Available from mid 2019, the Mate X costs €2299
Chinese telecoms giant Huawei has unveiled its first foldable smartphone, the Mate X, at MWC in Barcelona – just one week after Samsung launched its Galaxy Fold ahead of the tech show last Thursday.
Samsung might have taken the headlines with its innovative new handset, but Huawei’s Mate X shows there’s still plenty of competition for the Korean tech giant. Along with an impressive 8in display when unfolded, the device is billed by its makers as the fastest folding 5G phone in the world. Indeed, Huawei claims it can achieve theoretical download speeds of up to 4.6Gbps – fast enough to download a 1GB movie in just three seconds.
I’ve not been able to go hands-on with either device yet, so it’s difficult to say how drastically the Mate X differs from the Galaxy Fold. However, from what I’ve seen the foldable screen represents a significant development in terms of smartphone design. What’s arguably most impressive about the Mate X is that it measures 11mm thick when folded despite employing screens on both sides. In its expanded form, it’s just 4mm thick.
When unfolded, the Mate X has a brilliant 8in 2,480 x 2,200 display that’s not obscured by notches or cutouts, and which offers plenty of screen for browing the web and multi-tasking between apps. Fold it up, though, and you’re still left with 6.6in screen on the front and a 6.38in, 2,480 x 892 panel on the reverse.
It’s not clear how useful the rear display will be when the phone is used in this folded state, but one of the main benefits Huawei showed is that the subject of a photograph can see how an image looks as it’s being captured. And to make sure this screen stays in tip-top condition, Huawei has also specially designed a case that means you can put it down on rough surfaces without worrying.
As for its advertised 5G speeds, these are enabled by its 7nm Balcon 5000 + Kirin 980 5G chipset, with 8GB RAM and 512GB of storage. Although it’s unlikely most of us will see the benefits of 5G in the UK in the very near future, Huawei is making a statement of intent to Samsung by promising speeds twice as fast as the Galaxy Fold.
Other details about the phone are still a bit thin on the ground right now – we know nothing of its cameras except that they’re made by Leica, for example – but Huawei did show off some impressive tidbits about the company’s new battery technology.
The phone will be powered by a long-lasting dual 4500mAh battery, which can be charged to 85% capacity in just 30 minutes using the company’s 55W ‘SuperCharge’ charger. If it works as the company says, that’s not far off matching the fastest charging phone we’ve ever seen, the Oppo RX17 Pro, which can go from empty to full in just 35 minutes.
All this doesn’t come cheap. Huawei is selling its Mate X for a whopping €2,299, with a release date in the “middle of 2019”.