Nubia has announced the Red Magic 5S gaming smartphone and it arrives with some really amazing features but skips the Snapdragon 865 Plus processor that its competitors have and will be using. It also keeps the design largely unchanged. So what’s new about this refreshed model?

Nubia Red Magic 5S

Better Cooling and GPU Boost

The big change is the cooling system which includes a silver-plated heat sink sheet that is dubbed ICE Ag (Ice Age) and a nanosilver glass back. The advantage this brings is better cooling compared to other phones that use copper. Nubia says the air duct is also 56% larger than that of the previous generation. It maintains that the duct is resistant to corrosion and doesn’t accumulate dust.

The phone still packs a cooling fan with a lifespan of 30,000 hours and a speed of 15,000 RPM.

Another significant upgrade is the GPU Boost which Nubia says is a self-developed technology that allows games to play more smoothly without lagging during gameplay. The spec sheet says that users will need to use the new cooling fan accessory to make use of GPU Boost.

The new cooling fan called Ice Wind Cooling Box actually freezes as seen in the video above. Nubia says it helps to increase cooling efficiency by up to 56% (temperature drop of up to 25°C). It takes 10 minutes to freeze under conditions where the humidity is at 80% and the room temperature is 10°C. The fan has an audio jack and supports 30W PD fast charging.

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Red Magic 5S Specs

The Red Magic 5S has a 6.65-inch FHD+ AMOLED TUV Rheinland-certified display with a 144Hz refresh rate and a 240Hz touch sampling rate that can even go as high as 320Hz. The Snapdragon 865 processor is paired with 8GB, 12GB, or 16GB of LPDDR5 RAM and 128GB or 256GB of UFS 3.1 storage.

There are three cameras on the back of the Red Magic 5S just like we have on the Red Magic 5G. The primary camera is a 64MP Sony IMX686 sensor and it comes along with an 8MP ultrawide angle camera, and a 2MP macro camera. The camera packs features such as OIS, PDAF, and a Super Night Scene mode. For the selfie camera, the phone comes with an 8MP sensor.

The Red Magic 5S ships with an improved version of Red Magic OS based on Android 10 which brings new multitasking features and support for wireless projection with low latency. There is DTS X Ultra audio, an audio jack, capacitive trigger buttons, Wi-Fi 6, an in-display fingerprint scanner, and dual-frequency GPS. The phone packs a 4500mAh battery with support for 55W (10A) fast charging.

Price and Availability

The Red Magic 5S will sell for ¥3799 (~$543) for the 8GB RAM + 128GB version, ¥4399 (~$628) for the 12GB RAM + 256GB version, and ¥4999 (~$714) for the 16GB RAM + 256GB version. Buyers will be able to choose from Cyber Neon and  Ice Wind Silver.

It is already available for pre-order and will go on sale on the 1st of August at 10 AM on Nubia’s own online store, offline experience stores, and on JD.com.