I tested the RedMagic 12 Pro – and it’s the fastest Android I’ve ever seen

Tech > Services & Software > Operating Systems > Mobile OS > Android

If it's possible to release a flagship phone while at the same time making it appear more like a midrange phone, Red Magic has found a way.

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November 3, 2026, 7:00 am ET

Jack Wallen/ZDNET

ZDNET’s key takeaways

The RedMagic 12 Pro is an elite Android phone.

Outperforming all current Pixel devices, this thing is a beast.

It could, however, take itself a bit more seriously on the app front.

RedMagic just announced the international launch of the RedMagic 12 Pro — its latest flagship phone. Typically, the company releases devices in China first and then slowly rolls them out to the rest of the world. This time around, the company knew it had a phone that could compete with other flagship devices.

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RedMagic’s phones are high-performance devices known to do one thing especially well: mobile gaming. The RedMagic 12 Pro is no exception. It houses a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 CPU with up to 5.01 GHz, which is paired with the RedMagic R5 Gaming Chipset, and I can honestly say it’s the fastest Android phone I’ve ever tested.

After the initial setup, I installed Geekbench 7 to benchmark the phone and compare it to my Pixel 9 Pro. As for the latest iPhone, according to Geekbench, the iPhone 18 Pro Max comes out ahead in single-core performance, but it just barely falls behind in multi-core performance.

The RedMagic 7 Pro nearly doubled the Pixel 11 Pro’s multi-core score. And Google’s device couldn’t beat the single-core score either. As I said, I’ve never seen a Geekbench score this high.

Real-world usage confirms these numbers, because the phone reacts faster and behaves more smoothly than any Android device I’ve owned or tested. It’s so smooth and fast, it feels like magic. But it’s not just the speed that makes this phone special.

First off, I’ve always liked RedMagic’s Android “skin.” As you use it, it seems to be some amalgamation of Android and iOS. RedMagic is essentially doing what Google’s been trying for years: making the smoothest possible animations on Android.

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The interface is as elegant as any I’ve seen on a mobile device. Pull down the notification shade, and it glides down like it was made of silk. Tap on an app launcher, and it opens immediately. Switch between apps, and there’s zero lag or jitter. On top of that, there’s hardly any bezel to speak of — the display goes nearly to the edge of the device.

There’s also no indication of where the front-facing camera is. There’s no pinhole (as you’ll find with many Android devices), and there’s no island (like on iPhones). It’s just a solid display with no interruptions.

The Pro 12 also feels really good in the hand. Both the back and the front are glass. Yes, it invites fingerprints, but it feels so smooth. The back of the phone also has that typical RedMagic look and feel with integrated RGB lighting zones. You can customize the lighting zones for things like fan on/off, game key atmosphere, media atmosphere, incoming calls, charging, and the alarm clock.

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And of course there’s AI. The 12 Pro AI works with apps/features like call assistant, live translation, wallpaper, privacy, transcripts, notepad, and writing. I took it for a ride using the Notepad app, asking it (ironically) to write something about the RedMagic 12 Pro, and the speed at which it worked blew me away.

Everything, and I mean everything, about this phone is fast.

The RedMagic 12 Pro is 100% a gaming phone. I installed “Diablo: Immortal” and found it to perform better than the last RedMagic gaming-specific tablet I tested. Not only was it fast, but the graphics were gorgeous. Crisp, smooth, and responsive.

Since the RedMagic 12 Pro is advertised as a serious gaming phone, why does it include preinstalled games that are decidedly non-serious?

On this powerful gaming phone, you’ll find apps like Puzzle Spark, Mahjong Blast, Bolt Twist, GoGo! Blast, and Little Kitty, Big City preinstalled. These are not serious games. In fact, these game titles sound more like they belong on a list of malicious apps (they aren’t).

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I would rather see the Red Magic 12 Pro have zero preinstalled games than the collection it ships with. Yes, you can easily delete those apps, but their being on the phone kind of cheapens it. Given how amazing this phone is, I think RedMagic could get away with shipping a bit less cheese, and a lot more wine.

Either way, the RedMagic 12 Pro is a phone that belongs at the top of the heap among flagships, even above every Pixel phone ever released. If there is a phone that can impress me more than the RedMagic 12 Pro, I’ve yet to see it.

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