5 days ago
Huawei's next tri-fold phone leaks – and things are looking serious
Recently, we've been hearing quite a lot about Samsung's first tri-folding phone. But if you've been following the tech industry closely, you'll know Samsung won't be the first to introduce a commercially available tri-folding phone. Huawei claimed that title with the Mate XT.
And now, specs for its successor have leaked. Tipster Digital Chat Station has shared some of the specs for the next generation of the Huawei Mate XT on the Chinese social media website Weibo. Reportedly, those come from a TENAA regulatory listing for a phone with model number GRL-AL20. The listing confirms the phone was certified for 5G.
Apparently, the next Mate XT may be a minor upgrade for the tri-fold phone. We don't know its name yet, but we'll assume, for simplicity, that it may be called Mate XT 2. Reportedly, the Mate XT 2 may feature the Kirin 9020 chip and satellite connectivity (probably exclusive to China, though).
Image Credit - Digital Chat Station
There would reportedly be an upgraded new 50MP large-pixel sensor with variable aperture and improvements to the periscope telephoto camera. Not much else is know about this phone at the moment, but Huawei is a serious competitor in the realm of tri-folding phones that Samsung will have to face. Actually, so far, it's the only competitor and it has a huge lead. The Mate XT Ultimate Edition came with a Kirin 9010 chip, 16 gigs of RAM, up to 1TB of storage, and a 5,600mAh battery, supporting 66W wired and 50W wireless charging. Serious specs, if I may add. Meanwhile, it had a 50MP main camera, a 12MP periscope telephoto with 5.5x optical zoom, a 12MP ultrawide, and an 8MP selfie camera. Of course, the main attraction of the phone was the OLED displays: 10.2-inch fully unfolded, 7.9-inch when folded once, and 6.4-inch when fully folded. And that was one premium device, coming at €3,500. But yep, crazy innovative, it's worth noting, and such innovation does come at a cost, alright.
The next-generation Mate XT is expected to be announced sometime in September. Rumor has it the rival from Samsung (which may or may not be called Galaxy Z TriFold...) is said to come in October.
I personally think that while these foldable phones – especially the tri-fold ones – are super exciting from a tech perspective, they still feel a bit out of reach for most people. The innovation is incredible, no doubt, but the price tags are sky-high, and it's hard to know how durable these complex designs really are in day-to-day life. Still, it's fun to watch the competition heat up between Huawei and Samsung – and who knows, maybe in a few years, tri-fold phones will be the new normal… and hopefully a bit more affordable too.
