Huawei Mate Xs Launch

Huawei launches Mate Xs 5G folding smartphone

Huawei Mate Xs is the first 5G Foldable Smartphone

Despite Mobile World Congress being cancelled owing to fears over the coronavirus, Huawei launched a series of high-end updates at a virtual press conference today.

The headline product is the Huawei Mate Xs, a reworked version of Huawei’s smartphone that unfolds into a tablet, which directly competes with Samsung’s Galaxy Fold rather than the South Korean firm’s newer, smaller Galaxy Z Flip folding phone.

The Huawei Mate Xs is a refresh of the folding Mate X unveiled at MWC last year. It comes with a Kirin 990 5G chipset, 8GB of RAM, 512GB of internal storage, and a 4,500mAh split battery. When unfolded, it retains the same 8-inch display as seen last year, but with some improvements made to the display structure, which is made of two layers of aerospace-grade polymide that’s been fused together with an optically clear adhesive, which Huawei says makes it durable enough while allowing for high image quality.

When folded, you get a 6.6-inch almost bezel-free front display and 6.38-inch rear display.

Huawei Mate Xs Opened

AI is handled by a three-core Da Vinci NPU architecture based on two big cores and a tiny core. The chip also includes sub-6GHz 5G NSA and SA support, and 5G+4G dual sim dual standby, though it will notably only support the N41 (2.5-2.69GHz) 5G band at launch, adding additional bands in a future over-the-air update.

Huawei has also enhanced the Falcon Wing back-to-back folding design, which feels smoother and more stable than on the previous model.

Running on EMUI10.0.1, the Mate Xs has a multi-window function, which allows for two apps to be displayed side-by-side – and interact with each other. In other words, text, images and documents can be transferred simply by dragging and dropping content from one app to another.

There’s also a floating window function to let users launch a third app for small tasks such as responding to text messages, without exiting the other apps.

Huawei Mate Xs

The Mate Xs also supports multi-screen collaboration, which allows for data transfer and multi-screen control between the phone and Huawei’s MateBook and MatePad Pro, by creating a mirror screen of your phone on Huawei’s laptops and tablets, and allows for an easier drag and drop.

As for its cameras, the Mate Xs doesn’t disappoint. It comes with a Leica SuperSensing quad camera system comprising a 40MP SuperSensing camera, a 16MP ultra-wide angle camera, an 8MP telephoto camera and a 3D Depth Sensing camera.

It will also allow for up to 30x zoom and instead of just relying on the rear cam for selfies, the Mate Xs lets users take self-portraits using the secondary screen as well.

The Huawei Mate Xs will retail for £2,095 (€2,499) for the 8GB RAM, 512GB storage variant and will be available for purchase later this year.

Huawei Mate Xs

Huawei Mate Xs Specifications

Display:
Unfolded – 8-inches (2480 x 2200)
Folded – 6.6-inches (2480 x 1148) for the front panel, 6.38 inches (2480 x 892) for the back panel

Processor: Kirin 990 5G

RAM/Storage: 8 GB RAM + 512 GB ROM

Rear Camera: SuperSensing Cine Camera
40 MP (Cine Camera, f/1.8 aperture) + 40 MP (SuperSensing Camera, f/1.6 aperture, OIS) + 8 MP (Telephoto Camera, f/2.4 aperture, OIS) + 3D Depth Sensing Camera
Front Camera: 32 MP, f/2.0 aperture
3D Depth Sensing Camera

Battery: 4500 mAh (65W – Huawei superCharge, Wireless Supercharge 27W)

Network: 5G (NR), 4G (TDD LTE, FDD LTE), 3G (WCDMA), 2G (GSM)

Connectivity: WLAN (802.11a), Bluetooth (5.1), USB (Type-C), Earjack (Type-C)

Sensors: Gravity Sensor, Ambient Light Sensor, Proximity Sensor, Gyroscope, Compass, Fingerprint Sensor, Hall sensor, Barometer, Infrared sensor, color temperature sensor

Dimension, and Weight: 78.5mm x 161.3mm x 11mm (300g)

Other: NFC, GPS

Software: EMUI 10 (Android 10)