself.
The basic gameplay loop you’re going for is to stagger enemies and then perform an execution. Doing that causes Dylan to temporarily enter Dominance, which astronomically ups his attack power and allows him to kill enemies quicker. It’s a gratifying process that’s just as exciting as it looks cool.
The big issue here is that it’s incredibly difficult to falter enemies when you first start out. Dylan’s weapon, the Aberrant, can morph into different forms for both his light and heavy attacks. At the beginning, you can pick one form, and the rest you can create later on with the proper drops and materials.
(Image credit: Remedy)If you’re like me and picked a heavy weapon choice that didn’t fit your particular playstyle, then you’re going to have a tough time. You can use limited reset points to rechoose your points and abilities, but the fact that it’s not free feels like it’s discouraging experimentation, especially at the start before eventually unlocking everything.
After initially selecting the spear as my heavy weapon and being disappointed, I reset my build and opted for the slow but powerful hammer instead. I found that it fit my approach much better, and suddenly I was enjoying it more. Beforehand, combat felt like a slog as enemies seemed to just be damage sponges, as it took forever to falter them.
A little later on, after defeating the giant fire Resonant, I unlocked the ability to cloak my weapons in flame, increasing both the damage and falter output. Now even my light weapon attacks with the multi-target scythe-like glaive inflicted a decent amount of stagger. I was able to enter Dominance faster, and the combat became more frenetic, explosive, and most importantly, fun.
It just takes a while to get to.
Should I play Control Resonant?Play it if...You like action-adventure games
If you’re a fan of games like Devil May Cry, this might be up your alley. Just don’t expect to be graded on your work, though.
You enjoyed the first Control
Control Resonant is a direct sequel, so if you enjoyed the first game, then you should play this one too. It’s surprisingly loose with the events of the predecessor, so you don’t actually need to play it before jumping in here, but it helps.
You like open-world games
Control Resonant has one of the more interesting open-world games in recent memory, and the traversal mechanics are a joy to toy around with.
You like shooters
While the first Control was a third-person shooter, Control Resonant is not. This could be a sticking point for those coming from the first game.
You want a more streamlined experience
The first Control was much more confined, with open-zone environments rather than the open world that Control Resonant has.
Control Resonant has an impressive suite of accessibility features. These options include text, subtitles, colorblindness adjustments, and toggles.
It also has an Assist mode, which lets you change gameplay parameters to your liking. For example, you can change how fast Dylan’s Power meter replenishes, which lets him fire off special abilities. You can also make him invincible.
There’s even an option to OHKO enemies with just one attack, and it works on bosses too. None of the options disable Achievements either.
How I reviewed Control ResonantI played 25 hours of Control Resonant on Xbox Series X with the standard Xbox Wireless Controller on my 1080p LG Sharp TV, finishing up the main campaign while completing some side quests.
After witnessing the ending, you can go back into the open world once again to mop up any remaining collectibles and quests.
First reviewed September 2026
Categories: Reviews
200 hours in, Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave is my favorite Nintendo Switch 2 game ever — here’s why
Every now and then, a game comes along that doesn’t just entertain and engage me — it totally enraptures me. It stands as a pure work of art that reminds me of exactly why I love this medium and captures the essence of a book you just can’t put down. For me, that’s exactly what Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave is — an engrossing experience that I simply can’t get enough of.
Review infoPlatform reviewed: Nintendo Switch 2
Available on: Nintendo Switch 2
Release date: September 17, 2026
This Nintendo Switch 2-exclusive tactical JRPG offers a combination of excellent turn-based combat and rewarding exploration, alongside captivating storytelling and a great cast of characters. And its sheer scale cannot be understated — I’ve spent north of 200 hours in Fortune’s Weave, and there’s still so much more I have to see.
I’ve played through each of the four Flame Lords’ paths and taken the battle to the demonic god Balor, and I’ve got a number of thoughts about gameplay, visuals, and narrative to share. So, without further ado, let’s take a look at why Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave is one of the best Nintendo Switch 2 games you can play right now.
Four paths converge(Image credit: Nintendo)I won’t get into the weeds of the premise in Fortune’s Weave, but to sum up, you’re able to play as four heroes, known as the Flame Lords, as they compete in a grand arena event known as the Heroic Games. The champion of the Games will be granted a wish of their choosing by Divine Sovereign, Solel, who rules over the land of Dagda and its capital, Dagsion.
After completing the brief prologue — which acts as a solid tutorial for newcomers — you can select any of the Flame Lords’ paths and play through them in any order you like from a central hub area. This approach works nicely, as you don’t have to replay the prologue each time you start a new journey, and you’re able to dip in and out of each story as you please.
This makes up Part I of the game, which was probably my favorite overall. Although some cutscenes and quests are the same across the four stories, they still feel distinct and gripping in their own right. Each pathway has a distinct tone and feeling to it, with each Flame Lord having a deeply personal ambition and a unique set of close allies. For instance, the vengeful and skilful Leda is joined by the womanizing bard Sirocco and protective warrior Buccar, whereas Dietrich is partnered with the excitable Esmeralda and bizarre and eccentric missionary, Fabio.
The core cast of characters is truly excellent, but you’ll also be able to recruit more allies as you progress the story, including foes you face in the Heroic Games and parties of interest across Dagsion. Many of these units can be recruited across all four stories, though their recruitment requirements often vary, which encouraged me to experiment with different characters across different stories.
Best bit(Image credit: Nintendo)Anything with Dietrich and Fabio. They're an unlikely yet incredible duo, with Dietrich's bloodlust and Fabio's eccentricity somehow combining to create some of the most hilarious — and sometimes emotive — dialogue in the series.
What makes the multi-path system click is that you’ll uncover revelations in one story that answer questions — or even pose new ones — about events in one of the other paths. There are plenty of twists and turns — some perhaps more obvious than others — which change the way you perceive certain characters and add substantial depth to units that may seem less significant on some paths than others.
This cross-path storytelling is done really well, and the narrative is strong, more generally. I won’t spoil anything, but it’s got its fair share of shock instances, touching moments, and character development that help it to hit — and if not, exceed — the standards that the series has set thus far.
Gameplay-wise, things are kept pretty fresh too. Each Flame Lord has specific abilities that they can make use of on the world map and beyond, with Dietrich able to battle warriors and learn their combat arts, Leda capable of holding performances to unlock unique materials, Theodora able to recruit warriors to assign battalions, and Cai skilled enough to wrangle mounts for himself and his allies.
And luckily, all of this comes together nicely in the latter parts of the game. While Part I is more individually tailored to each Flame Lord and their journey through the Heroic Games, paths begin to converge in Part II, known as the War Arc. Again, I won’t spoil anything here, but Part II offers far less variation across each pathway, but there are still some interesting differences in dialogue, and the way you approach battles will likely change considerably.
I loved how the enormity of Fortune’s Weave came together in Part III, though. Here, you’ll be able to unite all of the Flame Lords beside the game’s true protagonist, you. It’s awesome that you’re able to make use of all of the heroes’ unique abilities and even re-recruit old units for the final battle against the demonic lord, Balor.
Being able to bring all of your units, inventory, and abilities into a singular, epic finale is incredibly rewarding and makes building the ultimate army even more enjoyable.
I see grids in my sleep(Image credit: Nintendo)Let’s delve a bit more deeply into gameplay, which, as you’d expect, is outstanding in Fortune’s Weave.
For the most part, you’ll be battling on classic grid-based battlefields. Honestly, I’ve fought on these so many times I’m starting to see them in my dreams. It's that classic turn-based Fire Emblem that you know and love, with some returning features, like Combat Arts (which provide benefits in exchange for weapon durability) and gambits (in Theodora’s path), for instance.
But there are new mechanics too, like Blaze Arts, which are unique to specific units. By sacrificing HP, Blaze Arts enable you to deal more damage, move further, buff allies, and more. The health trade-off means they don’t feel like a cheat code, and they also fill a blaze gauge, which will burst at a certain point, forcing you to work with reduced HP for the rest of the map.
(Image credit: Nintendo)Standard battles feel brilliantly balanced, and I never felt that difficulty spikes were too severe or that I had to grind much to push past my opponent. When you do want to grind, though, you can enter into a skirmish against foes on the world map, or try your luck in a dungeon.
Dungeons work a bit differently, and you’ll move around a 3D area to face foes in Clash Battles. These are a bit different and combine light action segments with more traditional turn-based JRPG combat rather than tactical grid-based battles. I think that they’re a great option if you want a break from the usual maps and want a faster-paced method for gaining experience or class proficiency for your units.
That’s not to say that the standard maps aren’t engaging though; quite the opposite. There’s some excellent map variety, and some battles will ask more of you than just routing the enemy. In some cases, I had to defeat more giants than my opponents, rescue defenseless citizens from a huge serpent, or even collect missing cargo before thieves made off with it. Battlefields are also delightfully diverse throughout the heroic games, and become even grander as the stakes rise towards the back end of the game.
If at any point you’re struggling, you can make use of Blessings, enabling you to rewind to a previous turn, increase your strength, or reduce the cost of Combat Arts, for example. I kept usage of these to a minimum, as I was playing on the slightly more gracious Normal/Casual difficulty. But there’s also a Hard mode, and you can play Classic (where units are permanently lost when they fall in battle), where Blessings will likely feel a bit more necessary.
All in all, combat is incredibly addictive, varied, and offers impressive depth. Building a squad with the right balance in terms of classes and weapons is massively satisfying, and breaking things up with a bit of dungeon crawling keeps the experience feeling fluid and fun for the game’s full runtime. And given that we’re talking about a title that will take you well over 100, if not 200, hours to finish, that’s an impressive feat in itself.
Beyond the battlefield(Image credit: Nintendo)Before I wrap up, I want to touch on my experience with Fortune’s Weave outside of battle. There’s quite a bit to do, both within the capital, Dagsion, and in the land of Dagda more broadly.
Dagsion has all of the stuff you’d expect. A training ground to boost your aptitude with specific weapons, a shopping district, an inn for viewing support conversations and restoring motivation (which is used for training and increasing your Blessings level), and an area where you can take an exam for whatever class you want to be.
A lot of your time in Fortune’s Weave will be spent using these facilities to increase your weapon levels, boost support with your allies, and acquire better equipment.
If I were to nitpick, I’d argue that the support grind can become a little tiresome for some units. If you want to recruit a new ally who requires a high support level, it can take quite some time to fill the gauge and add them to your team, though some are easier to add to your roster than others.
There are more things to do, though, like going to the Theater, taking a bath at the Thermae spa, and accepting subquests from distressed townsfolk. Perhaps the most unusual option, however, is Bird Time.
Here, you can feed the Pale Raven (the main protagonist in bird form) to increase your support level for later in the game. Is it a bit goofy? Yeah. Does it get a bit repetitive? Sure. But I kinda love the feeling of getting that sweet ‘perfect bird time’ message when you have a successful interaction with your ally.
Outside of Dagsion, you can enter the aforementioned dungeons, search for materials, enter into some smaller hub areas, and speak with wandering merchants. The world map is easy to navigate, but you’ll only have a set amount of time to explore before the day of the Main Quest arrives. This helps the game to maintain good pacing throughout, and while there’s a ton to explore, it’s broken up with main story goodness in healthy intervals, in my view.
(Image credit: Nintendo)On a technical level, Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave is pretty solid too. It keeps a lot of the enticing visual style seen in Fire Emblem: Three Houses, but being a Nintendo Switch 2 exclusive, there’s a clear step-up in terms of resolution, and character models look excellent too. Be it Fortuna, whose vibrant hair pops with eye-catching yellow, or the striking, rich reds of Bertrand, the White-Maned Demon’s clothing, I found myself impressed by the visuals pretty consistently.
Some background textures do look a bit basic, however, and while the game runs smoothly, it’s not targeting a silky 60fps (but this never bothered me, personally).
I also want to shout out the game’s excellent soundtrack, which is more eclectic than you may think. There’s the classic orchestral-style stuff, which creates a real sense of grandeur and high stakes, but there are also spacey, synth-led tunes in the temples, which create ambience and intrigue, as well as electronic music with pumping bass in some mysterious hidden areas.
On the topic of sound, the voice acting is exceptional in Fortune’s Weave. You feel each character’s unmistakable personality through just about every performance, and this only makes you feel more attached to your units. The perfect example is Fabio, whose voice acting is just as outlandish and unusual as you’d hope for the character, though he also has some authentic, impassioned emotional scenes that stole the show. Great stuff all round.
To conclude, then, Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave is a masterful tactical JRPG that has it all. Addictive, depth-filled combat, fresh mechanics, a well-paced, multi-layered story, and a likeable cast of characters. It hypnotized me from minute one, all the way to the end, and its careful balance of tight turn-based gameplay and exploration really worked for me. As things stand, I consider Fortune’s Weave to not only be among the best Fire Emblem games in recent memory, but also the best game on the Nintendo Switch 2 thus far.
Whatever you do, don’t skip this one.
Should you play Fire Emblem Fortune’s Weave?(Image credit: Nintendo)Play it if…You want to sink your teeth into an epic RPG
Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave is a huge game that will easily take you north of 100 hours to finish if you want to complete each Flame Lord’s path and clear every subquest. If you’re looking for a true epic to get your money’s worth out of, this is the game for you.
You’re a fan of character-driven narratives
Yes, Fortune’s Weave features a very high-stakes story, but the narrative is largely centered around the four Flame Lords, and their personal ambitions in the Heroic Games. Watching each story unfurl, and seeing how each hero develops is a joy, so if you’re into more character-driven stories, then you’ll likely enjoy this.
You’re not a big fan of tactical combat
There are some light action segments and swifter turn-based dungeon battles in Fortune’s Weave, but a lot of the time will be spent commanding your units on a grid. If you’re not into the more strategic style of other Fire Emblem games, then you may not have the best time with this one either.
You need top-tier performance from your games
While Fortune’s Weave looks pretty solid, it’s by no means pushing boundaries as far as visuals go. It’s very stable, in terms of performance, but it’s also not going to give you the buttery smoothness of other Switch 2 games, like Metroid Prime 4: Beyond, say, which can even run at 120fps in handheld mode.
There are a handful of ways to customize your experience in Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave. You can make UI adjustments, like altering the size of the battle minimap, toggling the grid display on and off, you can personalize camera controls and sensitivity, and choose from a number of different subtitle languages.
There’s even an Enemy Masking mode that changes the appearances of insectile enemies if you have arachnophobia or entomophobia. There is no colorblind mode, or similar.
(Image credit: Nintendo)How I reviewed Fire Emblem: Fortune's WeaveI spent just over 200 hours with Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave, during which time I played through the main story (including each of the Flame Lords’ individual paths), completed just about every subquest, and recruited countless allies.
For the most part, I played in docked mode, with my Nintendo Switch 2 connected to my Sky Glass Gen 2 TV and Marshall Heston 120 soundbar. However, I did dip into handheld mode now and then, and usually had my Sennheiser CX 80U wired earbuds connected when playing on the go.
More generally, I’ve spent years reviewing gaming software, hardware, and accessories here at TechRadar, where I serve as a Senior Reviews Writer. I’ve covered all sorts of titles, from Switch 2 exclusives like Kirby Air Riders and Yoshi and the Mysterious Book to RPGs such as Dragon Quest I & II HD-2D Remake and Final Fantasy Tactics: The Ivalice Chronicles.
I've also played a number of Fire Emblem titles, including Awakening, The Blazing Blade, and Three Houses.
Categories: Reviews
I spent a week with the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max — and they’re better in all the right places
Apple iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max: Two-Minute Review
If the iPhone 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max were a reinvention of the flagship iPhone, the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max see Apple carrying the flagship-iPhone baton forward with few, if any, missteps.
I’ve spent the last week with a Glacier iPhone 18 Pro Max and a Burgundy iPhone 18 Pro — both colors are striking new additions to Apple’s iPhone color palette — and Apple has mostly stuck to last year's winning formula, while updating key aspects of the experience to push things forward.
While the main camera array still carries the same 48-megapixel count across the telephoto, ultra-wide, and main lenses, the arrival of Pro controls in the Camera app breathes new life into the photo-taking experience, letting you get seriously creative whenever you want to.
You can also take advantage of the new variable aperture on the main 48-megapixel Fusion camera to shoot across ƒ/1.48, ƒ/1.8, ƒ/2.8, or ƒ/4.0, and capture unique visuals, including starburst effects from lights. Of course, you can also choose to let the Camera app take control, and in general it’ll capture a well-balanced shot that you can still edit after the fact.
All in all, after taking hundreds of photos and shooting dozens of videos, I’m impressed with the level of detail the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max can deliver. Some images match what you’ll get from the previous-generation Pros, but these iPhones can also deliver even better-looking images and video, especially when you take control.
Under the hood is Apple’s first 2-nanometer chip in an iPhone, the A20 Pro, and while it doesn’t run laps around the previous A19 Pro, or the chip before that one, its CPU, GPU, and Neural Engine do an excellent job of handling general iOS tasks, as well as more advanced AI features, including keeping Siri AI chugging along where it's available and powering Apple Intelligence features in Photos, such as Clean Up and Reframing. It also ensures that third-party experiences run well, and I’ll be shocked if you encounter noticeable slowdowns anywhere.
The iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max can easily keep pace with any of the other best modern smartphones, and I suspect they’ll keep doing so for years. You can again choose between a punchy, vibrant, and crisp 6.3-inch or 6.9-inch Super Retina XDR display, and that’s the main difference between the two Pro iPhones, as Apple maintains feature parity across the lineup.
Another meaningful improvement is in battery life, with the iPhone 18 Pro lasting longer than the 17 Pro Max according to Apple, while it says the 18 Pro Max establishes a new iPhone battery-life record. Add in the improved thermal management, smaller Dynamic Island, and arrival of Siri AI, and there’s a lot of refinement here beyond the cameras and processor.
And that’s ultimately what the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max feel like to me: a refinement of an already excellent Pro iPhone, rather than a reinvention. If the iPhone 17 Pro generation was about Apple changing the formula, the iPhone 18 Pro is about taking that formula and making it better across the board, without messing with what worked.
It’s not night and day across the board, and if you’re coming from an iPhone 17 Pro or 17 Pro Max, you probably don’t need to upgrade. The A20 Pro feels largely neck and neck with the A19 Pro in daily use, the displays remain familiar, and the overall design is essentially unchanged. But I would bet that some iPhone 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max owners will want to make the jump anyway, particularly for the camera improvements. The combination of the variable aperture and, finally, a genuinely customizable Camera app with Pro controls enables a level of user input that I’ve wanted Apple to bake into the iPhone for years.
If you’re holding onto an iPhone 15 Pro, 15 Pro Max, or anything older, the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max represent a much more substantial generational leap. You’re getting bigger and better displays, way-improved cameras, better battery life, a faster and more future-ready chip, improved thermals, and a modern, durable design that Apple has now had a year to refine.
And that’s the thing about the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max: you don’t need any one of these upgrades to completely reinvent how you use an iPhone. Taken together, though, they make for a seriously capable flagship that feels ready for the next several years.
Apple iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max review: Price and Availability- Starts at $1,199 / £1,199 / AU$2,099 for 256GB
- Both Pro models now offer 512GB, 1TB, and 2TB options
- On sale September 18, with preorders open now
Apple made the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max official at its September 9, 2026, ‘Surprise and Shine’ special event; preorders are open now, with an on-sale date of September 18.
The iPhone 18 Pro starts at $1,199 in the US, £1,199 in the UK, and AU$2,099 in Australia, and the iPhone 18 Pro Max at $1,299 / £1,299 / AU$2,299, respectively. That means they come with a $100 / £100 / AU$100 increase in starting price over the iPhone 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max, while, like last year’s Pros, starting at 256GB of storage. Both can be configured with 512GB, 1TB, and 2TB of storage, with the latter now an option on both Pro models. You can choose from Burgundy, Glacier, Silver, and Black.
Both phones officially go on sale on September 18, 2026.
- Value score: 4 / 5
- The 18 Pro keeps the 17 Pro’s aluminum body and camera plateau
- Burgundy and Glacier colors bring some welcome personality to the Pro lineup
- A new vapor chamber and Nanotwin copper help keep things cooler under load
With the iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max, Apple chose to dramatically reinvent the Pro-series iPhone's design. It swapped the left-side bump that housed the main camera system for a plateau that stretches across the back, went back to aluminum, and focused heavily on durability.
Given that, the odds of a major redesign for the next-gen Pro phones were slim, and the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max stick with a design that not only scored well in our reviews, but also won over a wider audience. I've been switching between the iPhone 17 Pro Max in Cosmic Orange and the iPhone Air for the last year.
The iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max stick with the aluminum body and camera plateau from last year's models. That might seem like a safe choice, considering that the iPhone Duo is launching alongside these candy-bar-style phones in October, but it also shows Apple pushing forward with a working design — essentially the same trajectory it took from the iPhone 16 to the iPhone 17.
Still, to help the 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max stand out from the crowd — and just to let people know you’re rocking one of Apple’s new phones, rather than a 17 Pro or 17 Pro Max — there are two entirely new colors, and I can't decide which is my favorite, and luckily I've been testing both. Burgundy is sort of a dark-red wine color that evokes a sense of high-class sleekness, while Glacier, which the event invite teased, is a mix of blue and silver that looks decidedly fresh. These are the two colors that pop, both much more muted than Cosmic Orange, but also a bit more vibrant than the Dark Navy from 2025. Those two join silver and the first ‘true’ black Pro model. It shows that Apple is listening, and I'm all for more Pro colors.
(Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)The dimensions are the same year over year. The iPhone 18 Pro measures 150 x 71.9 x 8.75mm, while the iPhone 18 Pro Max comes in at 163.4 x 78 x 8.75mm — exactly the same footprint as their predecessors. The button placement is also identical, so if you've spent the last year with an iPhone 17 Pro or 17 Pro Max, there's nothing new to learn here: power and Camera Control are on the right, with the Action Button, and volume up and volume down on the left. Both phones are a little heavier than last year’s: the 18 Pro weighs 211 grams, up from 206 grams, while the 18 Pro Max jumps to 249 grams from 233 grams.
Even with the slight weight increase, both the 6.3-inch Pro and 6.9-inch Pro Max feel comfortable in the hand and are pretty well balanced. The Pro Max is still very much a two-handed phone for me, especially for texting, while the Pro is still the smaller, more portable option.
Then there's Ceramic Shield 2, which is sticking around. Judging by the coatings on my iPhone Air and 17 Pro Max, it's done wonders at preventing micro-abrasions and front-screen scratches, and even means that drops don’t elicit a gasp, since after a year my screens are still unblemished. In my few days testing the 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max, I haven't seen a scratch on the front or abrasions on the back, which is both aluminum and glass.
(Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)The iPhone 17 Pro Max was known for getting warm, or at least warmer to the touch, during more intense activities such as gaming or long content shoots, and Apple has looked to address that issue with some new cooling tech under the hood. There's a new thermal architecture inside, which consists of a vapor chamber, the positioning of which has been tweaked, and which offers three times the surface area to better dissipate heat. Apple has paired this with an industry-first Nanotwin copper material, which is baked into the display plate to help keep that surface cool.
For the most part, this has kept the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max cool during my testing. They can still get warm, but nowhere near as warm as the 17 Pro or 17 Pro Max, and the heat is more spread out when it does become noticeable. I noticed it mostly heating up during longer capture sessions, especially when swapping between photo and video, but even then the heat felt more spread out and better regulated, and dissipated more quickly.
It's a subtle change, but one that matters when you're using the phone heavily. And that's really the story of the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max design: Apple hasn't reinvented the wheel this year. Instead, it's taken the design it introduced with the iPhone 17 Pro and refined the parts that matter — durability, thermals, finishes, and how the phone feels during sustained use.
- Design score: 5 / 5
- Two sizes, same experience across both
- A new anti-reflective coating joins 3,000 nits peak brightness and120Hz ProMotion
- Smaller Dynamic Island with room for three Live Activities
Your main decision when choosing between the 18 Pro and the 18 Pro Max comes down to size, as there’s feature parity between the two, and that’s a good thing. The iPhone 18 Pro features a 6.3-inch display, while the iPhone 18 Pro Max has a 6.9-inch display. Both are punchy, vibrant, and a joy to look at and use for any task, be it FaceTiming with friends or loved ones, typing out comms, reading an email, browsing the web, scrolling your photos, watching video, or just navigating iOS elements.
Much of that comes from the fact that these are Super Retina XDR displays, which are OLED and always-on, meaning that even when the phone is locked, the screen dims down to still show you the time, widgets, and even notifications. Like the iPhone 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max before them, the 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max have a buttery-smooth 120Hz ProMotion refresh rate and top out at a maximum brightness of 3,000 nits. It’s unlikely the phone will always run at that brightness, but suffice to say that even on a bright, humid, sunny day — and I mean it was really beating down — in Orlando, Florida, enjoying the sights, sounds, and rides of Disney World, I had no issues viewing content on the screen.
There’s also a new anti-reflective coating on the display, and while this isn’t a full Nano-texture coating like you’ll find on some of Apple’s other displays and the folding iPhone Duo, it’s a noticeable step up when it comes to reducing reflections and smudges. It’s particularly useful outdoors, where fewer reflections mean less fighting with the screen to see what’s actually on it. Compared to older iPhones, like the iPhone 16 and earlier models, this feels like a much bigger display upgrade.
(Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)There is one thing that really did catch my eye, though, and it’s the key change with the display: Apple has shrunk the Dynamic Island down on the 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max. It’s about the size of an extra-strength Tylenol liquid gel, and much less of a distraction at the top, if you could even call it that. In addition to the reduced size, the other big change is to Live Activities — the Dynamic Island can now support three, rather than two. So maybe it’s directions, music playback, and a timer, or if you’re on a flight, maybe it’s United Airlines showing the seat number, Flighty counting down your arrival time, and music playing in Music or Spotify.
I’m not saying you need to rush out to upgrade just for this if you have a 17 Pro or 17 Pro Max — although that might be the case for the cameras or battery life — but if you’re a fan of using this space, it’s definitely a super-functional quality-of-life upgrade.
- Display score: 5 / 5
- Pro controls finally arrive to let you adjust aperture, shutter speed, white balance, and more.
- The 48MP Fusion main camera aperture is adjustable from ƒ/1.48 to ƒ/4.0
- Better detail, strong low-light performance, and excellent 4x and 8x zoom
Alright, buckle in, because while the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max still boasts 48-megapixel main, 48-megapixel ultra-wide, and a 48-megapixel telephoto camera — similar to the iPhone 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max setup — things are a bit different across the board, and especially in one specific area.
For starters, if you’ve been wanting Apple to bake more controls into the Camera app, your wish has been granted. There are now Pro controls that let you adjust the aperture, shutter speed, and white balance for the main camera, alongside a host of other tools, including improved Photographic Styles, with more granular controls, and the ability to bring up a histogram.
You can also customize which of these controls live at the top of your screen, in a similar fashion to designing your perfect home screen or Control Center. Changes to shutter speed and aperture are persistent if you have that enabled in Settings for preserving camera settings, but you can’t design exact presets with a specific aperture or shutter speed, although — hint, Apple — that would be a nice upgrade.
(Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)Photographic Styles are also getting more flexible. You can still pick from the expected presets, but Apple now gives you more granular control over things like texture, including adjustments specifically aimed at skin. Push it in the right direction, and you can get smoother, more glowy-looking portraits, though there are times when that comes at the expense of some detail, particularly in lower-light areas of the frame.
That’s where I think Apple’s approach makes sense: the default Auto processing generally aims to strike a balance between detail, exposure, color, and skin tones, so you don’t have to think about any of this. But if you want to get more creative, the tools are there — and you can still make adjustments after the fact, rather than having to nail everything before you hit the shutter button.
(Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)Here’s a look at the camera specs, right before the big change that has to do with the main lens:
- 48MP Fusion main with variable aperture of ƒ/1.48, ƒ/1.8, ƒ/2.8, or ƒ/4.0
- 48MP Fusion ultra-wide at ƒ/2.2
- 48MP Fusion telephoto at ƒ/2.8
With these, you can still shoot at 0.5x, 1x at 24mm, 28mm, or 35mm, 2x for a digital crop with optical-quality results, 4x (as a digital sensor crop), or an optical 8x, and stretch all the way up to 40x digital zoom.
The big change, though, is that the main lens — the one your iPhone is set to by default — has a variable aperture for the first time ever on an iPhone. With a fine eye, or another camera pointed at it, you can actually see the lens aperture adjusting, getting wider or narrower to let more or less light in. It also swaps the previous main aperture of ƒ/1.78 on 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max, as the 18 Pro’ now offering ƒ/1.48, ƒ/1.8, ƒ/2.8, and ƒ/4.0.
(Image credit: Jacob Krol/Future)You can choose to ignore this new control, as well as the ability to adjust white balance or shutter speed, and let the iPhone and its image-processing pipeline automatically engage what it believes are the optimum settings to capture a great shot. And in my testing so far, it succeeds here, offering on-par quality with the iPhone 17 Pro or 17 Pro Max, but mostly punching above those phones with better details, more natural blurring and focus points, and excellent highlights.
The image-processing pipeline has also been updated. Performance still feels very much in line with what I’ve come to expect from an iPhone, but images are more detailed and sharper throughout, though at times they can pack a little more punch with colors thanks to some update on the image pipeline. Especially for 4x and 8x shots, I’ve found that these preserve more details generation over generation. It’s not a dramatic departure from the iPhone look, but there’s a clear refinement here in how the phone handles detail and brings a scene to life.
The 4x and 8x zoom continued to surprise me with how much detail they can deliver, namely with the former being a sensor crop and the latter being optical. Whether I’m picking out details around Disney World’s parks or zooming in on something far away, the results stay impressively detailed without looking like a processed digital crop.
The variable aperture gives the main camera more flexibility, especially when you want to control how much light comes in, or how much of a subject is separated from the background. The wider maximum aperture also helps make this excellent main camera even more versatile in lower-light scenarios, and because it’s the camera your iPhone defaults to, it’s likely the one you’ll navigate to first.
The Most Magical Place on Earth deserves the best camera on a phone on Earth, right? So I’ve done the bulk of my iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max camera testing around the Disney World parks in Orlando, and taken plenty of additional shots in New Jersey, California, and even up in the sky from the windows of planes. That means I’ve tested the cameras in just about every condition I could throw at them, from the beating Florida sun to nighttime attractions, indoor spaces, moving subjects, and everything in between.
Jacob Krol/FutureJacob Krol/FutureJacob Krol/FutureJacob Krol/FutureJacob Krol/FutureJacob Krol/FutureI’ve been putting the low-light performance to the test around Disney World, too, including taking plenty of shots after the sun went down. Even in Auto mode, I found the iPhone 18 Pro could deliver detail-packed, appropriately lit shots in less time, with Night mode often requiring less time to capture a shot than on previous generations. This comes down to about one to three seconds, versus five to eight seconds for processing. And that means less waiting around for the camera to finish its exposure and, more importantly, less chance of a moving subject turning into a blurry mess. You can accomplish longer exposures if the iPhone detects it’s in a tripod as well.
When I wanted more control, though, I could jump in and adjust the shutter speed and aperture when shooting at 1x or 2x zoom, letting me decide how I wanted to capture the scene, rather than leaving it entirely up to the iPhone. If you’re willing to take the time to dive into the controls, you can really customize how the iPhone captures a scene, and get much more creative with your shots.
Jacob Krol/FutureJacob Krol/FutureJacob Krol/FutureFor instance, I shot the Magic of Disney Animation building at night at ƒ/1.48 and 1/30s, deliberately opening up the aperture and slowing the shutter to let in more light. The result is a detail-packed shot with rich colors and a dramatic nighttime look, as you can see above. It’s still an iPhone, so you can absolutely leave everything on Auto and get a great photo, but when you want to take more control, the tools are there to help you capture the shot you have in your mind’s eye.
The same Pro controls carry over to video, giving you more control over how you capture moving footage. There’s also a new auto-tracking feature, and I’ve found it particularly useful for fast-moving subjects.
I put it to the test at Disney World with Slinky Dog Dash, capturing the coaster as it came down the sloping track. The iPhone did a great job of keeping the front of the coaster in focus while the people blurred with the speed of the ride, and the lighting on the track moving alongside the vehicles stayed remarkably clear. The shot came out incredibly well, and it really shows what the iPhone can do with a fast-moving subject.
The 18-megapixel front-facing camera is essentially unchanged from last year, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing, as the Center Stage camera still uses that clever square sensor, letting you rotate between portrait and landscape framing without physically turning the iPhone. Better yet, it will still automatically adjust to fit more people in the shot.
The cameras are easily the most exciting part of the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max, and as in years and generations past, it’s a big reason why folks go Pro. You get three capable shooters, and the ability to step back or step closer, depending on what you’re trying to capture. This year, Apple is giving you more control, and adding a genuinely neat upgrade to the main camera. The choice is ultimately yours: you can stick with Auto and still capture great shots, or make your mark with adjustments and shoot more intentionally.
Yes, third-party apps have offered many of these controls before, but having them baked right into the native Camera app can make a big impact, in my opinion. You don’t have to download another app or learn another interface to take advantage of them — they’re right there when you open the camera.
- Camera score: 5 / 5
- Siri AI is here, in beta, and works across apps and personal context
- It can use your current on-screen context to help answer questions
- It's a major step forward, but it still makes mistakes and has rough edges
The iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max ran iOS 26 out of the box, and it's no surprise that iOS 27 is preloaded on the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max. It runs really well here, and the A20 Pro under the hood keeps things gliding along — more on that processor below.
Much of iOS 27 is about under-the-hood changes that speed things up, which is especially helpful for older phones, along with more ways to customize the Liquid Glass interface, including adjusting how much of that glass effect you want to see.
The real story, though, is that the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max come with the new, AI-powered Siri out of the box, in beta, in specific regions. It’s available now in the United States, though you’ll need to join a waitlist, and it arrives alongside some new Apple Intelligence features.
(Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)For starters, Siri AI is much faster, and shows its work as it goes, which makes the experience feel more transparent. For instance, I’ve asked for details on my last flight and watched Siri AI dive into the right app — whether that’s Calendar, Flighty, United, or even Mail — to pull up the information I’m looking for. I’ve also used it to confirm my departure time, and ask how long it might take to get to the airport. It really does work, and it feels natural, and easy to get the hang of.
That doesn’t mean it’s perfect. Siri AI diving into some apps can cause mistakes, and at times it can pull up the wrong dataset or make the wrong assumption about what I’m asking for. But given how delayed this upgrade has been, and how limited the existing Siri has felt, overall it finally feels like Apple has delivered on the promise of a more capable assistant, while still putting privacy at the center as it works with your personal data and what’s on your device.
Siri AI can even be cued to see what’s on your screen, adding another layer of usefulness. Rather than having to explain everything you’re looking at, you can let Siri understand the context of what’s in front of you and go from there. It’s one of those features that sounds small on paper, but once you start using it, it feels like the direction Siri should have been heading in all along.
(Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)Apple Intelligence also brings a handful of other updates, including new ways to work with images, improvements to Photos and other apps, and more ways to put on-device intelligence to work. But Siri AI is easily the headline for me. After years of Siri feeling like an assistant that was increasingly behind the times, it finally feels like I’m actually talking to an AI assistant on an iPhone, rather than simply giving commands to a voice interface.
And while it’s still in beta, and there are clearly some kinks to work out, that’s an important distinction. Apple isn’t just talking about what Siri will be able to do anymore — on the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max, I’m actually using it. It’s faster, more conversational, understands more context, and can work across the apps and information already on my phone.
For me, that makes iOS 27 feel less like a flashy annual software update, and more like the foundation for where Apple wants the iPhone to go next. The A20 Pro gives it the horsepower to keep everything moving, while Siri AI finally starts making good on the Apple Intelligence promise. And because it’s built into the iPhone, and designed around the information already on your device, it feels like a much more natural extension of how I already use my phone, rather than another AI chatbot I need to remember to open.
- Software score: 5 / 5
- A20 Pro is seriously fast
- The biggest gains over the A19 Pro come in specific workloads and future headroom
- Improved thermal management helps keep the phone cooler under heavy use
It might be no surprise, but the A20 Pro chip inside the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max is, as Apple claims, the fastest chip it’s put in an iPhone. And it’s actually more similar to an M-Series-powered SoC that Apple might opt for in a Mac than previous A-series chips.
With the A20 Pro, the SoC actually sits next to the DRAM, rather than having the memory stacked on top, as it has been in previous generations. It’s also built on a 2-nanometer process, just like the M6.
Inside the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max, the A20 Pro is broken up into a 6-core CPU — two performance cores and four efficiency cores — a 7-core GPU, and a dual 16-core Neural Engine.
What does all of that mean for real-world use? Well, pretty much what you’d expect from a new Pro iPhone: everything is fast. Apps open quickly, jumping between them is fluid, games run smoothly, and even more demanding tasks don’t really give the A20 Pro much pause.
Take video exports, for example. I’ve been exporting 4K videos with graphics, text, and transitions in both Edits and CapCut, and the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max handle them quickly. It’s the kind of task where you can really feel the combination of the new chip and all that processing power, especially when you’re working with more complicated edits.
Gaming is another area where the A20 Pro flexes a bit. Real Flight Simulator runs smoothly, with environments rendering quickly as I’m flying around. The same goes for Wuthering Waves and Genshin Impact, both of which seemingly put a pretty serious load on the phones, which they seemingly handle without issue.
Multitasking has also been a non-issue. I’ve had plenty of apps open, jumped into FaceTime while playing a game, and bounced between multiple text conversations without the iPhone 18 Pro or 18 Pro Max missing a beat. That’s probably the less exciting side of performance, but it’s also where you notice the power of the A20 Pro day-to-day — you don’t really have to think about what’s running in the background.
Photo Clean Up is a bit faster than it was on the iPhone 17 Pro, for example, so removing an unwanted object or person from a shot takes less time. It’s not a massive difference, but when you use these tools frequently, those little speed improvements add up.
Additionally, the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max handle heat better, so sustained performance doesn’t come with the same uncomfortable warmth I experienced with the 17 Pro generation. The heat isn’t magically gone, but it’s distributed better, rather than sitting in one spot on the back, and dissipates faster.
It’s worth keeping some perspective here, though. The A20 Pro isn’t night-and-day faster than the A19 Pro in the iPhone 17 Pro or the chip in the iPhone Air, and you’ll likely only see more meaningful gains over something like the iPhone 16 Pro in specific scenarios. That’s not really the point.
The A20 Pro gives the iPhone more headroom for the future, especially as we run more and more AI-powered tasks on our phones, and, increasingly, other Apple devices. After spending this much time with it, the A20 Pro gives me no pause about getting several years of strong performance out of the iPhone 18 Pro or 18 Pro Max.
If you’re coming from an iPhone 15 or older, though, that’s where I think you’ll really notice the difference. You’re not just getting a faster chip; you’re getting a phone with considerably more processing headroom for demanding games, video editing, Apple Intelligence, and whatever Apple adds over the next few years.
Additionally, the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max will both feature the new Apple-made C2 modem globally. On my Burgundy iPhone 18 Pro connected to AT&T's network, I scored over 900MBps down in a jam-packed park, but the story is a little different with the 18 Pro Max in the US. The larger Pro iPhone in the States opts for a Qualcomm modem, but I didn't notice much of an issue with performance. I was connected to the Visible network and averaged about 350MBps to 500MBps down while in the parks and around New Jersey.
- Performance score: 5 / 5
- I averaged around 30 hours, with the Pro Max stretching further
- 50% charge in 15 minutes means you can get back in action quickly with wired charging
Alongside variable aperture on the main camera and the faster A20 Pro inside, Apple is making big promises about battery life with its latest Pro iPhones. In fact, the Cupertino giant notes that the iPhone 18 Pro will last longer than the iPhone 17 Pro Max, while the iPhone 18 Pro Max offers the longest battery life ever in an iPhone.
More specifically, it’s up to 36 hours of video playback on the iPhone 18 Pro, and up to 45 hours on the iPhone 18 Pro Max. These figures are based on Apple’s video-playback testing, and real-world battery life will vary depending on what you’re doing. Also keep in mind that these devices will need some time to index and get their bearings.
I’ll likely need to come back to this section in the coming weeks as indexing concludes, and I’m not shooting hundreds of photos and many minutes of video a day — after all, this is a review period. But with both the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max, I’ve averaged around 30 hours of use before needing to plug in, and that stretches a bit further with the Max.
Even on an endurance day in the Florida heat, with hundreds of photos captured and nearly an hour of video recorded, the iPhone 18 Pro Max lasted an impressive amount of time before I needed a pit stop back at the hotel to recharge. It can drain quickly with heavy use, especially when you’re doing a lot of content capture, but in my testing thus far, both phones have been impressive.
In Future Labs' battery test, the iPhone 18 Pro lasted 16 hours and 17 minutes, while the iPhone 18 Pro Max ran for 18 hours and 27 minutes. That’s a good chunk less than Apple’s own video-playback figures, but my daily usage does stretch a bit closer to its claims.
On my last day of testing, I took the iPhone 18 Pro Max off the charger at 6AM and it hit 80% right before 11AM. With lots of app usage and some capture, it dropped to around 40% around 6PM with heavier use, but on average I got about 30 hours of use.
Apple also has improved fast wired charging, letting you hit 50% in just 15 minutes. I achieved that with both phones using Apple’s own Dynamic 40W charger, as well as a smaller Anker 45W Nano Cube. That means even if you do drain the battery, you don’t have to spend long tethered to an outlet before you’re back in business.
- Battery score: 5 / 5
Attributes
Notes
Rating
Value
Even with the $100 / £100 / AU$100 price increase, both Pro models deliver enough meaningful upgrades to justify the premium.
4 / 5
Design
A similar design that's now refined with better thermals and two fantastic new colors.
5 / 5
Display
The Super Retina XDR OLEDs are still punchy, sharp, and smooth with ProMotion and Always-On functionality, and with a smaller Dynamic Island.
5 / 5
Software
Siri AI finally feels like the smarter, more capable assistant Apple promised, and iOS 27 is plenty smooth.
5 / 5
Camera
Apple finally gives you serious camera controls on the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max, plus a genuinely useful variable aperture for the main lens.
5 / 5
Performance
The A20 Pro is incredibly fast, efficient, and ready for whatever comes next.
5 / 5
Battery
Outstanding endurance, with the Pro Max delivering the longest battery life on an iPhone.
5 / 5
Buy it if...You want the best cameras
The iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max take their three 48MP cameras to the next level, adding a variable aperture to the main camera and Pro controls across the board.
Don’t buy it if...You have an iPhone 17 Pro
The iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max refine last year’s formula rather than reinvent it, so the upgrade is less substantial, especially if you're not interested in the changes.
Apple iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max: Also considerSamsung Galaxy S26 Ultra
If you're alright with Android and want an excellent mix of performance and hardware, plus far-reaching zoom that can rival the iPhone, Samsung's latest and greatest candybar smartphone is worth a look.
Read our full Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra review
Apple iPhone Duo
It won't arrive until October, but if you're after a design revolution from Apple, the iPhone Duo will likely fit the bill as Cupertino's first foldable phone. It offers the same excellent performance as the 18 Pro, plus an extra screen.
Read our hands-on preview of the iPhone Duo
Apple iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max: How I testedI’ve covered iPhones since the iPhone 8 generation, and the iPhone 3GS was my first personal iPhone. For this review, I spent a week with the iPhone 18 Pro in Burgundy and the iPhone 18 Pro Max in Glacier.
Why you can trust TechRadar☑️ 100s of smartphones reviewed
☑️ 15 years of product testing
☑️ Over 16,000 products reviewed in total
☑️ Nearly 200,000 hours testing tech
I used both as daily drivers, covering everything from calls and streaming to gaming, work apps, photography, and video. I also ran performance benchmarks, tested multitasking and demanding workloads, and tracked battery drain across different usage scenarios alongside a standardized battery test.
For the cameras, I captured hundreds of photos and dozens of videos across Disney World — including Magic Kingdom, EPCOT, Hollywood Studios, and the resorts — as well as New Jersey, California, and from airplane windows. I tested every rear camera, multiple focal lengths, variable aperture, Pro controls, Night mode, Portrait mode, and video, along with the 18MP Center Stage camera.
I also compared the 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max with the previous-generation Pro models, the iPhone 17, iPhone Air, and other smartphones including the Pixel 11 and Pixel 11 Pro.
First reviewed September 2026.
Categories: Reviews
I've watched the first 4 episodes of MobLand season 2, and the 'explosive' Guy Ritchie series makes a mind-blowingly perfect return to Paramount+
We're living in a drought of bold and brave storytelling. By that, I mean that almost everything we consume on our favorite streaming services plays it safe, looks the same, or lacks so much substance that you can't really say anything about it other than "it's fine".
MobLand, however, has been bucking that trend, and season 2 continues to build on an authenticity that's light years ahead of anything else. Why? At large, it's because MobLand trusts its audience to be able to think critically.
You've probably read reports of streamers modifying their scripts and plots to accommodate 'second screen' viewers — subscribers who've put something on in the background while doing something else. Without naming any names, this is starting to result in bland, unambitious storytelling that spoon-feeds you information unnecessarily.
But MobLand season 2 shows us just how fulfilling the results can be when creators and distributors alike are prepared to disrupt popular industry trends. The rich, complex layers to the central storyline feel never-ending, forcing you to play close attention to every second of dialogue and action.
The Harrigan family, as always, are unhinged. Conrad's (Pierce Brosnan) feud with Kevin (Paddy Considine) ramps up a notch, embroiling new 'fixer' Frankie (Johnny Flynn) in their mess as family arch-rival Kat (Janet McTeer) tries to take control of London from a distance.
This leaves Harry (Tom Hardy) having to clean up even more mess than before, particularly considering his and Jan's (Joanne Froggatt) impending divorce. On top of that, daughter Gina (Teddie Allen) has gone missing.
If you think you understand, you don't — between the Harrigans and us, it's the blind leading the blind. But that makes tuning into Paramount+ this week all the more enriching... because everyone is prepared to take a risk.
MobLand season 2 is a masterclass in how 2020s TV should be constructedThere's something so wonderfully hypnotic about watching a Dame and a former James Bond shower us with See You Next Tuesdays like it's no big deal (I counted, and Conrad says this four times within the first six minutes of episode 1). But such gimmicks aren't what makes MobLand season 2 so entertaining.
As I've touched on above, it all comes down to the construction. Having a whip-smart script, edgy editing and a soundtrack so defiant that Spotify would ask a listener with the same taste if they were okay, doesn't automatically give you a good show — all elements of production need to be working in complete synergy.
There will be no spoilers in this review, so I need you to trust me when I say that some scenes had all of their creative elements working in such beautiful harmony that I spiritually ascended. Never before have I wanted to be involved in organized crime, but throw me into an action sequence with dynamically rhythmic edits and Firestarter by The Prodigy as the soundtrack and I'd seriously consider it.
If I had to described MobLand season 2 in one word, it would be relentless. From the onslaught of family issues to the duplicity and deceit within them, nothing ever lets up. It's a mental scramble to keep up with everything that happens in a single episode (let alone the entire season); Guy Ritchie has created the most violent workout for the mind possible.
Throw yourself into it at full-throttle and you'll never want the grip of MobLand to let you go. It's not worth having any favorites — they'll either die or deceive you — but that in itself is a fitting lesson in trust. You stick out the ride and try to survive, and become pleasantly addicted to the process.
I've never loved a 'prick on a scooter' more (Image credit: Paramount+)It goes without saying that our ensemble cast is, as always, on top form. If there was any truth to the alleged behind-the-scenes drama involving Tom Hardy, all it's done is fuel the fire of some exceptional television. Harry's constant need to live on his wit's end is often amusing, while Conrad's slowly declining grip on reality never loses its gravitas.
Maeve (Helen Mirren) needed no improvement, really, but I've particularly enjoyed her power-dressing wardrobe this time around. In direct contrast is Bella (Lara Pulvey), who is the most fretful and unguarded we've ever seen her. Seraphina (Mandeep Dhillon) is on the way up the food chain, but her own worst enemy.
It's a social study in how complicated humans are while intent on making their own problems infinitely worse, then. But a particular shoutout must go to our most important newcomer, "prick on a scooter" Frankie Cooper.
Without giving too much away, he's brought into's Harry's orbit to act on behalf of the terrifyingly aloof Kat, all while dressed like the third Gallagher brother if he used the Lime app. With a chillingly monotone voice, and eyes that seem like they're constant dissociated from the world around him, he's the first genuinely troubling threat to Harry since the show began.
Frankie's relationship to everyone around him is just another fascinating dimension to behold, revealing a collective fear and vulnerability among the rest of the characters that we've not yet seen. From beginning to end, Ritchie's thought process is truly masterful.
Thank God MobLand season 3 is already a done deal. Thank God we get to experience more of this addictive high. If you thought The Gentlemen season 2 was good, you ain't seen nothing yet.
Categories: Reviews
I tried Canon's new-look EOS R8 Mark II — it's a solid upgrade of the EOS R8, but the competition from Nikon is fierce
Canon EOS R8 Mark II: Two-minute review
It might look like a Sony or Nikon, but I can assure you that the EOS R8 Mark II is a Canon camera. It's the realization of a long-rumored model that was expected to be a digital remake of the AE-1 analog SLR camera to mark that camera's its 50th anniversary, only those rumors proved unfounded, with Canon working in a "modern twist".
I can see the faint resemblance between the two cameras, and I like the EOS R8 Mark II's angular look, but I also think Canon has missed a trick by not going all-out retro here, in the way Nikon did with its Zf.
Design should have been the major selling point here, but instead we have a camera that blends in, and that's not a compliment. This makes it harder to forgive the dated elements of the camera that have been carried over from the original EOS R8.
That's not to say the EOS R8 Mark II isn't a decent upgrade from the EOS R8 — it adds in-body image stabilization that's rated up to 7.5EV to the 24MP full-frame sensor, plus an AF joystick (Canon calls it a multi-controller) which makes autofocus selection simpler.
The Canon EOS R8 Mark II isn't the retro design we'd been led to expect (Image credit: Tim Coleman)Video specs are also improved, autofocus performance enhanced, and pre-capture appears for the first time in a Canon camera at this price point.
The EOS R8 Mark II is a better camera than the EOS R8, but it also carries the same LCD and EVF displays, and the same tiny battery and entry-level build quality. These dated elements only highlight how much better a camera the Nikon Z5 II is — and that camera from 2025 costs less.
Still, if you're a Canon fan and committed to its system, the EOS R8 Mark II is a solid upgrade of the EOS R8, and a sensible alternative to the pricier EOS R6 Mark III for users who don't need the premium design, superior battery life and various high-end features.
Canon EOS R8 Mark II: Price and release date- Announced on September 16, 2026, priced from £1,729 (about $2,000 / AU$ 3,500)
- Available in 24-105mm F4-7.1 IS STM kit for £2,119 (about $2,400 / AU$4,300)
- Dedicated Extensions Grip (EC-G2) costs £89 (about $100 / AU$190)
- Goes on sale October 20
Canon is expected to sell the EOS R8 Mark II from October 20, with a body-only price of £1,729 (about $2,000 / AU$3,500), which rises to £2,119 (about $2,400 / AU$4,300) for the 24-105mm F4-7.1 IS STM kit (not to be confused with the pricier 24-105mm F4 L IS USM). Other bundles will be available, including one with an additional battery.
Canon also launched a grip for the EOS R8 Mark II, which costs £89 (about $100 / AU$190). It's a grip only, and doesn't feature a battery, but it does feature a hinge allowing direct access to the camera's battery door.
Canon EOS R8 Mark II specsCanon EOS R8 Mark II specs:Type:
Mirrorless camera
Mount:
Canon RF
Sensor:
24.2MP (effective) full-frame CMOS
Autofocus:
Dual Pixel CMOS AF II with 1,053 zones, subject detection of people, animals and vehicles + Register People priority
Continuous shooting:
Up to 40fps (electronic shutter)
Video:
4K up to 60fps, up to 10-bit, Canon C Log 3 profile
Viewfinder:
0.39-inch, 2.36M-dot OLED EVF, 0.70x magnification
Screen:
3.0-inch vari-angle touchscreen, 1.62m-dots
Storage:
Single SD/SDHC/SDXC slot
Connectivity:
2.4 and 5GHz Wi-Fi, camera connect, clean (micro) HDMI, wired connectivity USB-C
Dimensions:
131.4 x 90.0 x 79.7mm
Weight:
19.3oz / 546g (with card and battery included, 499g without)
Canon EOS R8 Mark II: Design- Major new look for an interchangeable-lens Canon camera
- Multi-controller and tally lamp added
- Single SD card slot relocated to a dedicated side access door
- Same LCD and EVF displays as the EOS R8
- Body not weather resistant
I've already covered the new look of the EOS R8 Mark II. Whether that fresh design is going to be worked into other Canon cameras or remain exclusive to the R8 series, or if an unadulterated retro mirrorless body is on the way, we'll have to wait and see. I asked a Canon spokesperson about the prospect of an all-out retro body, and they didn't rule it out.
I've included a side-by-side photo of the EOS R8 and and EOS R8 Mark II, below, and you can see the sharper lines, and the deeper and textured grip of the new model, which for me evoke the look of Sony bodies more than Canon heritage.
One welcome addition is Canon's multi-controller button, which can be used to select the autofocus point among other things, and is a much loved feature by users who like to control to how their camera autofocuses, included point selection.
I really appreciated the placement of the multi-controller alongside the AF-ON (autofocus) button, which are both within a slight move of your thumb where it naturally rests in the grip. As such, it was entirely possible to hold the camera and make autofocus point selection one-handed.
The EOS R8 (left) and the EOS R8 Mark II (right)Tim ColemanTim ColemanWith the new EC-G2 Extension GripTim ColemanTim ColemanTim ColemanTim ColemanTim ColemanTim ColemanA tally lamp has been added to indicate when video recording is active, while the single SD card slot has been relocated to a dedicated door on the grip-side of the camera, whereas in the EOS R8 it was found behind the same door as the battery on the underside.
Sadly, Canon hasn't used the space saved in the battery compartment (and deeper handgrip) to fit in a larger-capacity battery. The EOS R8 Mark II uses the same battery as its predecessor — shot life was already a major weak point — and has an even lower battery life when the power-hungry image stabilization feature is active, being rated at 220 shots when using the viewfinder (or 340 shots with the LCD).
Nor has the quality of the body been improved — Canon notes that the EOS R8 Mark II's body materials are part aluminum alloy, part polycarbonate, and it's not weather resistant. The controls, and the build quality, really do feel entry-level.
The 3.0-inch 1.62m-dot vari-angle LCD and 0.39-inch 2.36m-dot EVF displays are unchanged from the EOS R8, and look fairly dated when you compare them to the Nikon Z5 II's displays.
Canon EOS R8 Mark II: Performance- 24.2MP full-frame sensor now equipped with 7.5EV image stabilization
- Digic X processor unique to the camera, 40fps burst shooting
- 4K video up to 60fps, oversampled from 6K, plus 1080p up to 180fps
The addition of in-body image stabilization (IBIS) is the major upgrade offered by the EOS R8 Mark II, and its effectiveness is rated up to 7.5EV. This feature makes life simpler shooting handheld in many scenarios — whether that's for sharp images in low light or with telephoto lenses, creative long-exposure shots, or run-and-gun video.
The sensor that incorporates the IBIS is otherwise the same as the one in the EOS R8 — a full-frame 24.2MP CMOS unit which is a decent all-purpose sensor. Nothing too exciting in 2026, but dependable.
Maximum burst-shooting speeds are once again up to 40fps, using the electronic shutter. Not that there's a choice — if you didn't already know it, the EOS R8 Mark II, like its predecessor, doesn't have a mechanical shutter.
Canon has added Pre-Continuous Shooting (more widely known as pre-capture) to the EOS R8 Mark II. In short, the camera is able to continually buffer up to 0.5 seconds while the shutter is half pressed, before the user fully presses the button to take photos. In this case, you get up to 20 photos spanning the half-second before you start photos — it's a really useful feature for wildlife and action photography, for when your reactions aren't otherwise up to speed. The feature was introduced in the EOS R5 Mark II, and the EOS R8 Mark II is the first Canon at this price point to get it.
(Image credit: Tim Coleman)Video recording has been improved in several ways. First of all, 4K footage is oversampled from 6K, so it should look sharper. Secondly, 4K frame rates have been upped to 60fps, while 1080p goes up to 180fps — that's 6x slow motion. Thirdly, there's the aforementioned IBIS, which makes smooth handheld shooting all the more possible. And then there are additional color profiles to choose from, including 'filmtone' looks and other picture styles which can be added using the Canon EOS Utility app.
Canon has also added a new 'defocus' feature, which can add a creative blur effect (not aperture dependent), and alter the speed of focus transitions. I haven't had the time yet to test any of the EOS R8 Mark II's video features, but I will do for my upcoming in-depth review.
Dual Pixel CMOS AF II powers the camera's autofocus, which like before includes subject detection of people, animals and vehicles, but which Canon says offers an improved performance. For example, the camera's focus sensitivity in low light has been improved, being rated to -7.5EV.
‘Register People Priority’ is a neat addition — users can select specific people’s faces, storing up to 10 people for the camera to prioritize. It's a handy feature for scenarios like a wedding, where you might want to keep the bride and groom in sharp focus among a sea of faces.
Tim ColemanTim ColemanTim ColemanTim ColemanTim ColemanTim ColemanTim ColemanCanon EOS R8 Mark II: also considerNikon Z5 II
Nikon redefined what entry-level full-frame mirrorless cameras can do with its Z5 II. And despite costing less than the EOS R8 Mark II, it looks like the better camera overall. It also has a stabilized 24MP full-frame sensor, but its weather-resistant body has a magnesium alloy chassis, while its displays are superior, despite the camera coming more than a year earlier. If you're not tied to Canon, Nikon's Z5 II looks like the pick of the two cameras.
Read our in-depth Nikon Z5 II review
Canon EOS R8
Canon says the origial EOS R8 will remain on sale after the EOS R8 Mark II hits stores. The two cameras share the same 24MP full-frame sensor, burst-shooting speeds and displays, while the Mark II adds IBIS, a multi-controller, new design and more. The price of the EOS R8 has fallen since launch, so it's the more cost-effective option if you can live without the upgrades.
Read our in-depth Canon EOS R8 review
How I tested the Canon EOS R8 Mark II(Image credit: Tim Coleman)- I had a two hour hands-on session with the camera and kit lens
- I spent the time getting a feel for the camera, and took some sample photos
- Canon provided the EOS R8 and EOS R6 Mark III for comparisons
I've only used the EOS R8 Mark II for a couple of hours at Canon Europe's offices in London. During this time, I got a proper feel for the camera, and paired it with the 24-105mm F4-7.1 IS STM lens that the camera is available with in a kit.
Canon supplied me with the original EOS R8 and EOS R6 Mark III, so I was able to make direct comparisons between the three cameras, though only how they handle — I didn't have time to take like-for-like pictures.
I took a stroll in the outside space, and took various photos of birdlife, foliage and buildings. Look out for our in-depth review of the EOS R8 Mark II, coming soon.
- First reviewed: September 2026
- Read more about how we test
Categories: Reviews
Sony’s new 400mm and 600mm super-telephoto primes make light work of a heavy hobby — here are my favorite wildlife photos I shot with the pair
Sony FE 400mm F4.5 GM OSS / Sony FE 600mm F6.3 GM OSS: One-minute review
I've only just had my hands on the Fujifilm XF 400mm F4.5 R OIS LM WR lens, photographing birds of prey in flight, but I can now reveal that I was also testing two rival super-telephoto Sony primes at the same time ahead of their launch; the FE 400mm F4.5 GM OSS and FE 600mm F6.3 GM OSS.
Both lenses sit within the focal length range of Sony's longest zoom lens — the 400-800mm F6.3-8 G OSS — but they sacrifice zoom versatility for a couple of real benefits: they have a slightly brighter maximum aperture, and they're significantly lighter.
In fact, Sony's new 400mm and 600mm primes are the lightest of their kind, weighing 994g / 995g respectively (35oz approx). It's the light weight that's their major appeal — plus the promise from Sony of superior MTF performance (the outright optical quality at the various lens settings) versus rivals, such as Nikon's 400mm f/4.5 VR S.
The 600mm lens is physically the slightly longer of the two lenses, but they otherwise appear largely identical. (Image credit: Future)There's no shortage of super-telephoto lenses from Sony, but these primes are probably the best option for enthusiasts who know their focal length and want to prioritize quality over zoom versatility.
They're way more affordable options than Sony's high-end 400mm F2.8 and 600mm F4 pro primes, but they still boast the superior GM quality designation over comparable 'G' zooms such as the 200-600mm and 400-800mm, and are by no means cheap.
If you mainly photograph larger wildlife, then the 400mm lens is ideal, while the 600mm lens is better suited for smaller creatures. I took both lenses to my local wetland reserve and to a nearby deer park to really test them out over hours-long hiking and photography sessions, and I was able to get a feel for how they sit with a Sony camera – in my case the A7 V that Sony loaned to me for this review — and how each one performed. Let's dive in.
Sony FE 400mm F4.5 GM OSS / Sony FE 600mm F6.3 GM OSS: price and availability- The 400mm F4.5 GM OSS costs £2,400, while the 600mm F6.3 costs £3,300
- Both come in a soft padded case with handle and shoulder strap, and with a lens hood
Before I get into the handling and performance of each lens, let's look at the pricing. In the UK the FE 400mm F4.5 GM OSS costs £2,400, while the FE 600mm F6.3 GM OSS costs £3,300. I'll update this page with US and Australia pricing when I get it.
Each lens comes in a soft padded case with handle and shoulder strap, so they can be securely carried separately to a bag. A lens hood is supplied, too.
To put that pricing into context, Fujifilm's new 400mm F4.5 lens (for APS-C with 600mm equivalent focal length) costs around the same, while the cost of Nikon's 400mm f/4.5 VR S has fallen by 15% since its 2022 launch, which takes it to the same price.
The 600mm lens is cheaper compared to Nikon's 600mm f/6.3, which originally cost about 50% more, but with price reductions is currently about 25% more.
Sony's professional FE 400mm F2.8 GM OSS and FE 600mm F4 GM OSS are in another (five-figure) price and weight category altogether.
Though hardly cheap, considering the specs, and the fact that these are 'Grand Master' (GM) lenses — Sony's professional series — I think the pair are pretty decent value overall.
Sony FE 400mm F4.5 GM OSS / Sony FE 600mm F6.3 GM OSS: specsSony FE 400mm F4.5 GM OSS / Sony FE 600mm F6.3 GM OSS specsType:
Supertelephoto prime
Mount:
Sony E
Sensor:
Full-frame
Focal length:
400mm and 600mm
Aperture:
f/4.5 and f/6.3
Minimum focus:
8.21ft / 2.5m (both)
Filter size:
95mm (both)
Dimensions:
108 x 242mm (400mm) / 108 x 263mm (600mm)
Weight:
35oz / 994g and 995g respectively (bare lens)
Sony FE 400mm F4.5 GM OSS / Sony FE 600mm F6.3 GM OSS: design- Lightest lenses of their kind at 994g (400mm) and 995g (600mm) respectively
- Weather resistant, with rubber sealed lens mount
- Removable tripod collar
Light weight is the major talking point here. Both the FE 400mm F4.5 GM OSS and FE 600mm F6.3 GM OSS weigh a fraction under 1,000g (about 35oz), making them the lightest of their kind. For the wildlife and sports photography that these lenses are designed for, the light weight makes long shoot days more manageable — and I should know, because I've used them both extensively.
Nikon's equivalent lenses are 1,160g and 1,360g respectively, while Sony's 400-800mm G lens weighs 87oz/2,475g — and Sony's high-end 400mm F2.8 and 600mm F4 primes are around 3x the weight of its new additions. There are other Sony zooms available; the pricier 100-400mm F4.5 GM OSS weighs 65oz/ 1,840g, while the lower-end FE 200-600mm F5.6-6.3G OSS weighs 75oz/2,115g. Canon has no comparable lenses.
As for size, the 400mm measures 242mm in length, and the 600mm 263mm in length — not the smallest of their kind, therefore, but definitely the lightest.
FutureFutureFutureFutureFutureDespite the lightweight build, each lens is dust and moisture resistant, features a rubber ring to seal the lens mount, and includes Sony's Optical SteadyShot (OSS) — a key feature when shooting at such extreme focal lengths.
There are five switches, covering off focus mode, a focus range limiter, optical stabilization and the stabilization mode, a function ring, plus four focus hold buttons. The tripod collar ring hosts a (removable) tripod mount.
Like the rubberized function ring, the generous focus ring has pronounced ridging, which makes gripping and rotating it a cinch.
(Image credit: Future)Both lenses support Sony's 1.4x and 2x teleconverters, the latter of which doubles the focal length, at the cost of maximum aperture. I preferred shooting without teleconverters, because aperture margins are amplified when shooting high-speed action with fast shutter speeds at such extreme focal lengths — every bit of additional brightness goes along way.
Compared to Sony's pricier primes, the maximum aperture of each lens is less bright, being f/4.5 and f/6.3 respectively. However, the maximum aperture is brighter than the 400-800mm's, which is f/6.3 at 400mm, and f/8 when zoomed in to 600mm.
Sony super-telephoto lenses for full-frame E-mountLens
Price
Weight
400mm F4.5 GM OSS
£2,400
35oz/994g
600mm F6.3 GM OSS
£3,300
35oz/995g
100-400mm F4.5 GM OSS
$4,299 / £4,399
65oz/ 1,840g
400-800mm F6.3-8 G OSS
$2,699 / £2,399
87oz/2,475g
100-400mm F4.5-5.6 GM
$2,799 / £2,149
49oz/1395g
200-600mm F5.6-6.3 G OSS
$2,099 / £1,599
75oz/2,115g
400mm F2.8 GM OSS
$12,999 / £10,490
102oz/2,895g
600mm F4 GM OSS
$14,099 / £11,999
107oz/3,040g
Sony FE 400mm F4.5 GM OSS / Sony FE 600mm F6.3 GM OSS: Performance- Snappy and quiet internal autofocus when paired with a recent Sony camera
- 11-blade aperture creates attractive, smooth bokeh
- Detail is very sharp, especially when subjects are relatively close
Both lenses feature a fairly complex optical construction, comprising extra-low dispersion elements to minimize chromatic aberration, Sony's Nano AR Coating II to reduce flare and ghosting, plus an 11-blade aperture for what Sony calls "gorgeous ball bokeh".
Twin XD linear motors drive those lens elements for fast, precise autofocus and tracking, being able to support tracking up to 120fps — which covers 4x slow-motion video recording.
With the appropriate bird, animal and insect detection in play for taking photos of birds, deer and dragonflies respectively, autofocus proved swift and reliable. Only for photos of large mammals using the maximum aperture, did I see the occasional softness,where focusing was slightly off from the creature's eyes.
Tim ColemanTim ColemanTim ColemanTim ColemanTim ColemanTim ColemanTim ColemanTim ColemanI used the maximum aperture of each lens for the majority of the photos I took, and image quality is impressive — you can see for yourself in the gallery of some of my favorite shots below.
There's no particular sign of vignetting at the maximum aperture, while chromatic aberration is well controlled. Bokeh is smooth, too, while detail in subjects, provided they're not too far away and they're in focus, is crisp.
When depth of field is narrow and subjects are at some distance, images benefit from a little sharpening, but otherwise I'm really happy with the photos I took. The original images you see in the galleries are converted RAW files, which are largely unedited — I haven't applied any sharpening.
Tim ColemanTim ColemanTim ColemanShould I buy?(Image credit: Future)Buy it if...You want a high-quality, super-telephoto prime that's easy on the body
Sony's GM-quality optics, in a lightest-of-their-kind body — these are dreamy lenses for long days photographing wildlife and sports.
You're an enthusiast wildlife photographer with deep pockets
They're more affordable than Sony's high-end 400mm and 600mm lenses (but by no means cheap), and with a slighter smaller maximum aperture.
You want zoom versatility
Sony has compelling zoom lens alternatives for both of the 400mm and 600mm primes — so if you can live with the extra weight and, in some cases, slightly smaller maximum aperture, these alternatives could be a better bet.
You're a casual wildlife and sports photographer
Unless wildlife and sports photography are your thing, these lenses could be a little overkill.
- Sony loaned me both 400mm and 600mm lenses weeks ahead of their unveiling
- I received the lenses with a Sony A7 V body to test them
- I used the lenses in proper wildlife photography scenarios and carried them over many hours
I was fortunate to receive both lenses from Sony, with an A7 V body, several weeks ahead of their announcement, and was able to give them a proper test in the scenarios that people would use them.
I went to a wetland reserve to photography birdlife and insects including dragonflies, and to a historic park that's habited with deer. On multiple occasions I carried both lenses and camera over the course of several hours, and used the gear in bright daylight, under light rain, and as daylight faded.
I mainly used the maximum aperture of each lens, but also stopped aperture down to make comparisons. I set the camera up specific to each scenario, with the appropriate subject detection autofocus.
First reviewed September 2026
Categories: Reviews
I've watched all 8 episodes of Reacher spinoff Neagley and think longtime fans will love it — mostly because they feel like the exact same show
With Reacher season 4 still streaming on Prime Video as of writing, fans are divided on whether its pivot to a political espionage plot has worked. But there is one detail that unites them: the show was better with Neagley (Maria Sten) in it.
After three seasons of dedicated service to Reacher (Alan Ritchson), Neagley is now a spinoff all her own. Taking on the lead role, she's working as a private investigator in Chicago, learning that a beloved friend from her past has been killed in a suspicious accident.
Obviously, Neagley is hell-bent on justice, and "puts herself on a dangerous path to uncover a menacing evil," according to Amazon. Who does that remind you of?
We might have changed the surname in the title, but aside from Neagley's return, very little differs. From the aesthetic look of each scene and the eight-episode storyline structure to how new supporting characters are introduced and utilized, everything is feeling exactly the same.
It's also no secret that Reacher will make an appearance in Neagley, which, while incredibly enjoyable, blurs the lines between the two shows even further.
Sure, some elements of the new spinoff have been effective (more on that below), but when the opportunity arises to create an entirely original story that's adjacent to an existing, beloved IP... could we not have been a little bit braver?
Neagley is still Reacher... just with a different focal pointEven though I know that a review of Neagley is something that Reacher fans will be looking for, this is one of the rare times in my job where I don't feel enthused to write... well, anything.
Why? As a reviewer, the most difficult movies or TV shows comment on are the ones that are forgettably fine. It's easy to lift something brilliant up and fun to trash something that you've hated — but if a project has nothing to say for itself, you're stuck.
This is where I think both Neagley and Reacher sit in the TV landscape. Both are designed to be intentionally dumb fun wrapped in the popular package of a crime drama, and therefore, they require very little of you as a viewer.
Credit where credit is due, though. Where Reacher season 4 has potentially tanked its own legacy by getting too entangled in its political tone shift, Neagley has kept things much more straightforward.
Its overarching storyline is much more akin to Reacher seasons 1-3, with a surprising connection to a little-known cult effectively tapping into our continued love affair with all things true crime. There's a healthy mix of CGI and real-life action scenes, all of which are incredibly cool and draw you into Neagley's ridiculously varied day-to-day.
However, our new supporting faces are sweet and ever-present, but they don't hold the same sidekick weight as Neagley herself did as Reacher's right-hand woman. In short, it's swings and roundabouts on a fairly inconsequential level.
At the same time, this is Maria Sten's love letter to fans (Image credit: Prime Video)This brings me neatly to my main argument: it almost doesn't matter what Neagley as a show has got right or wrong, because we're only really showing up for Neagley herself.
For Maria Sten alone, Neagley is exactly the Reacher spinoff that fans have been waiting for. Search for anything Reacher related on social media and you'll quickly find fans pining for Neagley to return to the main series, or for the pair to finally give into their (questionable) underlying romantic chemistry and make things official.
Not only is Sten as impeccable as she was in the main series, but she understands exactly what both fans and the story need from her character. The exploration of Neagley's past and backstory is easily the most satisfying element of the new series, getting into the murky depths of why she is the way she is.
Through this lens, Neagley pulls no punches and leaves no stone unturned while reaching its hard to swallow conclusion. Even while she's recounting hidden trauma in the most vulnerable way possible, Neagley herself remains everything we want from the TV presence we've sorely missed.
Frankly, I credit anything and everything positive about the Reacher spinoff to Sten herself, and if Neagley gets commissioned for future seasons (which I think is highly likely), she'll be the one that makes them satisfying enough to keep watching.
If you're simply tuning in because you're upset that Reacher season 4 is ending on the same day, I'd probably advise that you rewatch seasons 1-3 instead. When it's good, it's golden, as they say... and we're still yet to beat that run.
All eight episodes of Neagley will be available to stream on Prime Video on September 16.
Categories: Reviews
I tested the spec-heavy Poco F9 Ultra and found a phone with top-tier performance and zero deal-breaker flaws for hundreds less than the competition
Poco F9 Ultra: Two-minute review
Poco’s latest high-end phone, the Poco F9 Ultra, continues to show you don’t have to spend absolute top dollar to get the best performance — but a price increase over the previous-generation model is hard to ignore.
The F9 Ultra replaces the Poco F8 Ultra after less than a year, and with the same chipset and design, it doesn’t change too much at first glance. But look deeper, and this is a refined upgrade that boasts an enormous battery bringing multi-day power, a new 200MP main camera sensor, and some of the best speakers on any phone.
The whole package proves you don’t have to spend four figures to land a phone with top-of-the-line specs and performance. The base model with 12GB RAM and the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chipset costs $799 / £899 — yes, that's a $70 / £150 increase over the starting price of the F8 Ultra, but Poco did explain to TechRadar that it believes this new price remains "competitive" for the level of specs on offer. And it has a point — there are only a handful of phones offering 12GB RAM and the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chipset for less money (one of which is Poco's own F8 Ultra).
The F9 Ultra's massive 6.9-inch AMOLED display looks great and is capable of 185Hz refresh rates during compatible games. Gameplay is also boosted with the unusual addition of a Bose-tuned subwoofer on the back, plus you're getting dual speakers, which makes the F9 Ultra a top choice for hands-free calls and listening to podcasts without headphones (though I still can’t condone blasting music from it here are on principle).
(Image credit: Future)As mentioned, for those after the latest Snapdragon silicon for as little money as possible, the F9 Ultra is only undercut by Poco's own F8 Ultra, or indeed the Xiaomi 17, which launched for £899 but is currently on sale for £699. But the F9 Ultra still costs a whopping $500 / £380 less than the Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra, and it wipes the floor with the pricier Google Pixel 11 Pro XL when it comes to gaming.
The cherry on top is a mammoth 8,050mAh battery, one of the biggest on a flagship device available in the UK at the time of writing (September 2026). It means the F9 Ultra can last for three days with moderate use, and I found it impossible to kill in a waking day.
And lastly, aside from a slightly stingy four years of Android updates, six years of security patches to see you through to 2032 is good to see on a phone as well-rounded as this.
Poco F9 Ultra review: Price and availability- Starts at £899 / $799 / €1,099.99
- A $70 / £150 price increase on the F8 Ultra
- Not officially available in Australia
- Still competitive considering the specs
The Poco F9 Ultra starts at $799 / £749, though the US price varies depending on the seller (the phone is not officially available through US carriers, but $799 is Poco's official US price). Official UK availability is good to see, though £749 represents a £150 increase on the F8 Ultra’s £749 starting price, and at the time of writing, the older model is on sale for £649, which is an absolute steal.
But in being equipped with the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chipset, the F9 Ultra undercuts the Galaxy S26 Ultra — the only S26 series phone in the UK to run a Qualcomm chipset — by an almighty £380, and it's much less than the £1,279 Pixel 11 Pro XL, too, whose Tensor G6 chipset can’t hold a candle to the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 in terms of performance.
In fact, at £899, the F9 Ultra is the same price as the Google Pixel 11, but it offers superior gaming chops, a more expansive display, and much better battery life. That's why, despite increasing the price, Poco believes the F9 Ultra remains "competitive" in today's market — and we're inclined to agree.
- Value Score 4 / 5
Here’s a look at the Poco F9 Ultra’s key specs:
Poco F9 Ultra
Dimensions:
163.5 x 77.9 x 8.7mm
Weight:
235g
Display:
6.9-inch AMOLED
Resolution:
1200 x 2608
Refresh rate:
185Hz
Peak brightness:
10,000 nits
CPU:
Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5
RAM:
12GB/16GB
Storage:
256GB/512GB/1TB
OS:
HyperOS 3, based on Android 16
Main cameras:
200MP main (f/1.7), 50MP ultra-wide (f/2.4), 50MP 5x telephoto (f/3.0)
Selfie camera:
32MP (f/2.2)
Battery:
8,050mAh
Charging:
100W wired, 50W wireless
Colors:
Dark Cherry, Black
Poco F9 Ultra review: DesignFutureFutureFuture- Similar look to the iPhone 17 Pro
- Large but manageable device
- Sleek dark cherry colour replaces gaudy denim
The Poco F9 Ultra I reviewed is the lovely Dark Cherry option, which I prefer over the F8 Ultra’s bold but gaudy Denim Blue. Despite being a very large phone, the F9 Ultra is very comfortable to hold thanks to subtly curved aluminum side rails and a ‘Glass Fibre’ composite rear, which should be more resilient than the glass found on most rival flagship devices.
There’s also a black model if you'd prefer a safer option, with a red power button for a pop of color. The Dark Cherry variant hardly shows any fingerprints on its matte surface, and the overall look of the F9 Ultra grew on me in the weeks I was testing it, despite its obvious similarities with the iPhone 17 Pro and indeed the F8 Ultra.
The phone's four-circle camera design alongside the Bose-branded subwoofer is different enough to me, and manages to look as simplistic as possible. The F9 Ultra also doesn’t rock and wobble when used face up on a table, which is a nice touch.
Save for the one-piece volume rocker above the power button on the right edge, there isn't much else to report besides a USB-C port and speaker grilles on the top and bottom. When all is said and done, this is quite a conservative design when it’s not clad in faux denim!
- Design score: 4 / 5
- Large, bright 6.9-inch panel
- Up to 185Hz refresh rate in some games
- Punch-hole selfie camera
The Poco F9 Ultra’s display is excellent, with great brightness and clarity. It's a 6.9-inch 1200 x 2608 AMOLED panel that Poco claims has a peak brightness of 10,000 nits, much higher than rivals. However, it tames that claim by saying this 10,000-nit figure only applies to 1% of the display area, so a 4,500-nit “multi-scenario peak brightness” is the real figure here.
This is a good example of a brand obfuscating the real specs when it doesn’t need to. The F9 Ultra has a great screen, so Poco should lean into the actual numbers rather than fudging a fake one for marketing purposes. The display is very easy to read in bright sunlight, which is all you need to know.
Poco offers excellent granular control over display and color settings, a nod to the phone's gaming focus under the hood. You'll find ‘Original color PRO’ or ‘Vivid’ options in the settings app, which offer full custom control so you can find the right look for you. A dedicated hardware chip can even enhance video quality if you switch the ‘dual-core visuals’ toggle on. All this really does is smooth everything out, so I left it off.
The display can refresh at up to 185Hz, which is the highest I have ever tested on a phone. Most modern OLED displays achieve 120Hz with a variable rate, and some gaming phones have pushed to 144Hz or 165Hz. At the time of writing, the F9 Ultra's 185Hz rate is only available in CrossFire: Legends and Blood Strike, but you'll still get 165Hz in titles like Call of Duty: Mobile and Bang Bang.
So again, what Poco should really say here is that the F9 Ultra has an excellent 120Hz display in most scenarios. That information is hard to come by in the review documents I was provided with, and most users, most of the time, will never see 185Hz unless they play the two aforementioned games daily.
I personally prefer the Pixel 11 Pro XL’s display, which I think handles white balance better and isn’t so blinding to look at, but it’s a close call, and the F9 Ultra certainly has one of the best displays for the price. It’s a great choice for a large screen and undercuts, say, the Galaxy S26 Plus by a significant margin, though the F9 Ultra's display has a slightly lower resolution.
With every conceivable display spec under the sun included here, such as HDR10+, Dolby Vision, and TÜV Rheinland certification for flicker-free viewing and blue light filtration, it’s hard to criticize the screen on this phone.
- Display score: 5 / 5
- Strong 200MP main lens
- Very capable 5x telephoto
- Ultra-wide is not the best
Poco has equipped the F9 Ultra with a pleasingly capable trio of cameras, which is led by a 200MP main lens, an upgrade on the 50MP shooter on the F8 Ultra. Shots are binned down to 12.5MP by default, though 50MP and 200MP settings can be toggled on.
In the default mode, shots look excellent, offering most of the color and mood I personally like from Xiaomi phones such as the Xiaomi 17 Ultra and 17T Pro, though Poco does not have the same Leica partnership or photo filters here.
Apart from a few times where colors looked wildly oversaturated, I really liked the output from the F9 Ultra. It has an artistic, filmic quality that many phones abandon in 2026 in favor of sharpened, contrast-heavy looks. The main camera is better than that of the regular Galaxy S26, which retails for $899 / £879, $100 / £20 less than the Poco.
It’s great to see a 5x optical zoom lens here too, mirroring what you’ll find on the Xiaomi 17T Pro and beating the S26’s 3x optical lens handily. Images are crisp thanks to optical image stabilization (OIS), and shooting in portrait mode at 5x makes for some great street photography. The F9 Ultra is also a phone that’ll come in handy when you’re sitting up in row Z at your next Harry Styles concert thanks to digital zoom up to 100x, though things look patchy after 30x.
The 50MP ultra-wide lens is the weakest of the three cameras, but that’s usually the case on triple-lens phones. In broad daylight, images are very usable, but without OIS, the smaller sensor size shows its limitations in low light, with noise and grain.
The 32MP selfie shooter is solid for solo and group snaps, and works as you’d expect for video calls.
Speaking of video, the main lens can record at up to 4K at 60fps, or even 8K at 30fps. 4K 60fps is great to see, though the Snapdragon chipset here is probably capable of 4K 120fps, like you’ll find on the aforementioned Xiaomi 17 Ultra and the cheaper 17T Pro. This is a case of Poco limiting its hardware’s capabilities in software, which is a shame, even if most users won’t notice.
That said, the camera app is fully featured and well designed, with an accomplished Pro mode offering the ability to shoot in RAW for those who want to edit images later on their computer.
- Camera score: 4 / 5
- Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 is still excellent
- Nothing slows this thing down
- Bose audio is fun but not a gamechanger
Performance is where Poco phones really shine, and the F9 Ultra is the most performant Poco phone yet. Its flagship-level specs include the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chipset, though this is the same chipset as you'll find in the F8 Ultra. Poco explained this decision to us, so you can see if you agree with the firm's reasoning, but it does appear as though the launch of the F9 series was brought forward this year, because Poco has opted to not use the next-generation flagship Snapdragon chipset, which is usually unveiled in October.
The base $799 / £899 F9 Ultra comes with 12GB RAM and 256GB storage, though there are also 512GB and 1TB storage options available, each offering 16GB RAM. Poco sent me the latter for review, which retails for £1,199 — notably less than the 12GB/256GB Galaxy S26 Ultra, which is £1,279. So, despite some price rises, Poco is still delivering value here for those after the very best specs for the money.
Performance follows, too. I could not get the F9 Ultra to stutter, even when playing Genshin Impact with the settings maxed out — the Pixel 11 Pro XL, by contrast, can’t even load the game.
The impressive thing about the F9 Ultra is its sustained performance under load. Where rival phones can stutter after half an hour or so on Call of Duty: Mobile, the Poco soldiers on (pun intended) without breaking a sweat. The phone didn't overheat once during my time testing it, presumably thanks to the built-in cooling system that Poco says reduces strain on the CPU.
Audio is great thanks to two stereo speakers and the addition of a subwoofer next to the cameras. This is tuned by Bose thanks to a partnership, and promises deeper bass and a wider soundstage. Compared to the Pixel 11 Pro XL and Samsung Galaxy S26 Plus, the Poco F9 Ultra sounds much fuller when playing music out loud or listening to gaming audio, though I don’t think this is a reason to buy the phone. The Bose partnership improves audio slightly, but you will still want headphones connected via Bluetooth for most things.
Now that you can no longer buy the identically priced OnePlus 15 in the US or UK (RIP), the F9 Ultra would have been your best bet for Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5-level power, but the previous-gen F8 Ultra offers incredibly similar performance and is available at the time of publication for £649.
- Performance score: 5 / 5
- HyperOS 3 based on Android 16 at launch
- Some AI tools require account sign in
- Four years of Android updates, six of security
The F9 Ultra gets Xiaomi’s HyperOS 3 Android skin, which at launch is based on Android 16, rather than the latest version, 17. Poco says the phone will get four platform updates, presumably to Android 20, and six years of security updates to keep buyers going until 2032.
HyperOS changes the look of Android to feel a little more like the iPhone’s iOS, but that’s no bad thing as it is perfectly functional, if a little cluttered at times. It’s a shame to see bloatware installed on a phone of this price, with AliExpress, Amazon Music, TikTok, and a few others pre-installed, but they can all be removed.
Going the way of iOS, notifications are a swipe from the left while quick settings are from the right. After I’d wrangled the software a bit during setup, I got it looking cleaner with more icons per row and fewer folders full of apps that are initially presented.
What is thankfully not shoved in your face is AI, even though there is a lot of it on board. There’s a whole section in the settings app called Xiaomi HyperAI, which directs you to Google’s built-in Gemini platform, as well as Xiaomi’s own branded AI tools.
(Image credit: Future)AI Dynamic Wallpapers, AI Writing to generate text, AI Speech Recognition to transcribe audio, AI subtitles for videos — AI everything! In the Gallery app, there are some capable AI editing tools, including a beautify mode that works well. But others, such as an Ultra HD toggle or an Expand feature to generate images, require you to sign in to a Xiaomi account within the settings app.
HyperOS is visually quite different to Google’s Android flavor on the Pixel or the now-barely-seen ‘stock’ Android look, but I’ve warmed to it in recent months. It’s perfectly functional, and mercifully lets you swipe down on notifications to expand them, unlike on fellow Xiaomi stablemate Redmi’s phones.
The software is also very responsive on this hardware. Menus flow, and apps open instantly. I saw and felt no difference between the F9 Ultra and other, more expensive Android flagship phones. It feels faster than Samsung’s S26 series in many ways, though that could be down to Samsung’s slower default animations.
- Software score: 4 / 5
- Two- to three-day battery life
- 100W fast charging but no charger in UK box
- 50W wireless and 27W reverse wired charging
The F9 Ultra has a whopping 8,050mAh silicon-carbon battery. This new tech means phone makers can put higher-density batteries in phones than they could with lithium-ion, resulting in devices of the same physical thickness that last for much longer. Using the F9 Ultra as my main phone for more than a week, I consistently got two days of use out of it, sometimes stretching into a third day’s morning.
That’s seriously good longevity, made even more impressive by the phone’s flagship specs. It’s capable of 100W wired charging, but there is frustratingly no charger in the box for UK buyers. I tested the charging speed of the F9 Ultra using a Vivo 100W charging brick with the ‘Top Speed’ charging setting turned on.
The phone went from dead to 100% in 95 minutes, which is impressive for a battery of this size, and it got to 27% in 15 minutes. You’ll have to fork out for a compatible fast charger, which is a little galling when you’re laying down at least $799 / £899.
The phone also has 50W wireless charging — faster than the S26 Ultra can do via a wired connection (45W) — and can even be used as a power bank for other devices thanks to 27W wired reverse charging and 22.5W reverse wireless charging.
A few phones on the market go for longer, like the Redmi Note 17 Pro Max, but the Poco F9 Ultra gets top marks here for stonking battery life paired with top-tier specs.
Here are the phone's charging speed results broken down:
- In 15 minutes: 27%
- In 30 minutes: 46%
- 0-50%: 33 minutes
- 0-100%: 95 minutes
- Battery score: 5 / 5
Attributes
Notes
Rating
Value
The Poco F9 Ultra offers top specs for a lower price than many of its competitors, but the F8 Ultra has the same chip for less.
4/5
Design
While a refinement on the F8 Ultra, the design is sleek and is as manageable to hold as large phones get.
4/5
Display
A superlative 185Hz display that usually tops out at 120Hz, save for some games. Great peak brightness and extensive customization options.
5/5
Software
HyperOS 3 is a mature and easy to use software skin, though launching on the older Android 16 stings. AI stays out the way if you want it to, which is a win.
4/5
Cameras
Very capable triple cameras led by a 200MP main sensor are a year-over-year upgrade, though they rank a tier below the very best on the market. Still excellent in this price range, though.
4/5
Performance
Incredible performance thanks to Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 and up to 16GB RAM. Sustained performance under load is notably great thanks to strong thermal management. An exemplary gaming phone.
5/5
Battery
Some of the best battery life on a phone with flagship specs thanks to enormous silicon-carbon cell and fast charging, though no charger in the box (in the UK).
5/5
Buy it if...You want the best battery life on a flagship phone
Two days of battery life with a Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 phone is possible with this phone; you may even get three days with careful use. This is the best you can get in the UK with these specs.
You want top gaming performance
No game can bring this thing down. If you fire up triple-A mobile games every day, the F9 Ultra should be at the top of your shopping list.
You want a great, large display
There aren’t many better displays on a smartphone. It’s best suited to mobile gamers, but the 6.9-inch size is strangely manageable thanks to good handset design.
You want to spend as little as possible on these specs
Poco sells a very similar product for less in the F8 Ultra, which is still on sale.
You want the best cameras in this price range
While very capable, you can get better cameras on the Xiaomi 17T Pro for less.
The Poco F9 Ultra is a strong phone in its price range, but there are a couple of similarly priced options worth considering alongside it:
Xiaomi 17T Pro
This phone has very similar specs to the Poco and costs £100 less. It lacks the Snapdragon chip, but has better-tuned cameras and longer software support.
Read our full Xiaomi 17T Pro review
Oppo Find X9 Pro
A phone with noticeably better cameras and very comparable performance is on sale at the time of writing for £899, the same price as the F9 Ultra.
Read our full Oppo Find X9 Pro review
Poco F9 Ultra
Xiaomi 17T Pro
Oppo Find X9 Pro
Price:
$799 / £899
£799
£1,099 (£899 on sale)
Display:
6.9-inch OLED
6.83-inch OLED
6.82-inch OLED
Cameras:
200MP main; 50MP ultra-wide; 50MP 5x telephoto
50MP main; 12MP ultra-wide; 50MP 5x telephoto
200MP main; 50MP ultra-wide; 200MP 3x telephoto; 50MP 10x telephoto
Chipset:
Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5
MediaTek Dimensity 9500
Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5
Battery:
8,050mAh
7,000mAh
7,050mAh
How I tested the Poco F9 Ultra- Review test period: Two weeks
- Testing included: Everyday use with messaging, web browsing, social media, photography, video calling, gaming, streaming video, music streaming
- Tools used: Geekbench 6, 3DMark
☑️ 100s of smartphones reviewed
☑️ 15 years of product testing
☑️ Over 16,000 products reviewed in total
☑️ Nearly 200,000 hours testing tech
I tested the Poco F9 Ultra over the course of two weeks, using it as my main phone with my main SIM card for a week, and as a secondary phone on other days. I used it to make calls, send WhatsApp messages, take video calls, play mobile games, stream podcasts and music, and take scores of photos.
I tested the performance of the phone’s display, chipset, cameras, and battery life for this review, comparing results with Poco’s claims as well as my decade of experience reviewing Android smartphones professionally. I’ve used many of the most recent Android flagship devices the F9 Ultra is gunning for.
I also ran benchmark tests using the Geekbench 6 and 3DMark apps to qualify my performance assessments of the phone.
Read more about how we test here.
- First tested September 2026
Categories: Reviews
Vari Electric Standing Desk with TechTrack review: A desk designed for pros who like to stay organized, productive, and stylish
Unless you’ve done an extensive amount of research, And potentially even for those who have done an extensive amount of research, it would be shocking for most how many standing desk options there are in the wild today.
It’s one thing to look at how the vast majority of these standing desk companies are all shockingly similar. In fact, in my experience, I've noticed some even reuse parts or have quite possibly the same main distributor, with just a white label on it.
But it’s an entirely different game when you look at how Vari chooses to set itself apart. The company has a unique setup process, easy assembly, and now, with the included TechTrack, Vari has decided to step up its game once more.
the TechTrack system has actually changed what having a desk could look like. You're not just putting a desk shelf or accessories on top of your desk; you can actually integrate products into your desk.
There are only a few other desks that I've seen that have done something like this, where they have changed from the standardized slab of wood or material. Every time, I've loved it, as it is a decision to change the game without reinventing the entire wheel.
Vari Electric Standing Desk with TechTrack: Price and availability(Image credit: Collin Probst // Future )The Vari Electric Standing Desk with TechTrack is available direct from Vari in a range of styles, with prices starting at $949. However, at the time of review, it's discounted to $760.
I chose the walnut desltop with black frame, although I am a big fan of some of the other color options too. Speaking of options, there is also a ton of TechTrack accessories including a phone holder, a shelf, a laptop stand, and a tablet stand.
The only thing I can compare it to is something almost like taking the ingenuity and brilliance of the Balolo Desk Shelf and building it into a desktop. It allows for sleek, customizable modularity in a way that is not otherwise attainable.
(Image credit: Collin Probst // Future )Vari Electric Standing Desk with TechTrack: Unboxing and First ImpressionsVari does a phenomenal job, or should I say a very good job, at packaging and creating an unboxing experience. I have unboxed a lot of desks and gear at this point, and Vari is still one of the top unboxing experiences. It's seamless, it's easy, and it feels very well thought through.
For this desk specifically, Vari recommends assembling the legs while the desktop is still in the shipping box to help reduce the risk of scratches from the TechTrack system.
I didn't think that was possible until I was putting together another desk I'm currently testing, and I scratched both the floor I was assembling on and the desktop itself when a rogue screw fell underneath the desktop. It turns out following instructions is a brilliant idea. Who would have thought it?
The assembly process may not be everything, but it does have a good indicator of how the rest of the product will operate. For most of its life, all of these tasks are very similar. It's a wooden slab on top of some legs where you can put all your desk accessories.
However, with this desk, the process is extremely easy to follow, ensuring you do it right without any mess-ups and quickly. This already sets you off for success, making you believe that this desk is the best from the very moment you have it.
Vari Electric Standing Desk with TechTrack: Design & Build QualityObviously, the big deal here is the TechTrack system, but beyond that, another big deal for this desk is that the desktop and legs are also great to start with. Anybody can toss a flashy new gadget on a desk and think that it's special.
Vari decided to upgrade one of its highest-end and one of their already popular desks. It was a true upgrade. That, combined with TechTrack accessories that are actually useful and helpful for professionals made this release a slam dunk.
Vari Electric Standing Desk with TechTrack: In use(Image credit: Collin Probst // Future )When I use standing desks, I use them to their fullest extent. By this, I mean I will, multiple times an hour:
- change the height of the desk
- utilize the presets
- load down the desks with quite a bit of gear
- build out each desk to be pretty advanced
Some people use a standing desk to feel better and stand up once a day or once a week. I use it to change my thoughts, make sure I'm staying fresh, or even just to keep my toes under the fire and get all my standing time in.
By being honest, I've even had times when I'll stand just to make sure I don't have to leave a meeting early to go to the bathroom. All that said, I've put this desk through a very similar test, and so has my team.
We've used this desk day in and day out for almost 150 days now, so that time has been with me. That time has been with other people I have helping test these desks.
The point is that we've actually put it through the wringer. We've tried it in more than just a studio setting for an hour under special lighting. Through that time, we've proven and have the experience that the stability on this desk is spectacular, even at full extension.
For me, I usually have at least one preset at full extension, especially if I have more than two presets. That is because then I can frequently use them to put chairs under or feel like the desk is up and out of the way. At the absolute highest the electronics will let it go, I still don't worry about my gear wobbling or a monitor tipping over.
Another thing to note is that even with our 60-inch-wide desk, which is fairly large, I don't experience any sway while playing or using it day-to-day. While moving up and down, the motors operate smoothly and quietly.
Vari Electric Standing Desk with TechTrack: Final verdict(Image credit: Collin Probst // Future )In short, this is a desk you should consider if you have a knick-knack or 17 on your desk and you're still trying to find a way to organize your series workflow.
This is the kind of desk you want if you are into gadgets. This is also the kind of desk you should consider if you have a few gadgets on your desk and want to project a professional image.
However, if you're the kind of person who just throws things on their desk, doesn't really care, or is going to stay seated at all times, then you can probably find another desk that fits your budget and desires a little better.
This is the desk meant for those who like to be organized, get things done, and do it in style. There's a handful of areas that always make sense to spend a little more, and in my view, I stay in this because I'm quickly becoming one of them.
Collin Probst // Future Collin Probst // Future Collin Probst // Future Collin Probst // Future Collin Probst // FutureFor more office furniture, we've tested the best standing desks and the best office chairs.
Categories: Reviews
I was ready to call these the best open earbuds ever, and they're incredibly cheap — but one recurring issue ruined it all
Soundpeats Pop Clip2: Two-minute review
There's a version of this Soundpeats Pop Clip2 that you'll never read. After several weeks with the Soundpeats Clip1's cheaper successor, I was half-way through writing a five-star review which declared them the best open earbuds you could buy. That version is, as you can already tell, not this version of the review.
You see, the longer I used the Soundpeats Pop Clip2, the more I had to contend with some annoying issues; the kind of problem which often emerge after months or years of use, especially in cheaper tech, but shouldn't be affecting the buds after just a few weeks.
For example, I had an issue with the charging case, where it wouldn't reliably power up the buds. Sometimes I'd take them out, only to find them drained. My biggest problem, though, was with connectivity: they'd often fail to connect to my phone, or repeatedly drop out while I was running. A few times, when I needed some buds for a cycle or run, I'd just use the recently-reviewed Baseus Bowie MC2 rather than try and fight with the Pop Clip 2.
It's a shame, because aside from these common cheap-bud problems, the Soundpeats Pop Clip 2 are genuinely fantastic earbuds. Or is it the Soundpeats UU2? Depending on where you live, they're called one or the other, but in many countries the brand is using both names. Confusing. I’m going to be using the former name, because it simply makes more sense.
The Soundpeats Pop Clip2 have to be some of the best-sounding clip-style earbuds I’ve heard: they have a nice simple V-shaped sound, offering bass with ‘oomph’ but tone, and clear crisp treble. They don’t re-invent the wheel, but nimbly avoid all the issues that come with audio in buds of this form factor.
They tick loads of other boxes too: they last longer than most rivals, fit really well, and offer a solid list of features like spatial audio, sound leak prevention and water drainage.
Perhaps most importantly, Soundpeats has defied our price-hike current state of living by dropping the price of the Pop Clip2 (compared to the predecessor). And not by a few pennies either: $20 in the US, £15 in the UK, $9.99 in Australia (okay, that one’s not a dramatic drop). The brand already had some of the best value open-ears on the market, and it’s really pressing its advantage here.
But because of the connection problems, they're a write-off, right? Uh, I'm not so sure. These problems were persistent, but not consistent. I frequently went for hours without a connection drop or problem, and found ways to cater for some of the quirks. As I write this mini-review, I've been seated at my desk and listening for three hours straight, without any problem. But I know if I went outdoors, they'd be less reliable.
I wish I could recommend the Soundpeats whole-heartedly, and the issues make that impossible. But it's possible that your mileage will vary, or that the brand will fix some of the connection issues through software patches.
Soundpeats Pop Clip2 review: Price and release date(Image credit: Future)- Launched in August 2026
- Sells for $49.99 / £59.99 / AU$70
- Cheaper than predecessors and other rivals
The Soundpeats Pop Clip2 were unveiled on August 10, 2026, just nine months after the unveiling of their predecessors, the Soundpeats Clip1. That’s not a long time to wait for them to… pop out.
At launch, the buds were tapped for a $49.99 / £59.99 / AU$70 asking price, which is cheaper than the $69.99 / £74.99 / AU$79.99 asking price of the last model. But just two weeks after release, I’m finding them available for £36 in the UK, so they may be even cheaper than reported. Let me be clear: this is rock-bottom prices territory from a trusted brand.
OK, they’re not technically the cheapest open earbuds around — there are options in the backrooms of Amazon and AliExpress that are much cheaper — but they’re the cheapest from a known, respected name in audio (notwithstanding sales on Soundcore, Baseus and Earfun products, which see them dip below Soundpeats’ cost).
The thing is, value only comes into effect if the performance is worth even the nominal outlay you'll have to part with to own them. So let's dig into that.
Soundpeats Pop Clip2 review: SpecsDrivers
12mm
Active noise cancellation
No
Battery life
10 hours (buds), 42 hours (case)
Weight
5.1g (buds), 47.7g (case)
Connectivity
Bluetooth 6.0
Frequency response
Not specified
Waterproofing
IPX5
Soundpeats Pop Clip2 review: Features(Image credit: Future)- Solid 10h/42h battery life
- App offers loads of features
- Connectivity problems plague experience
The Soundpeats Pop Clip2 offer a 10-hour battery life per bud, and in testing they lasted that long regularly. According to the brand, the case offers a total of up to 42 hours. Both of those sums are a little above average, and I'd say they're enough for most uses.
There's no ANC here, but the Soundpeats app offers basically every other feature under the sun. There's spatial audio, find my earbuds, a low-latency gaming mode, a privacy mode to reduce sound leakage, a drainage function to shake water droplets out if the buds get wet, a dynamic EQ tool which adjusts your sound on the fly, and of course an equalizer.
This latter lets you choose between a range of presets based on genre, though it turns off dynamic EQ and spatial audio. There's an adaptive and custom mode too, but for some reason, you can only use these if you create a free Soundpeats account. Locking an essential tool unless someone hands you their email? Thumbs down from me.
In the Soundpeats app, you can also toggle LDAC and set up multi-point connection, as well as change what the gesture controls do.
(Image credit: Future)Now, it's time to get to the elephant in the room, the one I mentioned in the review introduction. I had a bad time with the Soundpeats Pop Clip2's connectivity (or lack thereof).
Frequently, I'd remove the buds from the case, only for one to fail to connect. I never figured out a solution to this issue, though sometimes holding the 'on' button kicked it into gear, and it often prompted me to just pick up a rival pair of buds which actually connected.
Even when the Clip2 did connect, I'd sometimes have to contend with drop outs or a stuttery connection, particularly on whichever of the buds was furthest from the phone. And I wasn't using the buds at the extreme of their connection range; my phone could literally be in one hand, and the bud on the other side of my face would keep dropping out.
So, despite the use of Bluetooth 6.0 (and, of course, my attempts to fix the problem by changing phones and updating the firmware), connection is a real issue here. Depending on the root cause, it could be fixable with a software patch, but it might be an intrinsic problem with the buds.
- Features score: 3.5/5
- Few differences from predecessor
- Case is small, but with problems
- Earbuds fit reliably and comfortably
The big Soundpeats Pop Clip2 difference from its predecessor is the case, which is smaller and more convenient to tote around. It's a small pebble, weighing 47.7g, which fits in a pocket with no problem.
There is a problem, but it's inside. Like in some other cheap earbuds I've tested, the charging pins in the Clip2 case can often get stuck down. These are those shiny needles which touch the connectors on an earbud, in order to power it up while it's in the case, depressing as they do. In some cases, they can fail to spring back up, sometimes stopping working entirely.
I often managed to free the charging pins by pressing them down and wiggling, but often I only knew to do this when a bud had failed to charge. That is to say, there's a manual solution, but I would've preferred earbuds that just worked.
(Image credit: Future)Charging issues aside, the buds work great, which is no surprise given that they're almost identical from the wonderful previous-generation Clips. they're light, at roughly 5g per unit, and you can easily forget you're wearing them.
The fit is solid, and I never found any issues with them shaking or falling out of place while I was on a run. When it comes to the Pop Clip2's actual earpieces, I have no notes.
This extends to the on-bud controls. Instead of relying on a large and vague tap control, Soundpeats has placed a physical button on each bud, which is easiest to press by pinching the body of the device. This is easy to trigger, even when you're active, and a satisfying 'click' lets you know your gesture has been accepted.
A note to buyers: head to the app and customize what single, double-, triple-tap and long-held functions do. I didn't love the default options, but luckily it's easy to change.
- Design score: 4/5
- These are the best open earbuds I've heard
- Lovely balanced sound with plenty of customization
- 12mm drivers, LDAC and Hi-Res Audio Wireless
Several open earbuds makers have experimented with different multi-driver set-ups in order to solve the core problem with the form factor – getting good sound is incredibly tricky when the bud is far from your ear – and yet somehow Soundpeats has made the biggest leaps with a single driver.
Put simply, the Pop Clip 2 are the best-sounding open earbuds I’ve used to date, a compliment that’s a little limited in its reach but no less earnest for it. Each bud has a 12mm dual-magnetic driver, which according to Soundpeats has been tuned for “deep bass”, and seems on paper at least to match the Clip1’s driver. In practice, though, it performs a lot better.
By default, the earbuds have a fairly neutral sound profile, not favoring bass, mids or treble too heavily, and that’s pretty rare for exercise buds. In Handle With Care by Traveling Wilburys, I was surprised to hear the various rhythmic and harmonic instruments alongside the vocals and bass, and in Cinnamon by The Long Winters, it was easy to pick out the various simultaneous guitar lines which, in worse earbuds, blur together.
(Image credit: Future)Despite this neutral focus, treble and bass are both handled well: the latter is bright, clear and crisp, the latter well-defined and energetic. And, thankfully, my Clip1 gripe about the max volume being too low has been fixed.
The buds’ sound can be pulled six ways from Sunday if you’ll let them too. In the dynamic mode, the bass and treble were boosted for a lovely V-shaped audio which gave Two Door Cinema Club’s Sleep Alone a lovely, bouncing energy.
Contributing to the sound is the Bluetooth codec support which Soundpeats has added — at least the connection works in one way. The buds support LDAC, and are certified for Hi-Res Audio Wireless, which isn’t something you can say about every set of open earbuds.
Of course, much of your enjoyment will depend on how you listen. No matter how good open-ears sound in the comfort of your home, the sound quality will plummet when you step outdoors into the busy word. But that’s the nature of the beast with these buds, and the dynamic equalizer went further than most in balancing for these issues.
- Sound quality: 5/5
- Should be top-value earbuds
- Unfortunately, longevity isn't guaranteed
The Soundpeats Pop Clip2 sound fantastic and offer a solid range of features, despite being some of the cheapest open earbuds worth buying. They should be five-star buys.
Unfortunately, that appraisal would be forgetting the connection and case issues, two problems which sadly aren't uncommon in low-cost earbuds.
With that in mind, you're basically getting what you pay for, matching the promise of other same-price rivals: these are buds which work very well, but may stop working well before their time.
- Value: 3.5/5
Attributes
Notes
Rating
Features
The feature set is impressive, but consistent connection problems make using the buds a drag.
3.5/5
Design
The buds are smartly-designed and fit reliably and comfortably. Unfortunately, the case has a flaw.
4/5
Sound quality
They're the best open-ear buds I've ever tested (admittedly, of a limited pool).
5/5
Value
It's a fantastic package, but the various problems suggest a short lifespan.
3.5/5
Buy them if…You need good-sounding open-ears
Most don't buy this form factor for the sound quality, but if you want something great-sounding, the Clip2 are second to none.
You want open-ears which fit reliably
Not once during many weeks of testing did the Clip2 ever fall out of my ears or ache during a workout.
You're on a budget
Don't buy super-cheap options for pennies. This is the cheapest option you should consider.View Deal
You need something reliable
My Clip2 worked well when I found my way around their flaws. If you want something that works perfectly without having to put in the work, just skip these.
You want something that sounds good, full stop.
Just because these are the best-sounding open earbuds, doesn't mean they're fantastic in the grand scheme of things. If you want workout headphones with fantastic sound, you need something with an in-ear seal, or over-ears.
Looking for other affordable clip-style earbuds? Here are a few we've tested and would recommend.
Soundpeats Pop Clip2
Baseus Bowie MC2
Anker Soundcore AeroClip
Drivers
12mm
11mm
12mm
Active noise cancellation
No
No
No
Battery life (ANC on)
10 hours (buds), 42 hours (case)
11.5 hours (buds), 55 hours (case)
8 hours (buds), 24 hours (case)
Weight
5g (buds), 47.7g (case)
5.1g (buds), 51g (case)
6g (buds), 42g (case)
Connectivity
Bluetooth 6.0
Bluetooth 6.0
Bluetooth 5.4
Waterproofing
IPX5
IP67
IPX4
Baseus Bowie MC2
The buds I tested before the Clip2, which I kept cheating on the Soundpeats with, don't sound as good or have the same feature set. But they're more reliable and last for longer between charges.
Read our full Baseus Bowie MC2 review
Anker Soundcore AeroClip
These earbuds have decreased in price since they were released, so they now rival the Soundpeats. They sound great and have an app that is chock-full of features, even if other specs aren't as impressive.
Read our full Anker Soundcore AeroClip review
- Tested for roughly four weeks
- Paired with two different Android phones for music, podcasts, movies and games
- Used on runs, at gym, at desk and during travels
To write this full review, I used the Soundpeats Pop Clip2 for the best part of one month. In that time, I used it paired to two different Android smartphones: the Fairphone 6 Plus and Samsung Galaxy Z Fold.
To test the earbuds, I used them for various fitness activities including walks, runs, cycles and trips to the gym. I also used them while working at my desk, on the train and on a flight. Mostly, my listening was done on Spotify, but I also used Tidal and several video streaming services, played games and conducted calls with them.
I've been reviewing for TechRadar since early 2019, and over the last few years, that's included plenty of open earbuds, including the stablemates of the product here, the Soundpeats Clip1. I've also used various other Soundpeats headphones and earbuds.
- First reviewed in September 2026
Categories: Reviews
“In terms of price-to-performance, it’s hard to beat”: This Xbox gamepad might be better value than Microsoft’s version — but there’s one feature I desperately wish it had
Drakong Challenger: One-minute review
The Drakong Challenger takes aim at the budget controller market by offering a basic but high-performing pad. On the style front, the Challenger is very much a case of function over form. You’d be hard-pressed to tell it apart from your run-of-the-mill Xbox controller, although the green rings around the thumbsticks are one notable point of difference.
Just like that controller, the Challenger is very comfortable in the hand. It’s also surprisingly well-made, with a solid shell and planted buttons. What’s more, it’s pleasingly light, making it easy to use for long periods. All this makes it one of the best Xbox Controllers at the budget end of the sector in terms of construction.
(Image credit: Future)Although there’s no software to accompany the Challenger, you can assign the back buttons quite easily using the M button. A rumble notifies you when your assignments have been confirmed, which is a useful indicator.
The Challenger impresses in action. The triggers and sticks are as smooth and precise as you would expect from their Hall Effect technology, while the D-pad and face buttons are satisfyingly damped and quick to respond and rebound. The back buttons are a little less tactile, but they suffice nonetheless.
Given how inexpensive it is, you’d seriously have to consider the Challenger over a standard Xbox controller or any other, for that matter, so long as wireless connectivity is something you’re willing to sacrifice.
(Image credit: Future)Drakong Challenger review: Price & availability- $34.99 (about £25 / AU$50)
- One month of Game Pass Ultimate included
- Good price-to-performance ratio
The Drakong Challenger costs $34.99 (about £25 / AU$50) and is available now. It comes with a USB-C cable, as well as a code for a one-month free trial of Game Pass Ultimate.
The Challenger is cheaper than the official Xbox Wireless Controller, although that gamepad has the advantage of wireless connectivity. However, it doesn’t include a rechargeable battery as standard, nor does it have customizable back buttons.
If you want something a little more feature-packed, but don’t want to spend a huge amount, the Turtle Beach Pacific Skyline is a good alternative. It has companion software that can be used to remap buttons, as well as adjust vibration intensity and thumbstick dead zones. Also, the controller itself is far more vibrant than the Challenger — and many other controllers, for that matter.
Drakong Challenger review: SpecsPrice
$34.99 (about £25 / AU$50)
Weight
7.23oz / 205g
Dimensions
6.3 x 2.5 x 4.4in / 160 x 63.5 x 111.8mm
Compatibility
PC, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Xbox One
Connection type
Wired (USB-C), 3.5mm AUX (headset)
(Image credit: Future)Drakong Challenger review: Design- Classic Xbox controller design
- Light yet solid construction
- No accompanying software
As far as looks go, the Challenger barely departs from the traditional Xbox design. It has the same shape, size, and layout, with the only additional flourishes being green rings around the sticks and a subtle outline around the two halves of the pad. There’s no RGB lighting, despite what those aforementioned stick rings may lead you to believe.
However, all this isn’t to say the Challenger has a disappointing construction. After all, to many gamers, the Xbox controller form is comfortable and practical. And despite the plastics not feeling particularly premium, the Challenger is surprisingly solid and pleasingly light at the same time, which is always a winning combination.
(Image credit: Future)What’s more, the sticks and buttons are well fitted with no play in them at all, which isn’t something that can be said about most budget controllers. The back of the handles is textured for added traction, but the improvement is marginal given how subtle this texture is.
There’s no software available to customize the Challenger, but there are two mappable back buttons. I couldn’t find information on how to map them anywhere, but thankfully it’s a fairly simple process to figure out. You simply press the M button and a back button simultaneously until you feel a rumble, then press the button you want to assign and another rumble will confirm its activation.
The Challenger has no wireless connectivity, which is a shame but understandable at this price point. The included USB cable is quite long, but it isn’t finished in a braided fabric, which is something you often find on the best gaming mice to improve flexibility and reduce drag. It does at least seem quite durable, and the connection at either end was solid in my experience, despite the small amount of superficial wobbling at the controller end.
(Image credit: Future)Drakong Challenger review: Performance- Solid and responsive buttons
- Precise and tactile triggers and sticks
- Easy connectivity to Xbox and PC
The Drakong Challenger might be a budget controller, but that’s not something you’ll notice when gaming with it, as every input is smooth, solid, and precise. The face buttons are also well damped and very responsive, rebounding quickly to allow for easy spamming when needed. The same goes for the D-pad, and despite its traditional four-pronged hat, it felt comfortable in my thumb, even when performing rolls and frantic inputs in Tekken 8.
On the shoulder buttons, the texture is subtle but noticeable, and feels quite nice on the fingers, although I’m not sure it provides much in the way of traction. The Hall Effect triggers are light but offer a surprising amount of control, which was especially helpful when accelerating and braking in Assetto Corsa. The Hall Effect thumbsticks were accurate and responsive when steering, too, as well as when aiming in S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl. I also appreciated their soft, grippy coating and textured rims for added purchase and feedback.
(Image credit: Future)The two back buttons are easy to reach, but they don’t feel quite as tactile as the other inputs, lacking depth of travel and dampening by comparison. Also, I found them quite easy to trigger accidentally, even when I didn’t have a particularly tight grip on the pad.
Surprisingly for an inexpensive controller, the Challenger features a headset jack. The cable connection is solid, and I didn’t notice any loss in audio quality relative to connections made elsewhere.
As for the pad itself, I had no issues connecting it via the USB cable to either an Xbox Series X or to my PC, being just as easy to use with the latter as the best PC controllers.
Should I buy the Drakong Challenger?Buy it if…You want a solid build
Despite how light it is, the Challenger’s shell and buttons are surprisingly sturdy.
You want great value
In terms of price-to-performance, it’s hard to beat this controller.
You want to go wireless
Part of the cost-cutting comes from its wired connectivity, which might seem a little outmoded in 2026.
You want to tweak inputs
You can remap the back buttons, but not any of the others. You can’t alter the behavior of the sticks and triggers, either — a missed opportunity given their Hall Effect tech.
Drakong Challenger
Xbox Wireless Controller
Turtle Beach Pacific Skyline
Price
$34.99 (about £25 / AU$50)
$59.99 / £54.99 / AU$74.99
$89.99 / £79.99 / around AU$150
Weight
7.23oz / 205g
9.76oz / 275g
7.04oz / 200g
Dimensions
6.3 x 2.5 x 4.4in / 160 x 63.5 x 111.8mm
6.02 x 4.01 x 2.40in / 153 x 102 x 61mm
6.22 x 4.09 x 2.36in / 158 x 104 x 60mm
Compatibility
PC, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Xbox One
Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Xbox One, PC, Android, iOS
PC, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Xbox One
Connection type
Wired (USB-C), 3.5mm AUX (headset)
Wireless (Xbox, Bluetooth), Wired (USB-C)
Bluetooth, Wired (USB-C), 2.4Ghz wireless dongle
Battery life
N/A
20-40 hours
~20 hours
Xbox Wireless Controller
It’s hard to go wrong with Microsoft’s official controller for its console (and other platforms). But although it’s wireless, it doesn’t come with a rechargeable battery by default; that’s an optional extra on a controller that already costs more than the Challenger. It doesn’t have back buttons, either. Read our full Xbox Wireless Controller review.
Xbox Wireless Controller
It’s hard to go wrong with Microsoft’s official controller for its console (and other platforms). But although it’s wireless, it doesn’t come with a rechargeable battery by default; that’s an optional extra on a controller that already costs more than the Challenger. It doesn’t have back buttons, either. Read our full Xbox Wireless Controller review.
- Tested for several days
- Played a variety of games
- Experienced with many other gamepads
I tested the Challenger for several days, using it for a variety of games and on both PC and Xbox.
I played Assetto Corsa to test the triggers, and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl to test the precision of the sticks. I also played Tekken 8 to test the responsiveness and comfort of the D-pad and face buttons.
I’ve been gaming for decades and have used a wide variety of systems and controllers in that time. I’ve also reviewed a range of them, from simple budget-friendly affairs to feature-packed premium offerings.
- Read more about how we test
- First reviewed: September 2026
Categories: Reviews
Even Realities G2 smart glasses show the limits of speaker- and camera-free frames
Even Realities Even G2 Smart Glasses: 30-second Review
It's a weird time for smart glasses. After a moment in the sun (as sunglasses!) where companies like Meta sold millions of frames to willing customers seeking on-their-face intelligence and the ability to life-log with ever-present, eyebrow-level cameras, the worm has turned. Now people refer to smart glasses with cameras as "pervert glasses". Even Realities Even G2 smart display glasses (Even Realities G2) would seem to be the antidote to those concerns.
The relatively stylish specs live up to the smart expectations by connecting you to phone-based AI and delivering useful information to your eyes where and when you need it, but without the concerning cameras.
In some ways, Even Realities' approach is rather quaint. Instead of Augmented Reality, you get binocular, monochromatic waveguide displays that offer eye-level access to notifications, notes, translations, news, even a teleprompter, that only you can see. The imagery is sharp, but not rich. It's glanceable info that could be handy in a pinch, but is also stuff you can easily ignore.
Even Realities G2 glasses pictured with the included charging case and optional R1 smart ring on its charging base. (Image credit: Lance Ulanoff / Future)These are smart lenses in the narrowest sense. They have four mics for listening, but no speakers. The microphones let you summon the AI (Even AI), which lives on the Even Realities iPhone app, but with no speakers, Even can't talk back to you. Even AI's responses appear before you as text on the waveguide screens.
The AI is not quite good enough to fully control the glasses, but that's where the gestures come in. While Even's G2 glasses look much like any other analog pair you'd wear, each arm ends in a large pill shape that houses the batteries and touch sensors. If you don't want to keep touching behind your ear, you can buy the $249 Even R1 ring, which Even Realities did supply to me. You wear the R1 on your index finger and use your thumb to recreate the taps, long presses, and swipes you'd do on the glasses. The Ring also records temperature, heart, and step measurements, readouts of which you can view on the glasses.
It's easy to see (pun intended) how useful these could be for turn-by-turn directions delivered from the app's map to the screen, and teleprompter text gently scrolling up, but inconsistent operation, missing features, finicky controls, and an overall feeling of, "Do I really need this?" left me wondering if half-way smart glasses are worth making the trip at all.
Even Realities Even G2 Smart Glasses: Price and availabilityEven Realities G2 smart glasses were unveiled earlier this year and are now shipping for $599 / £599 / AU$649. If you need prescription lenses, which they do support, be sure to factor that into the price (expect at least another $150). My review unit arrived with my prescription in place, and I often forgot I was wearing them.
Even in monochrome, in-lens displays are a premium feature, which accounts for a price tag that’s considerably more than, say, Meta’s recently launched $299 EssilorLuxottica smart glasses, which do feature a camera and speakers.
- Value: 3.5/5
- Thin, light, and durable
- Premium materials
- Mostly look like regular glasses
- Comfortable
- Stem bulbs look a little odd but are mostly hidden
Even Realities G2 display smart glasses are easily the most normal-looking smart glasses I've ever seen or worn. The gray titanium-and-magnesium frames are thin, light, and quite stylish. Where many smart glasses are bulky, heavy, or uncomfortable (or look ridiculous), Even Realities G2 frames are as comfortable as my regular prescription glasses. Yes, the stems end in pill-shaped nodules that house sensors and the batteries, but those elements are mostly hidden behind the ears.
The glasses ship with extra stem covers for comfort and a larger set of nose pads, though I was fine with the default set. There’s also an included charging case.
I didn’t think they looked bad, though my wife, who noticed that, unlike standard glasses, the fronts of the G2 lenses are flat and reflective, called them weird. “They don’t have cameras," I added hopefully.
I asked her if she could see anything on the lens, meaning the display I was viewing. She said no, but still remained unmoved. Some people are never gonna love smart glasses of any stripe, even ones I think look almost like regular glasses.
- Design score: 4/5
- Solid waveguide technology
- Low resolution but mostly fit for purpose
- Virtually large enough to be useful
- Plenty bright
Even Realities G2 glasses use micro-LEDs embedded in the frames and waveguide technology, which basically guides the 640 x 350 monochrome (day-glo green) imagery in front of both eyes. Remarkably, the embedded displays are almost imperceptible to the naked eye (even with content running on them).
With my prescription lenses, the single-floating-image effect is perfect. The bright green imagery looks like a monochrome, 15-inch display floating in front of my face. It sits slightly above my eyeline, meaning I could easily look below the display to see what’s in front of me or just slightly up to see the display. It’s not so high on the frame that if you’re looking at the display, someone will think you’re not looking at them.
Even in daylight, the 1,200 nit display is clear, sharp, and very viewable. There are settings to adjust the display brightness, and while the resolution sounds low, you don’t need much for what is essentially CRT-grade imagery.
- Display score: 4/5
- There aren't a lot of features
- Main menu access takes practice
- Teleprompt is a highlight
- News feed is nice to have
- Translate could be useful if you remember to pre-set your language choices for the location
- Navigation purposely is missing a key feature
- No real access to smartphone features
- AI shows promise but has noted limited access
While you might imagine a certain level of complexity with smart glasses, Even Realities keeps it pretty simple. The Dashboard, which you raise with a double tap on one of the stem sensors (or on the optional ring), reminds me of one of those old 1990s personal assistant devices or even a slightly more informative digital clock. There’s a large time readout on the left, with smaller, dare I call them digital watch-like complication elements arrayed around it. At the top is the day and date. To the right is the battery life of the glasses and, if you have it, the R1 smart ring. On the bottom left is the local temperature, and to the right of that is the number of notifications. To the right is a large square news feed.
With another sensor tap, I can open the feed and swipe backwards on the sensor to scroll through it. One more tap opens a news item, which, yes, I can scroll through by swiping on the stem sensor. You can see why someone might want to opt for the R1 ring. Who wants to be touching and swiping near their ear all the time?
(Image credit: Future)Double taps pull you back out of the news feed, all the way to the Dashboard.
One of the less obvious interactions is how you bring up the main menu. I must admit, it took me a while to get the hang of the tap-and-hold gesture to open it. Once you master that — assuming you do — you get just seven options:
- Notifications
- Conversate
- Teleprompt
- Translate
- Navigate
- Dashboard
- Silent Mode
You can swipe up or down to go through them and tap to open one. The gesture-based control system is so finicky that I often ended up in the wrong place, and there’s no confirmation; the system simply starts, for instance, “Coversate,” which is basically a speech-to-text note-taking app.
More interesting is Teleprompt, the one feature that could potentially be the reason someone invests in these glasses. As the name suggests, it puts a teleprompter that no one else can see in front of your face.
(Image credit: Future)To test it, I imported some text into the app (it supports txt, Docx, and PDFs). The app lets you expand or contract the margins, which controls the length of each line you read, but it lacks a way to control the line spacing — a key teleprompter feature. On the glasses, the text appears in front of you, and voice recognition detects you saying each word. As a result, there’s no need to mess with speed or stop and start the text scroll. It’s all controlled by your voice. That’s pretty cool.
Unfortunately, you might look a little odd while using it. I took a picture of myself while reading a script and noticed that I was looking up instead of at the audience in front of me. The key to teleprompters is that they're usually projected over, say, a camera lens, so you are reading while looking directly into the camera. To use Even Realities G2 for this task, you have to look up just a little bit.
(Image credit: Future)Navigate launches turn-by-turn directions, but you can’t do much until you put locations in the iPhone app’s navigation section. I added my home and office addresses and then used them to start navigating from my current location. The only two navigation options are walking or cycling. That's because Even Realities intentionally excluded driving directions, as they might be too distracting in a heads-up display. I disagree with their exclusion.
Glancing at monochrome, see-through, heads-up directions while driving should not be distracting, but I'm not going to argue with the safety concern. Still, I suggested to them that they think about enabling driving directions that can be reviewed before starting the trip and then use detection of the iPhone's Driving Mode to disable that feature as soon as you start driving.
As for what navigation looks like, there’s a small turn-by-turn map on the lower left, distance and time to destination on the upper right, time and a walking icon on the upper left, and next turn on the lower left. Another tap on the sensor shows the full map route, which is a bright green line on a dimmer green map with no labels. I'm not sure how useful that is.
The Translate feature works pretty well, although despite the onboard mics, it does not auto-detect languages. Instead, I had to choose the to-and-from-translation languages in the app. Then, when I played a Spanish-language video, I watched the live translation on screen. Basically, before you go to a different country, you’d want to pre-load the appropriate language settings.
(Image credit: Future)Silent mode instantly turns the G2 frames into dumb glasses, silencing all notifications and ensuring the screen doesn’t turn on, which it can even when you tip your head up. To un-silence it, you put one finger on each sensor.
Of course, there is AI, in the form of Even AI, which I summoned by saying, “Hey Even”. It wasn't the best at listening and getting my requests right, and there are many, many things it cannot do. Even AI has no access to your phone at large, just the app and its relatively limited features.
(Image credit: Future)I did have some success. For instance, when I asked about the latest news on tech companies, I got a nice summary that I could read on the display.
I struggled to get notifications working, though. I was unaware of texts, Slacks, and incoming emails – basically anything I really needed.
Things did not improve when I tried to get clever. I had this idea that I could have the shopping list in my iPhone Notes app float in front of me while I walked around the grocery store. Yet, when I asked Even AI to read my files from the Notes app, it told me it couldn’t access them, but I could access the App’s Quick List. So I tried to build a Quick List, but every time I tried, the glasses would state “Quick List saved” before I even gave it a list. Then it had a bug where it told me the “Command execution” failed. Not useful.
- Performance score: 3.5/5
- Small-ish battery on the glasses (to save the design)
- Sizable battery is included in charging case
Even Realities G2 smart glasses are equipped with a 192mAh battery rated to last two days. My first charge ran out after three days of intermittent use. The included charging case has a 2,000mAh battery for up to seven recharges.
Considering there’s no camera, I would expect a longer battery life, but I think Even Realities purposely sacrificed some battery capacity for its exceptionally svelte style.
- Battery score: 3.5/5
Attribute
Comment
Score
Value
A bit pricey for what they do. You end up paying a premium for the impressive waveguide technology and their normal-glasses style.
3.5/5
Design
The rare smart glasses that's thin, light, and kind of attractive, if you ignore the oddness of the flat lenses (only on the front).
4/5
Display
The low resolution waveguide displays are used to mostly good effect here. Everything is bright, sharp, and readable.
4.5/5
Software and Performance
Even Realities software and operation on the G2 smart glasses is a true mixed bag, with inconsistent performance and only occasional delight. The relatively spare features do not really sell it as a must-have wearable.
3.5/5
Battery
Tiny batteries on the glasses can stretch to a few days use, but it's the charging case that saves the day.
3.5/5
Buy it if…You want camera-free smart glasses
The Even Realities G2 does away with the one thing that's freaking people out — at least when it comes to smart glasses
You want on your face teleprompter
The voice-activated teleprompter feature is cool
You wanted full-featured smart glasses
Even Realities G2 offers baseline features and decent AI, but it's not enough to make this a truly compelling wearable
You don’t want to spend almost twice as much as the nearest smart glasses
Even Realities G2 offers less for more, reminding you how expensive it is to build in-lens display wear.
You want cameras and audio
These glasses are not the smart glasses for you
Weighing just 76g, the X3 Pro proves that cutting-edge AR hardware no longer has to crush your nose. The display is a genuine glimpse of the future. But the future has a small battery, and the X3 Pro's 245mAh cell is, alongside the price, the device's biggest obstacle.
Read our RayNeo X3 Pro reviewView Deal
Xreal Air 2
If you want to stick with Xreal, the Xreal Air 2 or its electrochromic dimming-enhanced Xreal Air 2 Pro are both solid options that cost a little less – though expect a slightly lower-quality image and noticeably inferior audio.
Read our Xreal Air 2 reviewView Deal
Meta Quest 3
While not a direct competitor to Xreal’s glasses, the Quest 3 is an XR product that you should consider if you want to experience what VR and MR have to offer – it’s simply superb.
Read our Meta Quest 3 reviewView Deal
I spent the last week or so wearing these glasses instead of my normal prescription eyewear. I tried all the features and sometimes used the smart ring to control them.
- First reviewed September 2026
Categories: Reviews
Prusa CORE One+ INDX 8-Tool 3D printer review: This beast makes rival multicolor 3D printers feel slow
Prusa is at the heart of the open-source 3D printing community, and this machine really shows it, as its partnership with Bondtech has produced one of the finest machines on the market today.
What's even more surprising is that you can buy the simple four-tool kit for less than £2,000/$2,000 assembled, and the eight-tool set that I'm looking at in this review is a touch over that £2,000/$2,000.
That money not only gets you access to eight-tool printing, but also to one of the most reliable and solid-performing 3D printers I've ever used. The machine is based around the CORE One, a machine that I'm just upgrading to the One+, and is still the most used and reliable 3D printer in the workshop.
Whilst that's machine is only one filament, upgrading that reliable system into this eight-tool-changer machine absolutely makes sense.
I went for the fully assembled version because I just don't have time to assemble a machine, but if you do fancy the kit, you can save almost £300/$300 over the pre-assembled version that I'm looking at.
While the eight-tool-changer printing is obviously the major headline here, it's only when you start using it and put it side-by-side against the likes of the Bambu Lab H2C and, at the cheaper end, the Snapmaker U1 that you really start to see the full potential.
The speed is a significant upgrade on both of those machines, and even with the H2C's far larger print bed, in a head-to-head printing a 5-color print, whilst on the Core One+ INDX it had to be done in several batches, the new 3D printer was able to produce substantially more models than the larger machine in less time.
At present, considering the price, the multifilament printing reliability and speed, this is the best 3D printer I've ever tested (and I've tested many). It makes it hard to recommend any other machine, and with the CORE One L now also adapted to utilise the INDX system, Prusa once again leads the field for this scale of machine, from small to large-scale projects.
Prusa CORE One+ (Gen 2) INDX 8-Tool: Price and AvailabilityThe Original Prusa CORE One+ (Gen 2) INDX 8-Tool is available directly from Prusa. Prices start at $2249 / £2039 assembled, and $1949 / £1769 for the kit.
Shipping starts October 15.
If you already own a CORE One or CORE One+, you can buy the upgrade kit, which is $999 / £909 for the 8-tool version (a 4-toolhead is also available). Other INDX conversion kits from Prusa can also be found here.
Essentially, like the very first model, it doesn't matter what Original Prusa machine you have; there is always an upgrade route to the latest version.
Prusa CORE One+ (Gen 2) INDX 8-Tool: Design(Image credit: Alastair Jennings)I looked at the original Prusa CORE One back in January 2025, and at the time it was a significant update to the MK4S, their previous machine. Since then, we've seen the larger version, the original Prusa CORE One L, and more recently the Plus upgrades to both. Now we also have the INDX from Bondtech and Prusa Research.
Since the machine is from Prusa, you have several ways to buy it, unlike most companies these days. The first is to buy it off the shelf as a fully assembled, ready-to-go option, which is exactly the option I went with in this review.
If, however, you really want to see the inner workings of the machine, and for many people running print farms or small businesses, I would probably recommend at least buying one machine in kit form so that you can see how it works. This gives you a good idea of how to repair it if something does go wrong.
Taking a look at the machine, the first thing you notice is that, from the outside, it looks almost identical to the CORE One. In fact, the main body and build area are the same, and it's only the 8 reels on the outside that really give it away.
I've used them without the dry boxes you can attach as well, really because I only have two and need to purchase another six to ensure my machine looks balanced. Still, aside from the four reel holders on each side, the major difference here is the INDX system bolted onto the front top of the machine.
This added dock essentially covers the view to the platform and contains the eight new toolheads, which are all heated through induction rather than traditional wires. This means that they can be attached to their magnetic dock along the front of the machine cold, heated up in just a few seconds, and printing following a filament change can start within a few seconds, far faster than any other system.
(Image credit: Alastair Jennings)The other major difference here is that, obviously, the CORE One was a fully enclosed machine. This carries over to the INDX expansion, with a hinged top lid, secured in place by two rotating holders that are, of course, 3D printed.
The area is slightly smalled the original Prusa CORE One because because of the new additions but only marginally at 248 x 205 x 270 mm, dropping from 250 x 220 x 270 mm, so 2mm in one direction and 15mm in the other while the height remains the same.
Essentially, the Prusa CORE One+ INDX is the original Prusa CORE One+, the second generation, with the Bondtech INDX system incorporated.
While it may look very similar asthetically, in practice, this machine's potential goes far beyond what was available before and at this price.
- Design: 4.5/5
Print Technology: FFF/FDM, eight-tool INDX tool-changing system
Build Area: 248 x 205 x 270 mm
Minimum Layer Resolution: 0.05mm
Maximum Layer Resolution: 0.30 mm
Dimensions: Width: 620 mm, Depth: 470 mm, Height: 690 mm
Weight: 24.5 kg
Bed: Heated print bed; heated chamber up to 55°C
Print Surface: Removable print sheet; multiple sheet finishes available
Software: PrusaSlicer
Materials: PLA, PETG, TPU, PC, nylon and other engineering filaments; abrasive materials will wear the nozzle
One of the great features of the Prusa machines is their customizability, so one of the first decision you have when looking at a Prusa machine is do you buy it assembled or as a kit. If you're a business and buying several, I would personally buy the majority as assembled and one as a kit, it will just give you that insight that can be invaluable.
Either way, if you need to keep costs down, you can opt for the assembled version without the camera, advanced filtration system, or additional print sheets, which keeps it at its base level. Or, if you want those more advanced features, they can be added on as well, so you can have the camera, advanced filtration, and different sheet finishes depending on the materials you're actually printing.
The machine is also available as a 4, or 8-tool option, with about £300 difference between the two. If you can stretch to it, I would definitely opt for the eight-tool version, which I'm looking at in this review, but if you can't, you can always buy the eight-tool upgrade kit later.
When it comes to the print volume, the machine offers an area of 248 x 205 x 270 mm, which isn't the largest for a machine of this size and a slight reduction over the Core One+, but it's still pretty decent.
Like the CORE One and One+, it's designed for engineering materials such as PC and nylon and has a heated chamber that reaches up to 55°C.
The main feature is its advanced tool changer. Unlike other multifilament machines that have one or two nozzles, or, in the case of the H2C 6, U1 4, here we see 8 individual nozzles that are preloaded with filaments during the initial calibration process.
Those nozzles sit cold in a docking station across the front of the machine, and only when the head picks up each nozzle does it use induction rather than wiring to heat it to the right temperature in about 12 seconds per material, so it's ready for use. This process dramatically cuts both filament waste and the time it takes to get up to speed.
What's impressive here is that when those tools are back in the dock, they cool right down. They're actually just passive toolheads, so whilst the filament is loaded within them, there are no electronics, making it even easier to change those nozzles when needed.
One feature Prusa highlights is that bed levelling is done through pressure, so the nozzles touch the print bed before printing starts; a load cell reads the force, and the machine knows exactly where the print bed is. This differs from many newer printers that have started using optical solutions. Whilst these are generally good, they're not always 100% accurate.
One of the big changes for Prusa, and something the company has tried to avoid until now, is a silicone wiper. Positioned just to the right of the machine, there are some silicone pads which each of the nozzles wipes across to remove any blobs before printing, and this is positioned right next to the purge collector, which, as I found through the test, even after hundreds of hours of printing, gathers very little waste material.
The INDX head features conductive electronics that heat each passive toolhead. Still, it's more than just technology: the extruder is self-adjusting, so it can alter its grip for different materials. This essentially means that, using the same system, you can print with soft materials such as TPU and rigid engineering filaments without having to stop the extruder for each.
Finally, because each one is passive, it takes literally seconds to change them. So, if you want to go from the standard 0.4 to 0.25 at the finest, up to a big, thick 0.8, then the tool-change process takes a couple of seconds. Simply unload the filament, remove the toolhead from the dock with a pull and release the feeder tube; plug in the new one, pop it back in the dock, load the filament, and you're set to go.
Each toolhead needs to be calibrated, and an automatic tool-offset calibration sensor is mounted on the outside of the print area. The speed at which this works, and the fact that it all works automatically, is impressive. To keep things running smoothly, I rerun the full calibration at the end of the week after clearing out any debris from the machine, which is probably one reason this machine has been so reliable.
Once again, to reduce vibration from movement in the machine, and so it sits in with most workshop devices, it features an all-steel build. As you pick up the machine and move it around, it is relatively heavy but easy to manoeuvre, with decent grip handles on either side, so you can move it from one side of the workshop to the other without too much issue.
And these days security is a huge issue, and it's nice to see that Prusa has taken this seriously and offers a 100% offline and, if you want, private solution to transferring files over to the machine. If you want to remove the Wi-Fi module, that's very easy to do, and if you want higher security, Prusa again offers a range of advanced features.
- Features: 5/5
There's been a lot of anticipation around the Prusa CORE One+ INDX 8T in the 3D printing community. Essentially, it blends the robust printing abilities of the Prusa CORE One with Bondtech's tool changer, and the result is an absolutely stunning printer that produces exceptionally fine multicolor prints at a very reasonable price, considering the competition in this sector.
There are, of course, a few small downsides, such as the fact that the print bed on the CORE version is relatively small compared with what we've been used to seeing recently, and on my initial few runs I did have a couple of misprints. But as the printer itself bedded in and I became more familiar with the system, I was able to resolve all issues and also learn more about the printer, which gave me greater confidence that, as with their previous printers, if anything goes wrong, I would be able to fix it without the wait that I've experienced with many other multitool machines.
That getting-started process is, in essence, no more complicated than with any other machine, and from the box to sitting on the workshop bench ready to produce its first print took no more than 10 minutes. It was faster than I expected, especially since I set up the XL a couple of years ago.
Essentially, the main machine is complete, and then it's just a matter of opening the box with all the nozzles, popping them into the front of the machine, and inserting each feeder tube. Then you're essentially set and ready to go once the power cable has been inserted.
Also supplied is a USB-C key with plenty of models to get you started. As I loaded the eight reels onto the side of the machine, it did expand the space needed either side of the printer, but it still fit neatly next to some of the machines in the test area.
What I also really like is that I can easily shift this printer around the workshop without too much issue. It's heavy, but nothing compared with some of the larger machines. It is that stopgap between the Snapmaker and the Bambu Lab H2C.
As I started the test, the big question that I had was: with a standard-size print bed, would this printer actually be a viable option for people running print farms? Was it fast enough even though that platform wouldn't be able to print the same volume of models? As the first few test models that Prusa supplied came off the print platform, I was instantly impressed by the complexity of the models produced and by the time it took to print.
I tried out a series of multi-filament and, in some cases, multi-material prints, and they took far less time than I would've expected, even with the H2C set to its fastest usable print speeds.
I ended up running a head-to-head between the two with a dragon model, and this is where the speed of the new Prusa CORE One+ INDX 8T really stood out.
On the H2C, the platform was able to take 14 dragons, which was impressive, whilst the Prusa INDX was restricted to 9. When it came to the time it would take for the dragons to print, this is where the biggest difference came, and whilst there were five additional dragons on the H2C, it takes 3 days and 10 hours to make that print, while the Prusa will took one day and 35 minutes according to the software. When translated to the actual time these printers took to run through those prints, they were quite accurate, plus or minus about 30 minutes. Notably, by the time the H2C, with much the same speed setting as the Prusa INDX, had finished its 15 prints, I had 27 from the CORE One INDX. Obviously there is the inconvenience of clearing the platform after each print run.
Another point here is that there is no purge tower. Instead, a small amount of filament is scraped from the toolhead before it's used, but the tool-change speed is far faster than other tool changers. Essentially, that induction system works incredibly quickly, meaning sometimes you can't even really tell that the tool change has happened, as the printer is only not printing for a few seconds.
This test was also a great time to ensure calibration and accuracy for both printers were spot-on, and it actually took a couple of days to get 100% reliability from both the Prusa and the H2C through tuning. But since I ran the test right at the start, both machines have been running side-by-side flawlessly.
Setting down the models from each printer, what's instantly apparent is how little quality difference there is between the two. Layer by layer, the walls look smooth and the transition between colors is neat. You can obviously still see the layers. These prints are as fine as any.
Through the test, as always, there were plenty of firmware updates, and some of the early issues that I had were with tool eight, which for some reason would always print just a little bit high was resolved.
After an update, a good vacuum of the inner chamber and a full recalibration, that seemed to kick into life and resolved the issue. It was a bit of an odd one. It worked in the initial stages of the test, then after a firmware update and a particularly messy misprint, it stopped working correctly, and then it worked again after the next update. It's now been three weeks, and that particular nozzle is now working absolutely fine.
There are a few other small issues that I've come across. My biggest issue whilst using the machine is the filament mount on the side of the machine, not so much that it's on the side, but the fact that those filaments are exposed. Prusa does sell individual dry cases for each of those filaments, which is a good thing, but these are very much bolt-on, and while they work, there are neater solutions.
Then there's the filament feed, and this is the part that started to get to me over the weeks with plenty of filament changes. Essentially, unlike the Snapmaker or Bambu multi systems, you still have to feed the filament into the machine, and with four filament reels on each side, this can get a little bit messy.
If space is tight, getting your hands in and feeding the reel around while pushing the filament up into the feeder tube all the way to the hot end is one of those tedious, fiddly things. I would love to see some sort of auto-feed system.
Then, for less experienced users, the camera and filtration system on the back need to be fitted, and it's not as simple as plugging them in and attaching them. You do need to remove the panel, feed the cable through, and plug it into the board, which takes about 15 to 20 minutes.
It's not complicated; it's just one additional step rather than being ready out of the box. The idea is that you can customise the machine to your exact needs. Not everyone wants a camera, but since cameras are such a standard part of many setups, it's something you expect.
The other surprise is that the nozzles aren't designed for abrasive printing, so if you do want to use PETG-CF, PC-CF, or another abrasive material, the nozzles will wear out relatively quickly. Essentially, they're rated for 10 kg of PETG-CF or 5 kg of PC-CF. While checking all the different material types, I noted that if you're using Prusament Ultra Glow, you'll get through just 0.5 kg of filament before the nozzle likely needs replacing. These are not hardened nozzles, although those are on the way very soon.
The point is that the print area is just 248 x 205 x 270 mm. That reduces the CORE One's build plate from 250 x 220 x 270 mm, giving a slightly smaller build area again.
One of the good things is that many of the early issues, such as stringing issues with the nozzles carrying filament back into the machine and other early performance problems, have all been addressed by each firmware update.
Obviously, for this review sample, it is an early production model, and what is striking is that with every firmware update that came in, and as I became more familiar with the machine and it bedded in, the machine became more accurate and reliable.
It's now been three weeks since I've had to do anything to it, and it's been running continuously printing ready for a new term. I will obviously give it a bit of oil as it requires, but otherwise this is a multitool machine that will print thousands of models without much maintenance, and that is one of the key points of Prusa machines.
Dimensional accuracy - score of 4
Target 25 = X: 24.76mm / 0.24mm Error | Y: 24.70mm / 0.30mm Error
Target 20 = X: 19.82mm / 0.18mm Error | Y: 19.80mm / 0.20mm Error
Target 15 = X: 14.75mm / 0.25mm Error | Y: 14.72mm / 0.28mm Error
Target 10 = X: 9.88mm / 0.12mm Error | Y: 9.83mm / 0.17mm Error
Target 5 = X: 4.88mm / 0.12mm Error | Y: 4.78mm / 0.22mm Error
X Error Average = 0.182
Y Error Average = 0.234
X&Y Error Average = 0.208
Fine Flow Control - score of 4
Fine Negative Features - score of 5
Overhangs - score of 5
Bridging - score of 4
XY resonance - score of 2.5
Z-axis alignment - score of 2.5
Add the totals for a final score of 27 out of 30.
(Image credit: Alastair Jennings)Before I leave the performance section, another point about the prints is the new color-blending mode within PrusaSlicer known as Prusa Color Mix, and this is something I'm still trying to get my head around. It's quite incredible how it works.
Essentially, like a dot matrix, it blends the colors you have together to create more colors by creating fine layers of filament rather than physically blending the two or more. With two fish models I printed very early on, I was first impressed that they printed.
They're quite complex models, and I set them aside for a few days. Then it occurred to me that there were about three or four different greens within the print, yet I only had one green loaded onto the machine. At that point, I realised that the color mix was in full flow with these models.
I went back to PrusaSlicer and started trying some color-blending modes myself and, again, was impressed by how easy it was to use. I would say that randomly loading different-colored filaments onto the spools will get you some pretty interesting results. If you really want headline-worthy features, careful filament choice is definitely needed. However you approach it, the results are incredibly impressive.
Whilst I've just touched on the beginning of how this technology works, it's probably one of the most exciting enhancements from any 3D printer that I've seen, meaning that those eight filament spools, especially if you get the color combinations right, can produce thousands of different colors.
- Performance: 5 / 5
The Original Prusa CORE One+ INDX 8T is a 3D printer in a different league, and while the build area is smaller than even the CORE One, the speed at which you can do a multicolor print is much faster than any off-the-shelf machine I've tried.
Most of the initial misprints and small issues I had were mainly the machine bedding in rather than any major problems, and this is an early review sample with fixes coming through the firmware updates. Still, even then as an early production sample its performance has been absolutely solid and rivals and beats any of the machines I have in the workshop.
Unusually, it has also been of major interest to several friends who run 3D print farms and engineering businesses, particularly for prototyping with multiple materials and colors. The production times of those models are vastly reduced, and whilst 3D printing already cut down their prototyping time dramatically, the Prusa CORE One+ INDX once again cuts down that time even further.
What's surprising here is that, even with a fully assembled machine pretty much ready to go out of the box, and with all those new firmware updates and obviously the knowledge that's out there as well, this becomes one of the cheapest multitool machines on the market whilst also being easily one of the best.
Some machines have a refined, fully product-designed, more plastic aesthetic that gives them a high-quality feel, and they are obviously extremely impressive.
The Prusa's more workshop-style design means it's a far better fit for many businesses; if anything ever goes wrong, you have full access to the plans, a huge knowledge base, and one of the best support networks available from any 3D printer manufacturer. You'll never be stuck without a printer.
Should you buy the Original PRUSA CORE One?Value:
Excellent value for 8-tool printing, giving reliability, speed and repairability when you need it
5
Design:
Robust and practical design, although spool handling and bed size are a compromise.
4.5
Features:
The 8 tools, color mixing, offline operation and essential easy maintenance make this a great business option.
5
Performance:
Fast and reliable multicolor printing with excellent quality after initial bedding in an calibration.
5
Total:
A superb multitool printer that combines speed, flexibility and reliability.
5
Buy it if...You need fast multicolor printing.
Eight independent toolheads make filament changes extremely fast, cutting delays for multicolor and multi filament printing.
You want a machine you can maintain yourself.
A repairable design, accessible components, and strong support make maintenance easier and reduce reliance on servicing.
Don't buy it if...You regularly print very large models.
The modest build area makes larger prototypes and models better suited to bigger-format printers instead.
You want completely automated filament handling.
Loading eight reels can be fiddly, while regular material changes still require some manual intervention.
We've also tested out the best laser engravers
Categories: Reviews
The Godox C100 is the weirdest camera and the weirdest light meter I've ever used — it's an intriguing concept, but it misses the mark on both counts
Godox C100: two-minute review
Well, this is a new one. Godox caught everybody by surprise when it announced the C100, a slim, rectangular point-and-shoot camera built around a transparent rectangular screen that also functioned as the viewfinder… and it also worked as a light meter for film photography. What, many asked camera nerds, was going on here?
Having now used the Godox C100 for myself, it remains to me a borderline inexplicable release, two devices wrapped in one very unusual shell. I did not hate using it. But I did find myself returning again and again to niggling questions like, ‘Who is this for?’, ‘What is the point of this?’, and I still don’t think I can answer them.
The sleek, sci-fi design of the Godox C100 is what got a lot of people excited on the camera’s announcement, and let’s start there since it’s an excuse to be positive. This is a cool-looking object – there’s no denying that. While I was testing the C100, the design received admiring compliments from friends and strangers alike — a common refrain was that it looked like something out of Star Trek. The transparent screen/viewfinder is exciting to use, in concept at least, and it’s a fun camera to slip in and out of a pocket for quick grab-shots.
But you’ll have noted that I said ‘in concept’. Once you actually start using the thing — in my view, it doesn't quite work. There’s nowhere that’s comfortable to hold the camera and keep both the subject and the frame lines in view; you find your eyes flicking from one to the other like a hunting autofocus system. And besides, unless you hold the camera quite close to your eyes (which I did end up doing), from your perspective, the frame lines aren’t going to particularly correspond to what ends up being captured.
In terms of image quality, I thought the Godox C100 was more or less decent for a camera of its type. With a tiny 2MP sensor and fixed-focus plastic lens, it’s never going to produce jaw-dropping images, but its colors can be quite punchy and detail is okay-ish — even if dynamic range is quite poor. But I think Godox missed a trick by not adding image filters or film-style looks to give its images a bit more intrigue. Honestly, I found the shots it produced a bit boring, in stark contrast to the camera’s striking exterior. Video quality was also very poor, with pronounced rolling shutter and even some dropped frames.
And how about that light meter functionality? Well, it works, producing readings that were consistent with my dedicated light meter. But unlike my dedicated light meter, it won’t attach to an SLR’s hot shoe. And that has me again asking the question that was constantly rattling around my brain while testing the camera — who, exactly, is this for?
The Godox C100 with screen activated. (Image credit: Jon Stapley)Godox C100 specsGodox C100 specsType:
Compact camera
Photo resolution:
2MP
Video resolution:
Full HD 30fps
Storage:
microSD card slot
Screen:
2-inch OLED
Connectivity:
USB-C
Dimensions:
104 x 71.7 x 19.1mm
Weight:
65g
Godox C100: Price and availability- The Godox C100 comes at a starting price of $45 / £47 / about AU$64
- At this price, it’s cheaper than most cameras and most light meters
- It was announced in June 2026 and is available now
As mentioned, one of the main things that got a lot of people excited about the Godox C100 was its unique design — the other was its price. At an asking price of $45 / £47 (equivalent to about AU$64), the C100 is cheaper even than most 'cheap' compact cameras like the Camp Snap, and is also cheaper than pretty much any light meter I can think of. Furthermore, I've already seen discounts on the original asking price.
Godox C100: Design- Slim design built around a transparent display with digital framing lines
- Very simple point-and-shoot operation
- Framing with the display/viewfinder is challenging — like trying to focus on two things at once
In a slim body not much bigger than a playing card, the Godox C100 houses a transparent plastic panel that functions as both viewfinder and screen all in one. Turn the camera on, and the display window is overlaid with mode information, battery level and framing lines.
Jon StapleyJon StapleyJon StapleyJon StapleyThe screen isn’t touch-sensitive – makes sense, since you wouldn’t want to be smudging it with fingerprints. A physical switch on the side allows you to toggle between photo, video and light meter modes, while a row of buttons beneath the screen switches between aspect ratios or adjusts light meter parameters. There’s no camera settings control to speak of — it’s a point-and-shoot situation.
It’s an odd camera to use. I like the lightness of it, the way it slips into a jacket pocket, and how easy it is to whip out and capture an image. I never got to the point where I found framing comfortable, mind you.
When I was capturing product images of the C100, my camera’s autofocus would frequently flick between the body of the camera and the view through the transparent window — and the human eye does the same thing. When you’re focusing on a subject through the window, you can’t really see the framing lines, and vice versa. Or at least, I couldn’t.
There’s no distance to hold the camera between yourself and subject that feels comfortable, no sweet spot; I actually caught myself holding the screen right up to my eye a few times, and must have looked ridiculous. In my view, the concept just doesn’t quite work.
Jon StapleyJon StapleyJon StapleyGodox C100: Performance- Image quality offers decent color rendition but poor dynamic range and detail
- Video is very poor, with rolling shutter and dropped frames
- The light meter functionality works, delivering readings consistent with dedicated light meters
I’ve tested a lot of cheap cameras with small sensors — particularly in recent years as they’ve become more popular — so I was bracing myself before I first took a look at my first few Godox C100 sample shots. The result? A long way from good… but not as bad as they could have been.
Jon StapleyJon StapleyJon StapleyJon StapleyJon StapleyJon StapleyJon StapleyJon StapleyJon StapleyJon StapleyJon StapleyFutureThe colors in a lot of shots were punchier than I expected, vivid and nicely rendered. Detail is basically okay, though quickly gets smudgy if your subject is distant or if you look too close. Dynamic range, inevitably, is quite poor — images are easily blown out by bright sunlight, and shadows can quickly become murky and indistinct. It’s okay for what it is — but I think that adding some filters or looks for images à la the Camp Snap 2 or the RewindPix might have helped give the Godox C100 a bit more intrigue and make it more fun to use for longer.
As mentioned, the Godox C100 shoots video, but I’m hard-pressed to see why you would do so. I tested it with a few short walking-around clips, and my reward was jittery video with no stabilization, some pronounced rolling shutter ‘jello effect’, and even some dropped frames.
The light meter functionality works — I tested it alongside my TTArtisan Light Meter II and it gave me settings recommendations that lined up. Of course, this also highlighted some of the conceptual issues with having a light meter in this format. The TTArtisan Light Meter II, which is also quite cheap, has a cold shoe mount that allows it to be affixed directly to the top of an SLR film camera — the Godox C100 does not. Practically, this restricts its usefulness as a light meter to tripod-based shooting only — you’re not realistically going to be juggling the C100 in one hand and a film camera in the other.
The Godox C100 with a TTArtisan II light meter. (Image credit: Jon Stapley)If I mentally squint, I can construct a use-case scenario where the Godox C100 functions as both a light meter and a means of capturing a quick ‘record shot’ of a scene that’s going to be captured on film — similar to the way that pro photographers used to use Polaroids, back when Polaroids were somewhat cheap. Maybe that sounds like something that’d be useful to you. It’s not for me.
Should I buy the Godox C100?Buy it if...You want a camera that literally fits in your pocket
Many cameras claim to be pocketable – the Godox C100 actually is.
You want a completely new photographic experience
Fair play, shooting with the Godox C100 didn’t feel like shooting with any camera or phone I’ve used before.
You want a light meter for film shooting
The light meter functionality works well, and the Godox C100 is cheaper than many dedicated light meters.
You want high-quality images and videos
Move along.
You want a light meter for fast-paced street shooting
The lack of a hotshoe mount means the C100 better suits slower pursuits like landscape photography.
For similar cheap point-and-shoot vibes, you might want to try the latest Camp Snap — a screen-free compact with an emphasis placed firmly on fun rather than image quality.
Read our full Camp Snap 2 review
Kodak's keychain camera has a similar novelty factor to the Godox C100. It's also cheaper, is one of the few cameras with image quality that's actually worse than the C100 — but as its name implies, it's kind of charming.
Read our full Kodak Charmera review
The Godox C100 with a film SLR. (Image credit: Future | Jon Stapley)How I tested the Godox C100- I tested the Godox C100 indoors and outdoors over several days of highly changeable weather in London
- I shot video across a long weekend trip to northeast England, plus my hometown
- I used the light meter mode to take readings and compared them to readings I had taken on a dedicated light meter from the same point
I was sent the Godox C100 shortly after its official release. I took it on several photo walks around different areas of London in varying light conditions, tried out the photograph and video modes and swapped between aspect ratio settings. I also compared the light meter readout to my TTArtisan Light Meter II to verify its accuracy.
- First reviewed September 2026
Categories: Reviews
Dell UltraSharp U3226Q 32 4K QD-OLED monitor review: A creator's dream panel with a jarring price tag
I’ve been a huge fan of Dell displays for a long time. So, when I first saw the UltraSharp 32 4K QD-OLED (U3226Q), I thought two things: What a long name, and Wow, that looks incredible.
I have got really used to my 52-inch beast from Dell, so I know they are capable of delivering spectacular quality and novel ideas. So, the idea of Dell jumping feet first into a creative monitor is really exciting… and they did it very, very well.
This monitor has DisplayHDR True Black; it’s a QD-OLED anti-glare coating; it's a 120Hz, 4K panel; and it’s built from the ground up for color-critical workflows that are vital to getting the colors just right. There’s a magnetic shade for use in areas with harsh or inconsistent lighting, a built-in colorimeter, and up to 1000 nits of peak brightness.
The specs are incredible, and rightfully so; this monitor is truly brilliant in all of the best ways. As long as you forget that unseemly price tag.
Dell UltraSharp 32 4K QD-OLED: Price and availability(Image credit: Collin Probst // Future )The Dell UltraSharp 32-inch 4K QD-OLED can be purchased for $2,440 at Dell in the US. And in the UK, it's got an equivalent cost of £2,405 at Dell UK. It's also available from a range of other retailers, but not reliably so.
(Image credit: Collin Probst // Future )Dell UltraSharp 32 4K QD-OLED: Unboxing and First ImpressionsI haven't really used it on a monitor or with shaders before; however, I've recently seen several. I didn't really understand why it would be used, but now, after seeing half a dozen monitor shaders in the last six months, I have a pretty good idea of why you would want them, why you would need them, and why you wouldn't need them.
Right away, I noticed just how sleek and polished this monitor looks. Granted, I have very good experience with Dell monitors at this point, but I still recognize the build quality on this thing, even from first on most
The packaging is pretty straightforward. After testing all some of the best business monitors over the last couple of years, I've learned to expect a certain level of standard in packaging. The monitor itself had front and back protection to ensure that it won't break during transport.
Dell UltraSharp 32 4K QD-OLED: Design & Build QualityThere is a reason why Dell monitors are insanely popular, especially in the business world. That's because, even though they don't have all the gimmicks that many other providers do, they have built their reputation on dependability.
This monitor, even though it is a high-end performance monitor, is built the very same way. It has the essentials covered, so the user can rely on it for any use case. It's able to fit in a really small project space all around.
The last thing I'll mention about design and build quality is the shader itself. It's made from a nice material. It doesn't look like it will sag at all, and it magnetically attaches, which is fantastic.
You may not always want to use this shader, but when you need it, you can easily slip it on to the display.
Dell UltraSharp 32 4K QD-OLED: In use(Image credit: Collin Probst // Future )Using this monitor has been fantastic. It looks super sharp. It's clean. It's simple. It's not overstated. It mounts great on modern monitor arms. It has great ports. All these things result in very smooth, easy usability for me.
I was able to get this all set up very quickly, and once everything was set up, I was able to use it right away thanks to its single USB-C cable for connecting a laptop or desktop.
Now, if I want to add more to this monitor, such as a secondary machine or something, it does have great ports and several options, though. It doesn't have nearly as many options as some of the more advanced monitors I have seen.
My team and I have used this monitor for photo editing, for video editing, and for basic website design. So far, it's been spectacular to use. Its picture quality is spectacular, and the shader is super easy to disable when I don't need it.
One thing that I'm very thankful for is that this monitor is still bright. Most of the monitors and shaders I have seen have a really dim max brightness, but this one still looks great with max brightness.
Another thing worth touching on is the ports for the Dell Ultrasharp for the desktop setup in the photo. I use a single USB-C cable running directly from my laptop to the monitor.
If you've a more complicated setup where you're using one of the mini Thunderbolt docking stations or something similar, you can plug directly into it via USB-C or, of course, HDMI.
For the longest time, I would recommend Samsung or BenQ panels for creative work - in my experience, those companies produce some of the best monitors for photo editing and the like.
However, several more companies are stepping up when it comes to high-quality creative panels. Dell is clearly one of them, and honestly, I don't think its are too late to the game either. I think it's right on time, bringing its background of reliability and dependability to a growing demographic.
Dell UltraSharp 32 4K QD-OLED: Final verdict(Image credit: Collin Probst // Future )If you know that you are looking for a creative monitor with specific specs, the best panel possible, and you even know what a shader is and what it does, then this is the kind of 4K monitor you should be looking into.
If you have to wonder whether this is worth it, it probably isn’t. It's total overkill for running standard office software and streaming the occasional movie.
If you know you're looking for an absurdly nice monitor because you are a video editor, a photo editor, or a content creator in some way, and you need a high-quality one, then absolutely make sure you check this one out.
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Categories: Reviews
“Not even Secretlab’s Titan Evo has these”: I’ve never tested a gaming chair with features like this Boulies model — and it beats key rivals on price, too
Boulies Master Rex (2026): One-minute review
The Boulies Master Rex (2026) follows up on the previous model with a few tweaks and some new additions, all in the name of improving comfort and versatility.
Just like its forebear, the 2026 version is a rather understated affair. The dark gray colorway of my review unit made it look all the more austere, although the lack of brash accents and branding help to impart a more professional veneer; this is a gaming chair that wouldn’t look out of place in an office.
The fabric finish of my review unit (there’s also a PU variant) seemed durable yet was soft to the touch, lacking the scratchy feel of cheaper examples and aligning more closely with the fabrics adorning the best gaming chairs. The stitching was very precise and strong, too.
The head pillow feels less premium, with its relatively meagre padding and elastic strap in place of a magnetic attachment as seen on more upmarket chairs. However, it was fit for purpose and provided sufficient comfort and height adjustments.
(Image credit: Future)As for the seat, it’s firmer than the previous model’s, and the front edge has a more prominent lip, which can dig into the underside of your thighs uncomfortably. The seat height has a fairly decent range, although it’s not the largest.
The Master Rex offers plenty of other adjustments, though. The back rest reclines all the way to 165 degrees and there’s also a rocking function, although this is quite stiff even on its loosest setting.
There’s built in lumbar support as well, which is adjustable for both height and prominence. However, the former lacks range, and didn’t go as low as I would’ve liked. What’s more, the dials for both settings require far too many turns, making them a chore to use.
For me, the standout feature of the Master Rex, though, is its 6D armrests. These provide all sorts of positions, thanks to their series of pivots and rotations. However, I struggled to find a benefit to their tilt function, and they still couldn’t go low enough for my liking — although admittedly this is a problem I have with many gaming chairs. Their padding is harder than on the previous model’s, too, and they can wobble around, although thankfully they remain stable during normal use.
The footrest is a far more basic affair that you simply pull out and flip. The cushioning is sufficient, but it doesn’t extend very far; I found that it supported my calves rather than my feet.
I managed to build the Master Rex without help. It was a relatively straightforward process, although attaching the tilt mechanism to the seat base was frustrating, since this heavy piece requires a very delicate placement to avoid moving the spacers out of place.
The Master Rex is reasonably well priced considering its build quality, adjustments, and integrated footrest. Its seat may be a little too firm for some, and the clever armrests aren’t without issues, but all things considered it makes for a compelling choice at this corner of the market.
(Image credit: Future)Boulies Master Rex (2026) review: Price and availability- $479.99 / £409.99 (about AU$670)
- Seen with significant discounts
- Good price given its quality and features
The Master Rex costs $479.99 / £409.99 (about AU$670) and is available now. It comes in fabric and PU finishes, with black, grey, and green colorways optionable.
For a gaming chair of this caliber, it’s well-priced. Better yet, we’ve seen it with a considerable discount already, which only sweetens the deal. But even at its base price, the Master Rex is considerably cheaper than the Razer Iskur V2 NewGen, a chair that has less adjustments to its armrests and lacks an integrated footrest.
Its 6D armrests are also a selling point; not even Secretlab’s Titan Evo has these, and the base model of that chair is still more expensive than the Master Rex. However, the Titan Evo is a stalwart in the gaming chair market and one of our favorites. It has a superior build quality to the Master Rex and more premium flourishes, such as the magnetic head pillow, but again lacks an integrated footrest as standard.
Boulies Master Rex (2026) review: SpecsPrice
$479.99 / £409.99 (about AU$670)
Backrest dimensions
29.9 x 22 inches / 760 x 560mm
Max user weight
243lbs / 110kg
Max user height
5ft 11in / 180cm
Seat dimensions
18.9 x 20.9 inches / 48 x 53cm
Warranty
2 years
Boulies Master Rex (2026) review: Design and aesthetics(Image credit: Future)- Muted looks
- Solid build quality
- Armrests can wobble
The Master Rex has a fairly smart and stoic appearance. There’s hardly any branding, save for a small Boulies logo on the back and on the head pillow, and the muted colorways only serve to further downplay its presence (the dark grey finish of my review unit was probably the most dour of the bunch). Some small suede patches provide a marginal amount of interest, but hardly add much panache. Personally, though, I’m glad it has a smarter and perhaps broader appeal than the cliched ‘adolescent gamer’ aesthetic.
I was also thankful for the quality of the materials. The fabric upholstery is pleasingly soft, devoid of the nasty scratchiness of cheaper examples, and the stitching is also impressive, with its perfect alignment and durable feel. On top of this, the metal wheel base is sturdy and a cut above the plastic units of less premium gaming chairs. I also appreciated the curved edges of its spokes, dampening the impact of knocks with your heels.
Conversely, the construction of the armrests are a little disappointing. They appear to be made from a low-grade plastic, and there’s a fair amount of play to them, lacking the stability I would’ve expected. Thankfully, no wobbling occurs during normal use, but regardless it doesn’t speak well of their overall quality.
The head pillow also lacks the premium feel of those adorning more upmarket gaming chairs. It attaches via a basic elastic strap rather than magnetically, and it doesn’t have much padding inside, although it’s still fit for purpose and the outer material is soft if not velvety smooth.
(Image credit: Future)Boulies Master Rex (2026) review: Comfort and adjustability- Firm but comfortable seat
- Difficult lumbar adjustments
- Mixed 6D armrests
The Master Rex is a comfortable chair to sit in. Its seat is sufficiently padded, although it’s noticeably firmer than the previous model’s, which might prove divisive. There’s also a more prominent lip to the front edge that rises upwards, something that can definitely be felt underneath your thighs. While this didn’t cause me any issues, I can imagine others finding it uncomfortable.
The seat height can be adjusted, although the range is somewhat disappointing. I found the minimum height low enough for my needs (I’ve sat in many gaming chairs that aren’t), but the maximum may not be high enough for taller users. Neither will the relatively short backrest; Boulies recommends the Master Rex for users who are 5’11” and under, and currently there are no larger variants.
(Image credit: Future)As is standard on many gaming chairs, the Master Rex features a rocking mechanism. However, it’s stiffer than many others, even on its loosest setting, meaning it takes quite a bit of effort to rock it backwards from an upright position. Naturally, this becomes easier as you recline the backrest, as your weight provides more leverage.
Speaking of which, the recline function itself is easy to use. The lever only requires a relatively light pull to release, and adjustments are quite smooth. However, the notching can feel a little rough, which can make locking certain positions in place a little awkward. Also, the notches seem quite far apart, so you can’t dial in a precise angle — something that won't be ideal if you’re particularly picky about your backrest position. It can recline all the way to 165 degrees, which is reasonably far and is the same angle the Secretlab Titan Evo can achieve.
The backrest itself is comfortable, thanks to its relatively thick padding. I appreciated the soft edges of the bolsters too, so they’re not uncomfortable if you knock your elbows against them.
Given it saves the need for an additional cushion, I also welcomed the integrated lumbar support. This is adjustable via two dials either side of the backrest: one for height and one for depth. I found them quite easy to reach and twist while seated, and they provide good feedback via their clicky notches. However, they require far too many turns to make meaningful adjustments, and what’s more the height range is limited, with the bar failing to go low enough for my liking.
(Image credit: Future)The 6D armrests are perhaps the centerpiece of the Master Rex. They can be rotated 360 degrees at two points, with one on top of the other. Since the mechanism for the lower point is offset, adjusting it alters not just the angle of the rests, but also how far apart and far forward they are when used in combination with the upper point. This means they offer far more possible positions than 4D armrests.
Despite this impressive showing, they’re not perfect. I wouldn't ever use the tilt adjustment for angling the armrests upwards or downwards, given that it lacks increments; you only get a binary choice between flat and what seems like 45 degrees, or close to it.
What’s more, the armrests don’t go low enough for my liking, although I concede this is an issue I have with many gaming chairs. And while they’re comfortable to lean on, they have less padding than those on the old Master Rex. Some of the various adjustments can also be unduly stiff, too.
A retractable footrest is also featured on the Master Rex. This operates smoothly and easily enough, requiring a gentle tug to slide it out. It doesn’t extend that far, though, with the result that it provided more of a rest for my calves than my feet. Still, there’s enough padding to use it comfortably for long periods.
Boulies Master Rex (2026) review: Assembly(Image credit: Future)- Reasonably easy to assemble solo
- Frustrating tilt mechanism attachment
- Light backrest
Assembling the Master Rex was a relatively easy process, even by myself. The instructions are clear and the various parts are well labelled. Most of the various bolts and screws were easy to affix using the included tools, too.
However, attaching the tilt mechanism block to the seat base frame is needlessly difficult. Not only is the block very heavy, but the four plastic gaskets you have to place in between it and the frame are prone to moving out of place with the merest touch.
This means it’s all but inevitable they’ll fail to align with the bolt holes once you place the block on top of them — and thus require some slender fingers to realign them while holding the block (did I mention how heavy it is?) overhead. Oh, and you’ll have to pray the gaskets don’t move out of place so much that they fall off the frame altogether and into the tangle of webbing below. This process is as fiddly as it sounds, and not one I’ve encountered when assembling chairs from other brands. It’s a frankly baffling design choice from Boulies.
Thankfully, installing the backrest is much easier, given how light it is. It still requires some effort to push it down far enough to align the bolt holes with the brackets, but this isn’t too difficult in my experience.
Should I buy the Boulies Master Rex (2026)?Buy it if…You want plenty of armrest adjustments
With its 6D armrests, the Master Rex offers plenty of scope for getting a comfortable position, although I do wish they went lower.
You want a footrest
Not every gaming chair comes with an integrated footrest, but the Master Rex does, and it's sufficiently supportive, if a little short.
You’re tall
The recommended maximum height for the Master Rex is 5’11”, which is quite low compared to many other gaming chairs. There’s only one model size as well — at least for now.
You want an unfussy assembly
The Master Rex is mostly easy to put together, but attaching the tilt mechanism will test your patience.
Boulies Master Rex (2026)
Razer Iskur V2 NewGen
Secretlab Titan Evo
Price
$479.99 / £409.99 (about AU$670)
$649.99 / £649.99 / AU$999.95
From $529 / £469 / AU$799
Dimensions
29.9 x 22 inches / 760 x 560mm
33.5 x 21.3 inches / 850 x 540mm
35 x 22 inches / 890mm x 560mm
Max user weight
243lbs / 110kg
299lbs / 136kg
396lbs / 180kg
Max user height
5ft 11in / 180cm
6ft 6in / 200cm
6ft 9in / 205cm
Seat width
20.9 inches / 530mm
15.7 inches / 400mm
22.8 inches / 580mm
Warranty
2 years
5 years
5 years
Razer Iskur V2 NewGen
Razer is one of the biggest names in gaming hardware, known for its quality and feature-rich products. Its Iskur V2 NewGen gaming chair is very much in the same vein, with its multitude of adjustments allowing for various sitting styles and cooling material designed to keep users fresh. However, when we reviewed it, we weren’t so keen on its awkwardly shaped neck pillow, or its high price. Read our full Razer Iskur V2 NewGen review.
Secretlab Titan Evo
The benchmark for gaming chairs, Secretlab’s Titan Evo has been around for a while yet it remains hard to beat, thanks to its all-round quality. It’s well made, comfortable, and provides good adjustments. It also commands a higher price than the Master Rex, and lacks some of its features, but it’s still a solid choice for many gamers. Read our full Secretlab Titan Evo NanoGen Edition review.
- Tested for several days
- Used for gaming and other tasks
- Plentiful gaming and reviewing experience
I tested the Boulies Master Rex (2026) for several days, during which time I used it for gaming and working, as well as general browsing and relaxing. I made sure to try out all of its various adjustments, and assembled it myself following the included instructions and using the included tools.
I’ve been PC gaming for over a decade, and have used a variety of chairs during that time, from office and productivity-focused offerings to those designed for gaming. I’ve also reviewed a variety of them across a range of brands, and have also reviewed the previous generation of the Master Rex.
- Read more about how we test
- First reviewed: August 2026.
Categories: Reviews
The Instax Mini 13 was made for taking selfies — and my friends have never been happier with the instant memories I've captured
Fujifilm Instax Mini 13: Two-minute review
The Instax Mini 13 is the newest instant-print camera in Fujifilm’s long-standing lineup of budget, easy-to-use party snappers. These film cameras are a great way to capture memories at shindigs, weddings and the sort, and this latest model is no different.
Like most Instax mini cameras, the Instax Mini 13 has a 60mm f/12.7 optical-grade plastic lens, making it ideal for close-up snaps and selfies that require a fixed field of focus. It even has an additional close-up mode to give you a little extra control over the focal length.
These are all features already found in the Instax Mini 12, which we rate as the best instant camera for most people for its point-and-shoot simplicity — but the Instax Mini 13 does have a few small tricks up its sleeve to warrant it being the step up model in the range.
The biggest upgrade from its predecessor that was released in 2023 is the addition of a self-timer, which is normally found on more expensive models like the Instax Mini 99 that retails for more than double the price.
And while the self-timer is the most significant upgrade from the Instax Mini 12, there are other small differences, including a fresh, playful ribbed design with new pastel colors, and a small, rubber wedge that hangs on the strap for propping the camera up on a table.
If I were to sum up the Instax Mini 13 in three words, I'd say it's cheap, cheerful and charming, which is exactly what you want from a fun instant camera that's a piece of cake to use.
Fujifilm Instax Mini 13 review: price and release date(Image credit: Future)- Announced in March 2026
- Shipping began in Australia on March 31
- Released in the US and UK in late June
- Priced at $94 / £79 / AU$139
As noted in our Instax Mini 12 review, many of us camera nerds have come to expect a new Instax Mini instant camera every three years from the brand, so it was surprising that this model ended up having a staggered global rollout, without much fanfare. Aussies were the first to get their hands on the new camera on March 31, followed by the US and UK on June 25.
Even more surprising is the fact that those of us in the UK didn't see the same 15% price jump from the cost of the previous generation, with the Instax Mini 13 being priced at £79 — the same as the Instax Mini 12 at launch. Those in the US and Australia weren't as lucky, however, with the Instax Mini 13 seeing an 18% increase from the Instax Mini 12 to $94 and 16% to AU$139.
Fujifilm Instax Mini 13 review: specsFilm type
Fujifilm Instax Mini
Print size
62mm x 46mm
Focus range
f = 60mm (equivalent to approximately 35-40mm)
Aperture
f 12.7
Shutter speed
1/2 second to 1/250 second
Power
Two AA-size alkaline batteries
Selt timer
2 seconds or 10 seconds
Dimensions
105.5mm x 125mm x 124.7mm x 67.6mm
Weight
376g (without batteries, film or strap)
Fujifilm Instax Mini 13 review: design(Image credit: Future)- A fun, ribbed design for added grip
- Five different color options to choose from
- Comes with a handy accessory on the strap for propping the camera up
The most striking update to the Instax Mini 13 is the rounded, ribbed design and five new pastel colorways, which have been called Candy Pink, Frost Blue (featured in this review), Clay White, Lagoon Green and Dreamy Purple.
Although the new design does bring a new poppy look to the camera, the trade-off is that it's a bit bulkier and heavier than the likes of the Instax Mini 12. If that's a problem, and you're more so after a slimmer and compact build, take a look at our Instax Mini 99 review instead.
That model also has a built-in tripod thread at the bottom of the camera to help with taking group shots, which is one of the reasons why it's the more expensive, premium model. But the Instax Mini 13 brings a thoughtful budget accessory to help you stabilize shots: a rubber wedge attached to the strap that you can use to adjust the angle of the camera when placed on a surface.
Fujifilm Instax Mini 13: performance(Image credit: Future)- Incredibly easy to use — just point-and-shoot and print
- Best for taking short-range images, like selfies
- For optimum results, make sure to hold the camera about 30cm away
The biggest selling point of the Instax Mini 13 is the fact that it's so straightforward and easy to use. Simply load up Instax’s credit card-sized Mini Film pack of 10, spin the lens dial to turn it on, and you’re all set to go.
With a shutter speed range between 1/2 a second and 1/250 a second, and a film sensitivity rating of ISO 800, it's best used in well-lit spaces, as you'll run the risk of overexposing a shot if you were to shoot in direct, bright sunlight.
At night, the constant-firing flash will automatically adjust itself to different light levels on its own, but it's important to keep in mind the distance of your subject. As mentioned earlier, it's best to use it for close-up shots to get the best quality images. And the optimum range for the flash is the same, with a distance of 30cm to two metres being the most effective.
To make selfies ever easier to capture, the Instax Mini 13 has a self-timer that works brilliantly to stabilize any photograph by reducing the chances of blurring from pressing the shutter button. You simply have to spin the dial that's fitted around the shutter button to activate it. One rotation sets the timer at two seconds, which you can tell is on by the blinking light, while holding it down activates the 10 second timer.
My only gripe is that the self-timer doesn't give you a countdown light for when it's about to take the picture (say, the blinking light speeding up). Yes, I know I can simply count the seconds down myself from pressing the button, but when you're already trying to frame yourself in the small mirror that can easily be forgotten to do.
FutureFutureShould I buy the Fujifilm Instax Mini 13?Buy it if...You love taking selfies
This is a no-brainer. Capture memories in an instant that you can share with family and friends. View Deal
You don't have a big budget
As one of the cheapest instant cameras in Fujifilm's lineup, you're getting a lot of great value. View Deal
You want manual controls
There's not a lot to get to grips with here. Simply frame your shot and pray that you don't waste one of your precious prints. View Deal
You prefer larger film prints
The Instax mini range only takes credit card-sized film prints, so you'll have a limited field of view. View Deal
Fujifilm Instax Mini 12
It might not have the self-timer or ribbed design, but the Instax Mini 12 does retail for less than the Instax Mini 13, making it a great cheaper option, especially during the sales. You're still getting the same Fujifilm instant camera experience (minus a self timer), just for less money.
See our Instax Mini 12 reviewView Deal
Fujifilm Instax Mini 99
If you've decided that a self-timer is an essential feature for your next instant camera purchase, you can also get the Instax Mini 99, which is the most premium model in Fujifilm's mini lineup, complete with an array of creative modes. Just note, you'll have to pay premium prices for it...
See our Insta Mini 99 reviewView Deal
How I tested the Fujifilm Instax Mini 13 (Image credit: Future)- I took the Instax Mini 13 to several events over the course of two months
- Experimented with holding the camera at different distances to determine the best for image quality
- Printed 20 Instax Mini prints, which were scanned into the Instax UP! app
Being an instant camera fan, I knew the best places to bring the Instax Mini 13 to. From a friend's 30th birthday party to a Harry Styles concert, I snapped away to see how it performed in different lighting environments.
I went through two packs of Instax Mini film — the classic white border type and the Instax Mini Rainbow edition that prints out different colors. Unfortunately, the Pastel Galaxy film that was launched alongside the Instax Mini 13 wasn't available to test.
To show off some of the sample pictures I snapped over the two months that I tested the camera for, I scanned the prints onto my phone using the Instax UP! app.
- First reviewed: September 2026
- Read more about how we test
Categories: Reviews
GMKtec EVO-X3 mini PC review: For local AI, the hardware is impressive, but the software still needs work
GMKtec EVO-X3: 30-second review
The GMKtec EVO-X3 is a mini PC with a difference: firstly, it stands upright; the size is larger than most, the specs are impressive, and the price- well, that prices it out of most people's reach; however, this is a machine with an AMD Halo Strix processor.
The EVO-X3 features the AMD Ryzen AI Max+ 395 processor; that’s the same as the EVO-X2 with 16 Zen 5 CPU cores, Radeon 8060S graphics, and a 50-TOPS XDNA 2 NPU. In this review, I’m looking at the machine with 128GB of LPDDR5X unified memory, enough to load and run local AI models; this ability is well beyond the capabilities of most other Mini PCs and even desktop PCs.
A quick look at the hardware makes it clear this is different, and for a machine with its specs, it’s still relatively compact, thanks to its slim, tower-like structure. It’s essentially been designed to stand upright to ensure plenty of airflow.
During testing, I ran local chat, reasoning, image recognition, image generation, transcription, and coding models on the EVO-X3. Smaller language models started responding almost immediately, while larger models provided more detailed reasoning and better-quality copy, essentially mirroring what you’d expect from cloud models.
You could also run these tasks with Wi-Fi disabled, so completely local and offline, with no need for credits or additional spend. This also meant all prompts, photographs, audio recordings, and project files stayed on your computer rather than being sent to a cloud service where you don't know what happens to them.
While the main focus here is the AI potential, I also ran the conventional benchmarks, and these are impressive. If you need a cutting-edge gaming PC and want to underplay the machine's potential, this is a great compact option, especially with the OcuLink connector.
However, refocusing on AI and unlocking the EVO-X3’s AI performance proved that some knowledge and experimentation are still needed; this isn’t quite an out-of-the-box, ready-to-run solution, although GMKtec has taken huge strides in that direction.
Local AI through the GMKtec Claw software environment was impressive. During testing, the Herdsman model manager recognised the NPU but reported that the Ryzen AI Max+ 395 was unsupported by its current NPU runtime manifests, which I found odd since the software was pre-installed.
Installing Lemonade and its Ryzen AI runtime solved the problem. Compatible models then pushed NPU utilisation close to 100%, proving that the hardware was operating properly.
This leaves the EVO-X3 in an awkward position. It’s an exceptionally powerful local AI workstation, but it is not yet the polished, out-of-the-box AI machine that the marketing suggests. It will do everything advertised, but for you to get there, you must understand models, runtimes, servers, agents and external applications, or at least be prepared to learn.
Whether or not this deserves a spot on our guide to the best mini PC is, ultimately pretty subjective. At $3,799.99 for the current 128GB/2 TB configuration, this is a relatively cheap machine for experienced developers, and technically minded creative professionals will find it an extraordinarily useful tool if they’re willing to put in the time. If you’re less experienced, then hold out; a more streamlined and cheaper option will inevitably be available soon.
GMKtec EVO-X3: Price and availability- How much does it cost? From £3,029 / $3,799
- When is it out? Available now
- Where can you get it? Directly from GMKtec or Amazon
The GMKtec EVO-X3 is available in the US direct from GMKtec and on Amazon.com, with the base 128GB/2TB configuration priced at $3,800. However, you can save an extra $100 at GMKtec or 5% on Amazon with code GMKX3DP3.
In the UK, the EVO-X3 is priced at £3,030 from GMKtec. At the time of review, it's not currently on Amazon, but I'd expect it to arrive shortly.
The EVO-X3 comes with either a 2TB or 4TB SSD, with both versions featuring 128GB of onboard LPDDR5X-8000 memory.
- Value: 4 / 5
CPU: AMD Ryzen AI Max+ 395, 16 cores/32 threads, up to 5.1GHz
GPU: AMD Radeon 8060S, 40 compute units
NPU: AMD XDNA 2, 50 TOPS; up to 126 TOPS total AI performance
RAM: 128GB LPDDR5X-8000, non-upgradeable
Storage: 2TB or 4TB PCIe 4.0 M.2 2280 SSD, two slots, up to 16TB total
Front Ports: USB 3.2 Gen 1 5Gbps, USB 2.0, 3.5mm audio
Rear Ports: HDMI 2.1, USB4 40Gbps, USB 3.2 Gen 2 10Gbps, OCuLink PCIe 4.0 x4, 2.5GbE RJ-45
VESA Mount: Not specified
Dimensions: 13.90 by 7.32 by 1.61in (353 x 186 x 41mm)
Weight: 5.07lb (2.3kg)
Power: 230W external power adapter, 19.5V/11.8A
Operating System: Windows 11 Pro, with Ubuntu and Linux support
The EVO-X3 design is far removed from the usual square mini-PC, and instead goes for a tall, narrow metal enclosure with vents on either side that help draw cool air through the system to help maintain maximum performance.
While it’s tall, the footprint because of this is relatively small, meaning it can sit neatly next to your monitor. Standing at 353 x 186 x 41mm without its stand, it looks more like an oversized external graphics card than a conventional desktop computer; the small stand that’s included is held in place with two screws and adds stability to the vertical stance.
While the unit is slim, it does have a good weight at 2.3kg, so while you could transport this very easily, this is one designed to stay in situ.
The full-metal CNC-machined casing looks great once you get used to the slightly different design, and with the grey finish with green detailing, the aesthetics are all well balanced. Compared with the small boxy Mini PCs, this definitely looks and feels like a professional workstation, as the pricing suggests.
Taking a closer look at the cooling and the slim tower design enables air to be pulled in through the single vent plate on the top/side of the machine and output through the two vent panels on the base/side. Checking inside the casing, there are three heat pipes and multiple cooling fans that all help to keep the powerful components cool.
Through the test, I was impressed by just how well and how quietly these fans were and left on auto; while you can hear them, they’re never overbearing. Through the interface, you also have the ability to adjust the mode, from Silent 45W to Balanced 85W and Performance 140W.
One of my biggest surprises when it comes to the design is the port allocation, or lack of it. The front provides one USB-A 3.2 Gen 1 port, one USB-A 2.0 port and a 3.5mm audio connection. Considering the EVO-X3’s intended creative and professional audience, another high-speed USB connection or front-mounted USB-C port would have been handy.
The rear is slightly better equipped, with HDMI 2.1, 40Gbps USB4, 10Gbps USB-A, 2.5Gb Ethernet and an OCuLink connection. I would have preferred a little more, as connecting to a hub of some type is essential if you have further accessories.
(Image credit: Alastair Jennings)The most interesting addition here is the OCuLink that enables you to add an external desktop graphics card via a more direct PCIe connection than a typical Thunderbolt or USB4 enclosure. Hot plugging isn't supported, so you must shut down the computer before attaching or removing an external GPU.
Wireless connectivity options are all pretty standard with Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4; then there’s also the wired 2.5Gb Ethernet. This is slightly lacking, and I would have expected a 5GbE or 10GbE at the least.
However, the lack of ports aside, the big story here is AMD’s Ryzen AI Max+ 395 that combines a 16-core, 32-thread Zen 5 CPU with Radeon 8060S integrated graphics. The GPU includes 40 RDNA 3.5 compute units, while the XDNA 2 NPU contributes up to 50 TOPS of dedicated AI processing.
Other machines with this CPU, such as the EVO-X2, they feature only 64GB of RAM and no Oculink connection, both of which, as I discovered, really are essential if you want to make the most of running local AI.
- Design: 4.5 / 5
At the heart of the EVO-X3 is AMD’s Ryzen AI Max+ 395, part of the AI power family Strix Halo. This chipset offers a combined 16-core, 32-thread Zen 5 CPU alongside Radeon 8060S graphics and an XDNA 2 NPU all within a single processor package, which is why it can fit into this small form Mini PC.
The CPU can be boosted to 5.1GHz and is supported by 16MB of L2 cache and 64MB of L3 cache. Alongside it, graphics processing is supplied by the Radeon 8060S, which provides 40 RDNA 3.5 compute units operating at up to 2,900MHz.
What is impressive here is that the performance of this integrated GPU has, in tests, beaten many dedicated GPUs. As GPU power is central to creative work, gaming and local generative AI, this power will be a huge benefit to the majority of Creative Apps that I use.
Alongside the CPU and GPU is the XDNA 2 NPU that provides up to 50 TOPS of dedicated AI processing, which brings the combined processor performance to up to 126 TOPS. The NPU essentially handles supported AI workloads better than running everything through the CPU or GPU. Again, surprisingly, some of the AI Apps used in the test fell back to the CPU and GPU rather than making use of the NPU and the speeds with and without made a big difference.
If you’re looking through this and thinking this all sounds very familiar, then it is essentially a very similar configuration to the EVO-X2, which is again equipped with the the Ryzen AI Max+ 395, Radeon 8060S graphics and a 50-TOPS NPU. The EVO-X3 adds the new chassis design to maximise the new cooling system, OCuLink connection, 128GB of standard memory capacity and a pre-installed AI environment to make getting started easier.
My review sample of the EVO-X3 features 128GB of onboard LPDDR5X memory running at 8,000MT/s. This memory is soldered and cannot be upgraded, but up to 96GB can be allocated as graphics memory. That large shared-memory pool is useful for local AI because it enables the integrated Radeon GPU to load models that would exceed the dedicated VRAM capacity of most graphics cards.
Storage options are either 2TB, as in my review sample, or 4TB M.2 PCIe 4.0 NVMe SSD. It includes two internal M.2 2280 PCIe 4.0 x4 slots, which enable you to install up to two 8TB drives, with a maximum internal capacity of 16TB. Having downloaded and installed several models, tools and applications through the test, I would definitely install a minimum of an additional 4TB.
One of the big upgrades over the EVO-X2 is the rear OCuLink connection. This provides a PCIe 4.0 x4 interface for an external desktop graphics card; you do, of course, need an eGPU enclosure as well, and then this gives you the ability to add an Nvidia or AMD GPU for rendering, gaming, as well as those AI workloads. OCuLink does not support hot plugging, so if you do use one, the machine needs to be powered down before the port is installed. I don’t at present have an OcuLink enclosure, so I haven’t tested the boost that this will give to performance.
On the back there’s also the USB4 connection, but only one, and it enables data transfers at up to 40Gbps, DisplayPort video output at up to 4K 60Hz and USB Power Delivery input at up to 100W. If I were to use this machine long-term, then I would connect a hub to maximise connections, especially for creative use, as just one USB-C is limiting.
Display output is limited to two screens, which can be connected through HDMI 2.1 and USB4. The HDMI connection supports higher-resolution displays, while the USB4 port provides DisplayPort output up to 4K at 60Hz.
Connectivity includes Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 5.4 and 2.5Gb Ethernet. The front has two 5Gbps USB-A 3.2 Gen 1 ports, a 3.5mm combined audio socket, and the power button. Around the back are 40Gbps USB4, 10Gbps USB-A 3.2 Gen 2, HDMI 2.1, OCuLink, 2.5Gb Ethernet and the main DC power input.
The absence of a front USB-C port or card reader is disappointing for such an expensive creative workstation. This is especially noticeable because the cheaper EVO-X2 includes both front USB4 and an SD card reader.
I was also pleased to see three performance profiles provide a choice between power consumption, heat and processing speed. Silent mode operates at 54W, Balanced mode increases this to 85W, and Performance mode allows sustained operation at up to 120W, with short peaks of up to 140W.
Three heat pipes, two fans, and intelligent fan control handle cooling by pulling air through the vent on the top/side and pushing it out through the bottom/side. This cooling remains relatively quiet throughout the testing and is designed to maintain the processor’s performance during heavy AI use, as well as video rendering and development workflows.
As you would expect, Windows 11 Pro is preinstalled, with support for Ubuntu and other Linux distributions. GMKtec also supplies its Claw local-AI environment, which is promoted as offering one-click model and agent deployment and was well implemented; there’s also Herdsman and installers for LM Studio and Ollama, giving you a good choice of Local AI management.
Claw is well integrated with EVO-X3 as it brings together local models, cloud services and AI agents without requiring you to assemble the entire software environment. The associated Herdsman model manager detected the NPU but reported that the Ryzen AI Max+ 395 was unsupported by its current runtime manifests. The underlying hardware worked once Lemonade and its Ryzen AI runtime were installed, but that workaround goes against GMKtec’s claim that local AI is ready to use without coding or setup.
The EVO-X3 has an exceptional feature set for local AI with the 128GB unified-memory capacity, integrated graphics, NPU, dual SSD slots and OCuLink connection enabling both flexibility and power. The issue is that most of this is already present in the substantially cheaper EVO-X2, making the X3’s £3,029.99 price seem a little steep.
- Features: 4.5 / 5
Crystal Disk Mark Read: 7045.28
Crystal Disk Mark Write: 6182.82
Geekbench CPU Multi: 9469
Geekbench CPU Single: 2619
Geekbench GPU: 25645
PC Mark Overall: 6855
Cinebench CPU Multi (Threads): N/a
Cinebench CPU Single (Threads): N/a
Fire Strike Overall: 7429
Fire Strike Graphics: 8551
Fire Strike Physics: 11509
Fire Strike Combined: 2953
Time Spy Overall: 3631
Time Spy Graphics: 3473
Time Spy CPU: 4897
Wild Life Overall: 24312
Steel Nomad Overall: N/a
Windows Experience Overall: 8.7
Getting started with the EVO-X3 is much like any other mini PC: plug in, screw the stand into the base and power on. You then have the Windows 11 Pro setup to run through, and as ever, GMKtec has covered the LAN port with a warning not to connect until the full setup process has been completed.
Once installed, I instantly noted the speed of the system; this was as fast and responsive as they come, and powering down and starting up from cold takes just 18 seconds from power being pushed to the home screen and the machine being ready to use.
As I started to load the applications for the benchmarks, the machine was fast and responsive, really as you’d expect for a machine at this price, and I was happy to see that this was at least in line, if not faster, than my workstation. Opening Premiere Pro, Lightroom and Photoshop all worked seamlessly, with the only real issue being the lack of ports for connection at the back.
When it came to the usual software and benchmarking tests, I ploughed through with almost all hitting record speeds and values when compared with any Mini PC or Laptop that I’ve reviewed in the past. An example is the Geekbench score, which aligned with many of the high-performance Mini PC’s and laptops, with a score of 2,956, but then the multi-core result of 19,401 far exceeded anything else.
Pushing the rendering benchmarks to give an idea of how it would perform for 3D content and video, the Cinebench R23 produced 33,295 points in the multi-core test and 2,034 points using a single core again; this is almost double anything else that I have seen.
Due to the positioning of the machine in the market, you would expect decent graphics performance, but due to an AI rather than games and creative perspective, and sure enough, the graphics performance was superb as I settled into some gaming. The Radeon 8060S hit scores of 101,583 in Geekbench GPU, while 3DMark Fire Strike returned an overall score of 25,721.
The EVO-X3 scored consistently high results through the 3DMark benchmarks, with most doubling the results that I have seen from other high-performance Mini PC. This performance not only translated to the test but also to gaming, as I settled back to play Cyber Punk 2097.
My review sample came with the 2TB NVMe SSD, and the transfer rates were slightly below what I expected but are consistent for a PCIe 4.0 slot, with read and write speeds of 4,912.96 MB/s and 4,648.62 MB/s.
Rounding out the standard tests, I checked out PCMark and wasn’t surprised to see a high score of 9,857, while the Windows Experience result was 9.5, again one of the highest I’ve recorded this year.
GMKtec EVO-X3 review: AI software
The EVO-X3 is sold as a ready-to-go machine with local AI models installed and one-click agent deployment through its Claw software environment. Claw uses Herdsman as the gateway to the AI models, so you start Herdsman and then open Claw, and the rest is quite straightforward for chat, image generation and countless other Agents that can be downloaded and installed.
Using this approach simplifies everything, and as I downloaded SuperPowers Agent, software workflow, Paper Research, Office Copilot, slidewright and a few others, I quickly built myself a decent set of tools for day-to-day AI use. The models you use can be downloaded in Herdsman and then used in GMKClaw. Depending on the complexity of the model you use and whether you switch Thinking on or off, the speed of the AI model you have selected varies.
What I like about this is that once you have models loaded, the application then downloads the additional tools that it needs to run. This is obviously online, with the AI processing done offline. Initially, the results were hit and miss, with the simple prompt, “A photo of a Labrador on a beach”, creating an abstract; once it had a few more prompts and details, the final results started to look better. The point here is that the more you use it, the better it gets.
While I also wanted to test the offline AI ability, what I also realised quickly was that I needed to run examples of everything I wanted to do; it needed to download and upgrade the models and tools that it had to hand.
Through the menu at the top of the screen, you can toggle between the different AI models, with Auto selected as default. This auto mode switches between the cloud and local to generate the images, but I noted that the NPU throughout stayed silent, registering 0% in Task Manager.
While the performance of the models was good both online, offline and hybrid, this wasn’t the potential that I was hoping for from this machine. I then went down another route and installed Lemonade and a series of Apps to give me greater control.
Installing Lemonade provided a way forward. After downloading its Ryzen AI NPU runtime and compatible models, Windows Task Manager showed the NPU operating at near-full potential, and a quick test in chat showed just how fast this machine's AI could be.
Lemonade provided what I had hoped for from Claw, with the clearest interface for testing local models; the GMKTecClaw integration is good but not yet mature enough to reach its full potential. Lemonade also displays time to first token, token-generation speed, memory use and processor activity, while making it relatively easy to switch between NPU, hybrid and GGUF models.
However, the setup process does require large model downloads and multiple tools and other additions to be downloaded. It’s also worth highlighting that downloading several models simultaneously resulted in HTTP 429 rate-limit messages from Hugging Face. Some completed downloads also encountered temporary file-locking problems, so for the complete set that I ran in this test, I downloaded over a few days, trying one task and then returning for more models for images, text, speech, and more.
Once Lemonade and its Ryzen AI runtime were installed, the EVO-X3’s NPU performance was impressive. I started out with the relatively lightweight Qwen-2.5-1.5B-Instruct-NPU model, which responded in around a second per response. Checking the stats, it recorded a time to first token of 0.61 seconds and generated 25.1 tokens per second. RAM usage reached 16.7GB, while CPU utilisation remained at only 4.8%.
This made it a good model for quick questions, summaries and relatively straightforward writing tasks.
Moving to Qwen2.5-7B-Instruct-NPU resulted in slower responses, as expected from a more complex model, but provided a useful step up in capability. The Qwen2.5-7B-Instruct-Hybrid model was again fast, and when asked to generate the opening of an imaginary book, it began responding in about a second, with Lemonade showing 523 input tokens, 393 output tokens, and a time to first token of 0.47 seconds.
I then loaded the larger gpt-oss-20b-NPU, more brain and more thinking, so everything took longer to consider when it came to the responses but produced noticeably better copy. It did, however, become slightly preoccupied with satisfying the requested word count and took quite some time rewriting the 100 words. That test processed 825 input tokens and generated 1,500 output tokens. Time to first token was 1.67 seconds, while RAM use reached 25.6GB and CPU remained at 5.9%.
These tests show why model selection matters. The smallest model delivered the fastest chatbot for general use, while larger models slowed speed for improved reasoning and writing quality. All processing was run locally, disconnected from the internet.
The next step was to plan a project, or, to be more accurate, all the things that I had to get done today. I wanted a plan and a spreadsheet that I could open on my phone and also print out if needed. I used DeepSeek-R1-Distill-Qwen-7B-NPU to organise the workday and plan an entire website project, covering content gathering, site structure, visual design, and implementation.
After asking several questions to clarify the project requirements, the model produced a detailed, methodical plan with useful software suggestions.
The website-planning conversation used 4,118 input tokens and generated 490 output tokens. Time to first token was 3.38 seconds, with RAM use reaching 19GB and CPU utilisation at 5.2%.
Generating the plan was straightforward, but turning it into a downloadable CSV proved difficult in the basic chat interface. While the model could create correctly formatted CSV text, it couldn’t save it as a downloadable file. Copying and pasting the information worked, but this highlighted the difference between a chat model and an agent with access to files and tools, which is where I started to discover additional tools needed to be used; with coding later, Visual Studio Code and the Continue extension were invaluable.
Essentially, the chat model can provide instructions and generate content, while an agent needs permission to create files, organise folders, run applications and modify a project directly, and everything needs connecting, which can take time initially, but after it’s done, the potential is exactly what you expect.
Image recognition is something that I’m really interested in, and training a model to help organise thousands of files literally. To start this off, I loaded a photograph into Gemma-3-4b-it-GGUF and asked it to describe the person shown, which was me.
The model correctly recognised that the subject was male and produced a reasonably accurate description of my appearance and clothing. It processed 267 input tokens and generated 147 output tokens. Time to first token was considerably slower at 22.65 seconds. The process used 17.2GB of RAM, while CPU utilisation remained at approximately 4.6%.
When I ran the UL Procyon AI Computer Vision benchmark, it returned a score of 1,171, which highlights this machine's potential on this front.
Through this part of the test, I looked at using local AI to organise an archive containing thousands of photographs. Gemma suggested several workable approaches, requiring Python scripts and external utilities rather than simply selecting a folder and pressing a button. Again, if you have more complex tasks, then these are possible but do require you to set up the resources required.
As part of this test, I installed ExifTool and ImageMagick, which provided the underlying ability to read metadata, organise files, and produce contact sheets, but connecting these tools to an agent required more configuration.
The EVO-X3 was powerful enough for the job. The difficulty was connecting the model to the required tools and granting it the ability to examine, classify and move files safely. This requires your knowledge and skill and is one of the features that is possible but is not ready out of the box.
Video organisation presents the same problem. Switching models provides different abilities, but no single supplied application will automatically understand, catalogue, and reorganise a large photo or video archive.
Local image generation produced surprisingly good results. I wrote several detailed prompts and used them to create original images.
The generated pictures followed the descriptions closely and, while each took approximately two minutes and 30 seconds to render, the resulting quality was more than acceptable for experimentation, visualisation and concept development.
During one test, Lemonade displayed 17 input tokens, 509 output tokens and a 0.25-second initial response. RAM usage reached 18.1GB, while CPU utilisation was 6.9%.
The token figures are less useful than the total rendering time because image generation differs considerably from language-model inference. However, the test showed that the EVO-X3 can produce useful generative imagery without a discrete GPU or cloud-based service.
I couldn't complete a comparable video-generation test. This would have required another specialist model and a separate workflow, such as ComfyUI, which would have extended the setup beyond the applications already installed.
Another of my major uses recently of AI agents is transcription. The UGREEN IDX6011 features a simple, ready-to-go app, and this machine looks to offer the same. To get started, I loaded a 46-minute podcast about 3D printing into Whisper-Large-v3-Turbo. The interface let me select the audio file but didn't provide a prompt field, preferring to just get on with it. As processing progressed, Windows Task Manager showed repeated spikes in NPU activity, showing that the dedicated accelerator was being used.
The processed transcription appeared after about five minutes and was really accurate. The speed and accuracy of this transcription are outstanding, and I’ll look in the near future to see if time codes can easily be added, which will help with editing. Again, all local and not cloud intervention.
AI code creation is one of the big areas of AI, and having used this machine for a month, I can see why. It’s not quite as straightforward as design me this site, and then it will. You need to provide it with the guidance, but as long as you do that, you can essentially bash together a site relatively quickly.
I still couldn’t get it to perform quite as well as some of my other workflows from Figma to GitHub and Cloudflare Pages, but still the workflow was quick and pretty solid when using the Qwen2.5-Coder-7B-Instruct model and connecting it through Visual Studio Code using the Continue extension.
As I created a site, the NPU utilisation reached 99% as the model generated the website structure and files. Further prompts could then add content, adjust the design, and fix issues. There was quite a bit of initial setup, and the end results needed an aesthetic polish, but for an hour's work I had a fully functional static site that could be updated quickly.
This test highlighted how a practical local-AI workflow, along with extensions and applications, can be used together to get the results that you want. Lemonade or Herdsman loads and serves the model, such as Qwen, providing the coding capability; Visual Studio Code then supplies the workspace and Continue enables the model to interact with the project.
- Performance: 4.5 / 5
The GMKtec EVO-X3 is a mini PC workstation and one that has been fine tuned to run local AI properly. The Ryzen AI Max+ 395 processor, Radeon 8060S graphics and 128GB of unified memory are provide the speed that's required and while more advanced models do push the system and slow things down,at least you get to use it without incurring cost.
Side by side the localised models aren't as powerful as the cloud based, but still what you're able to do is impressive and if you invest the time to develop your own AI workflows the end result will be AI agents in this local machine that can help with your workflows.
The bundled software is impressive, although there are some glitches at present that do slow the processing, however, a switch to another AI management option quickly unlocks speed and greater potential.
Out of the box this is one of the most impressive AI machine that really can run decent size local models. If you're willing to put in the time to discover how everything interlinks then this is a formidable machine with huge potential.
Value
Exceptional hardware, but extremely expensive
4
Design
Solid construction, compact footprint and superb quiet cooling
4.5
Features
128GB unified-memory capacity, USB4 and OCuLink
4.5
Performance
Outstanding CPU, graphics and local-AI capability once configured
4.5
Overall
Superb workstation hardware held back by setup complexity
4
Buy it if...You need to run substantial AI models locally.
The combination of Radeon graphics, a 50-TOPS NPU, and a large unified-memory pool enables models to run without relying on cloud processing.
You work with sensitive material.
You can process photographs, audio, documents, and source code locally without uploading them to a third-party service.
Don't buy it if...You expect an appliance-like AI experience.
The bundled model manager did not initially support the NPU, and accessing the hardware required Lemonade and separately downloaded models.
You only need a conventional mini PC
This level of processing, graphics, memory and AI performance is unnecessary for normal office work and occasional creative use.
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