Honor is dropping $10 billion to build a smarter smartphone

It’s par for the course these days that all our smartphones come with AI features. Whether we’re talking about full-blown AI assistants like Gemini, or just a bunch of AI photo editing tools, there’s bound to be some kind of AI inside there. However, Honor could be taking things to the next level with an AI smartphone.

At MWC 2025, the company announced the Honor Alpha Plan. This is a $10 billion investment over the next few years that will see the company build an AI ecosystem of their own. According to Honor, this will see the company transition from a typical smartphone manufacturer to an “AI Device Ecosystem company” (their words, not ours).

This will include devices like an “Intelligent Phone” in partnership with Google and Qualcomm. The company aims to be the first to introduce an AI-driven phone, in which we might already have seen a glimpse of it. According to a report from WIRED, Honor showcased its new Honor UI Agent, an on-screen AI tool that can understand what’s on your screen and have it perform tasks like making reservations for you.

In addition to creating an AI smartphone, Honor also wants to create an intelligent ecosystem. This comes in the form of AI Connect that will make it easier for iOS and Android users to share files. These are very lofty goals and we’re sure that Honor isn’t the only one working on AI, so it will be interesting to see whose version will come out on top.