8.0/ 10
SCORE

RedMagic Astra Tablet

$549 at RedMagic

Pros

• Sturdy, compact design good for travel
• Excellent 165Hz OLED display
• High-end Qualcomm chip delivers top performance
• Lots of gaming-specific features

Cons

• No microSD slot for expansion
• No software update guarantees
• No included accessories
• Mediocre gaming battery life

Earlier this year, I tested Lenovo’s 8-inch Legion Tab Gen 3 gaming tablet to see how it held up as a small gaming tablet against the iPad Mini. Spoiler alert: It did quite well. But shortly after testing that tablet, gaming phone-maker RedMagic reached out to ask if I wanted to test its new gaming tablet, the 9-inch Astra.

After a few weeks of testing, I can safely say that while Lenovo’s little tablet is still excellent, the Astra beats it in a couple of key areas. The most important of them is performance: It’s just flat-out faster than the Legion Tab. On the other hand, the Lenovo is a better option as a small, general-purpose Android tablet that’s also great for gaming (and it’s regularly less expensive than the Astra, too). However, if gaming features and performance, as well as a standout design, are what you care most about, the RedMagic Astra is worth paying a premium for and is why it’s an Editors’ Choice award winner.

Flagship hardware

I thoroughly enjoyed the Legion Tab’s design, and it convinced me of the benefits of the entire form factor. Even as someone who enjoys mobile gaming, I really don’t like carrying around a massive phone everywhere I go, so having something that’s big enough to game on without being as big as an iPad or Galaxy Tab, and especially a laptop, is pretty great.

Though slightly larger, the Astra still perfectly fits that in-between space for me. It has a 9-inch screen, but RedMagic packed it into a small, sleek tablet that can literally fit in my back pocket. The design is reminiscent of the iPad Mini with its round edges and flat sides, but the bezels are symmetrical and only 4.9mm wide, slimmer than the iPad Mini’s, which makes Apple’s littlest tablet look outdated.

There’s also a fingerprint sensor in the power button, which is quite welcome, especially considering other more premium tablets like the OnePlus Pad 3 (or even the Legion Tab) don’t have one. The front-facing camera supports face unlock (only for the tablet itself) and, at 9 megapixels, is perfectly fine for streaming or video chatting.

The single rear 13-megapixel camera is acceptable, but not much more than that. It’s fine if you need to use it, but RedMagic has never been known for its great cameras, and that certainly applies here as well.

RedMagic is known for packing its devices with all the latest top-of-the-line specs you could want, and the Astra continues that trend. It’s powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite processor, up to 24GB of LPDDR5x RAM and up to 1TB of UFS 4.1 storage. The base model with 12GB of memory and 256GB of storage is $549 and similar to what you’d get in the $550 Legion Tab Gen 3 (though the Legion regularly goes on sale for around $100 less). I tested a $699 version of the Astra with 16GB of memory and 512GB of storage. The maxed-out Astra with 24GB of RAM and 1TB of storage is a hefty $899.

Complementing the Qualcomm processor is RedMagic’s own gaming chip, the RedCore R3 Pro. The idea is that the R3 Pro hands some of the gaming-specific tasks from the main chipset to help maintain peak performance and keep the Snapdragon 8 Elite from throttling down sooner.

The 9.1-inch OLED display shows off all your favorite games with a 2,400×1,504-pixel resolution (331 ppi) and a beautifully smooth 165Hz refresh rate. It also gets up to 1,600 nits peak brightness, which is more than bright enough if you find yourself caught in the sun. I’d say it’s one of the best screens I’ve seen on a tablet and fantastic for any game. (By comparison, the iPad Mini’s screen has a pixel density of 326 ppi). 

Powering all of this is an 8,200-milliampere-hour battery with support for up to 80-watt fast charging. I easily got through several days of use with this tablet, which included an hour or two of gaming and another hour or two of basic usage. On CNET’s YouTube streaming test, it averaged 10 hours, 32 minutes, which is good, but you won’t get that while gaming only. The only downside is that there is no charger in the box, although you should be able to get fast charging with most 80-watt chargers.

Soundwise, the dual DTS:X Ultra speakers sound pretty good for a small tablet. Of course, you don’t get the room-filling sound from the four speakers on the iPad Pro, but that’s also a much larger and much more expensive device. The Astra’s speakers are fine for gaming or streaming, but for FPS games or those where every noise matters, you’ll want some good gaming headphones.

One odd design choice

RedMagic made a pretty odd design choice with the Astra by offsetting the USB-C port toward the top of the tablet. This means the power button is now situated directly across from the USB-C port, so if you try to use a USB-C controller, you’ll likely hit the power button when taking the controller on and off. I did experience this in my testing, and while it was annoying, I wouldn’t say it’s enough to keep me from buying it. It didn’t happen once I had the controller on, and Bluetooth controllers obviously won’t have this issue. (RedMagic would probably appreciate you dropping an additional $129 for its Bluetooth gamepad anyway.)

Also, when using a controller, the tablet now sits farther down and becomes a bit unbalanced. Again, this wasn’t a deal-breaker for me as I ended up resting the tablet on the table or my lap, and it almost became even better for me, so I didn’t have to hold it as much. Your mileage may vary here, and I do understand how uncomfortable it might be for some, but I would say don’t knock it till you try it.

I asked RedMagic why it used this layout, and a company representative said the top-mounted USB-C keeps the charging cable from getting in the way of your hands while it’s charging, so you can still play while plugged in without any issues. That makes sense to me and has been one of the issues I’ve had while gaming on phones or other tablets. Also, the side-mounted power button is offset to work with many third-party gaming controllers that have buffer zones to avoid accidental activation. I’d also be willing to bet that even though this is a gamer-focused tablet, the customer data RedMagic has shows that far more people play without a controller than with one.

All the performance you could want

As you might expect from the spec sheet, this thing just flies through anything you throw at it. Aside from gaming, I used it as a normal tablet as well, which included browsing, researching new cars (I got rear-ended, so that’s been fun), some YouTube and emails. As expected, everything I did was smooth and fast. No issues.

Obviously, being able to play the best games smoothly is a critical part of performance, but RedMagic is all about giving you the absolute best gaming experience possible on a mobile device.

All the most popular games I tried ran great at the highest possible framerates. I consistently hit 120 frames per second on Call of Duty: Mobile, and RedMagic has promised high refresh support for other popular games, including PUBG, Delta Force and League of Legends.

RedMagic’s Game Center software even allows you to boost frame rates in supported games like Genshin Impact. On mobile, Genshin currently only natively supports 60fps, but the Astra can boost the frame rate to 120fps through the Game Center software.

Also, with its high-speed wireless, streaming games through Game Pass or PlayStation Remote Play ran well, making the Astra a truly all-around mobile gaming powerhouse.

Is it complete overkill for most people? Absolutely. Is it still ridiculously fun? Heck yes.

Fast software, but don’t expect updates

I was pleasantly surprised with the Astra’s out-of-the-box software experience. Even just a few years ago, RedMagic’s software was still very heavily skinned and looked like something out of a bad sci-fi movie. Recently, the company significantly toned down its software experience, and now, it’s actually quite usable.

However, there is a decent amount of bloatware, but most of it’s easily removed, and the rest of it is a pretty clean build of Android. Apart from the Game Space, it’s not too different from what you’d find on most any other Android tablet these days. There are a few translation errors scattered around, but it’s certainly much more usable than it was even just a couple years ago. RedMagic deserves some credit for how much progress it’s made.

Where it still falls woefully behind, however, is on updates. The Astra runs on Android 15, and to be honest, I wouldn’t expect any major platform updates. From my past experience with RedMagic devices, you’ll get some security updates over the next two or three years, and there’s a chance you’ll get surprised with a platform update, but the company makes no guarantee of it, so don’t hold your breath.

That’s not a deal breaker for me, as this is primarily meant to be a gaming and entertainment device and not something I’d use for banking or anything personal. As long as major new games that come out in the next few years run on it — and they almost certainly will — I’m not too upset about the lack of updates. The company absolutely needs to do better about it, but I wouldn’t let that stop you from buying it.

Also, if you’re looking for a complete package of accessories in the box, you’ll be disappointed. As I mentioned earlier, there’s no charger included, but RedMagic will sell you one for $29.90. A screen protector and folio case are available, too, for $24.90 and $39, respectively, but they seem to sell out of them quickly. And, while the Astra does have active pen support, RedMagic doesn’t currently have a pen as an accessory, though one is expected to be available. This is where the Lenovo Legion Tab has an advantage because there is a charger, screen protector and folio case included with the tablet, and you can get a pen from Lenovo for about $40. It might not have the Astra’s performance, but it is a better deal in this sense.

Best way to game on the go

As of right now, I’ve not tested any other small tablet that’s better for gaming than the RedMagic Astra. The Lenovo Legion Tab Gen 3 has last year’s specs, an outdated design and only one configuration. If you can find it on sale, it’s worth it, but at $549, the Astra is hands-down the better option.

The iPad Mini has huge bezels and nowhere near the power of the Astra, plus it’s more expensive. And you’re stuck in Apple’s ecosystem, which has its own set of problems. The higher configurations of the Astra, including the one I tested, are expensive, and you still have to pay extra for any accessories if you want them. But if you’re all in on mobile gaming, there is no better device for it right now than the Astra.