You pick up these watches, and your first thought is — someone cut an Apple Watch in half and attached a strap from another brand. The same rounded square, the same rotating button on the side, the same bright edge-to-edge screen. Except they don’t cost 30-something thousand, but less than seven thousand rubles. The question that immediately arises: what’s the catch, and will they even work with an iPhone? I’m suspicious of cheap clones, but now I’m comparing them with this competitor head-to-head.
Even from a distance, you can see how similar the watch is to Apple Watch
How HONOR Watch 5 Differs from Apple Watch
The resemblance is no accident. HONOR Watch 5 is built around a square screen with rounded edges, the frame is made from 6-series aluminum, and there’s a rotating button on the side that works almost like the Digital Crown on Apple Watch. From a distance you won’t tell them apart, and even up close you need to look carefully.
With the screen off, you won’t see any differences from Apple Watch at all
The screen here is genuinely good. A 1.85-inch AMOLED display, 450 by 390 pixel resolution, density over 320 pixels per inch. The image is vibrant, watch faces look alive, and text is easy to read. The brightness of about 1000 nits is enough to see the time in sunlight, although it can’t match the peak values of top-end Apple Watch models.
The case is thin at 11 mm and weighs just 35 grams. You forget about them on your wrist by lunchtime. There’s IP68 protection and 5 ATM water resistance, meaning you can swim in a pool and keep them on in the shower. For a watch at this price point, that’s a serious proposition, not just marketing for the sake of it.
The strap clasp here is classic though
HONOR Watch 5 Battery Life: Real-World Usage
Next comes something Apple Watch still doesn’t have. Inside is a 480 mAh battery using silicon-carbon technology, and HONOR promises up to 15 days of use. According to real owner reviews, with active use including GPS and lots of notifications, you get closer to 12-14 days. That’s still fantastic compared to Apple Watch, which you put on the charger every evening.
The watch can last really long, even with workouts
The secret is simple: it doesn’t run watchOS or Wear OS, but its own MagicOS 8. The system is lightweight, doesn’t burden the processor with unnecessary tasks, which is why the battery lasts so long. The trade-off is less flexibility, but more on that below.
The feature set is packed. Built-in GPS with AccuTrack system, heart rate monitor, blood oxygen measurement, sleep monitoring, morning health report, and quick health scan with a single tap. There’s a speaker and microphone, so you can take calls via Bluetooth right from your wrist. 4 GB of storage for music, Bluetooth 5.2 connectivity.
HONOR Watch 5 Compatibility with iPhone: What Works and What Doesn’t
HONOR Watch 5 officially works with both Android and iPhone. You install the HONOR Health app on your iPhone, pair the watch via Bluetooth, and the connection is established.
What you get on iPhone: call and message notifications, workout and health data, music control, alarms, stopwatch, weather. In other words, the basic use case is fully covered: time, steps, heart rate, notifications.
The menu appearance, of course, differs from Apple Watch, and it’s noticeable
Now let’s be honest about the limitations — without which this review would be an ad. The watch runs its own system, so it doesn’t provide a full Apple Watch replacement within the Apple ecosystem. Replying to messages from your wrist on iOS won’t really work, there’s no Apple Pay, you can’t install apps from the App Store, and some features on iPhone are limited compared to Android. It’s a health and notification tracker in a beautiful case, not a second iPhone on your wrist.
If you’re expecting the exact Apple Watch experience, you can’t buy it for seven thousand from anyone. But if you need a device that shows the time, counts steps and heart rate, doesn’t die in a day, and doesn’t look cheap, then the iPhone pairing works quite well.
Is HONOR Watch 5 Worth Buying in 2026?
Right now they cost about 7,120 rubles, and with a coupon it comes out to just 6,980 rubles. Now compare that with Apple Watch. Even the most affordable SE costs three to four times more, and the higher-end models aren’t even worth mentioning. With the price difference, you could easily buy a couple more accessories and still come out ahead.
The watch also comes in a light color option
I would recommend HONOR Watch 5 to three categories of people.
- First — those who want the Apple Watch look but aren’t ready to spend half their salary on it. From a distance the difference is invisible, and a decent sum stays in your pocket.
- Second — those who are tired of daily charging. Two weeks of battery life versus one day is a completely different lifestyle. You just wear the watch and charge it once every week and a half.
- Third — those who need a reliable fitness tracker with proper GPS, heart rate monitor, and sleep tracking, but don’t need watchOS-level smart features. For running, swimming, and basic health monitoring, this is more than enough.
