Huawei has presented the world’s first tri-fold smartphone, the Huawei Mate XT. After quite a few leaks and teasers, we now have the official information. The device was announced in Huawei’s homeland, China. Do note that the company refers to it as the Huawei Mate XT Ultimate Design.
The Huawei Mate XT is official, the world’s first tri-fold smartphone
This smartphone has two hinges, and one display. That display measures 10.2 inches when fully extended, and it’s an OLED panel with a 3K resolution. The aspect ratio is 16:11, in case you were wondering. Needless to say, that’s a lot bigger than what regular foldable smartphones offer (around 8 inches at most).
You also have the option to use a single screen, or two screens at once, it’s up to you. You can unfold as many as you need, really. The main display has a resolution of 2232 x 3184. If you choose to use a single display, you’ll get a 6.4-inch panel with a resolution of 2232 x 1008. If you opt for two displays, you’re looking at a 7.9-inch panel with a resolution of 2048 x 2232.
Fully unfolded, this phone offers a 10.2-inch 3K LTPO OLED display
It’s also worth noting that this is an LTPO display that Huawei is using, and it has a 1,440Hz high-frequency PWM dimming. On top of that, it has a touch sampling rate of 240Hz. Yes, the display is protected by UTG (Ultra-Thin Glass).
We jumped straight to that display, as it’s the most appealing aspect here, of course. The phone itself is made out of metal and vegan leather. Each display section has vegan leather on the back, so basically the entirety of the phone’s back. An octagonal camera island sits on the back of the phone, though we’ll talk more about that later.
16GB of RAM is included, along with a 5,600mAh battery
We still don’t know what SoC is used here, but if we had to guess, we’d say it’s the Kirin 9010, the same processor included in the latest Pura 70 smartphones. The phone includes 16GB of RAM and comes in 256GB; 512GB, and 1TB storage options.
The specs that surfaced yesterday were way off. The phone does not include an 8,000mAh+ battery, but a 5,600mAh unit. Yes, that is a silicon-carbon battery, and it does seem large enough for regular phones and foldables, but we wonder how will it do in this phone. If you end up using the phone completely unfolded, it may not be up to par. We’ll see.
The device does support 66W wired charging and 50W wireless charging. On top of that, it supports 7.5W reverse wireless charging too, while the charger does seem to be included in the package.
There are three cameras on the back, the main one even offers a variable aperture
There are three cameras located on the back of the phone. A 50-megapixel main camera (f/1.4-f/4.0 aperture, OIS) is backed by a 12-megapixel ultrawide unit (f/2.2 aperture). On top of that, a 12-megapixel periscope telephoto camera (f/3.4 aperture, OIS, 5.5x optical zoom) is also included. On the front, you’ll find an 8-megapixel camera (f/2.2 aperture).
HarmonyOS 4.2 comes pre-installed on this smartphone. The phone supports Bluetooth 5.2, and it has stereo speakers. It comes in Red and Black colors, both of which have gold accents on them. That means that color leaks from a couple of days ago were also mostly wrong.
The phone weighs 298 grams, which is not bad at all considering everything
The Huawei Mate XT Ultimate Design measures 156.7 x 219 x 4.75mm when fully unfolded. When only one display is in use, it measures 156.7 x 73.5 x 12.8mm. When two are in use, the phone measures 156.7 x 143 x 4.75-7.45mm. The device weighs 298 grams.
This weight is actually not bad at all considering that there are two hinges here and that the phone unfolds into a 10.2-inch monster. What about the price? Well, it starts at CNY19,999 ($2,809), and goes up to CNY23,999 ($3,371).
We still don’t know if the phone will make its way to other markets, but if it does, chances are it will be even more expensive. It is the very first of its kind, though, so that’s not all that surprising.