A series of rumors, leaked images and teasers meant that an official announcement was imminent, and the Huawei Mate XT Ultimate Design has finally arrived, bearing a tri-fold form factor that is not just here to eat the lunch of its foldable smartphone competitors, but also to steal some of the iPhone 16’s spotlight. We take a look at the device’s specifications, along with how the company successfully managed to bring this design to light.
The world's first trifold phone is here❗️
Huawei Mate XT | Ultimate Design
Starting at ¥19999 ($2800) pic.twitter.com/PaGlmhbHqG— Ben Geskin (@BenGeskin) September 10, 2024
Huawei stamps a $2,800 price tag on the base Mate XT Ultimate Design, but considering what it is, some might believe it to be generous
When completely folded, the Huawei Mate XT Ultimate Design sports a compact 6.4-inch display. The company has allowed users to unfold the second panel to use it as a 7.9-inch handset, or they can go all the way and transform the smartphone into a tablet with a 10.2-inch screen. The display technology used is LTPO OLED, and it supports an adaptive refresh rate with a 240Hz touch sample rate and a 1,440Hz PWM dimming. It is remarkable that Huawei and its engineers managed to keep the device so thin, functional, and lightweight all at once.
At 238 grams, the Huawei Mate XT Ultimate Design is lighter than most flagships, and when completely unfolded to its tablet form factor, the smartphone has a 3.6mm thickness. The rear side has a genuine leather finish and will be available in the red and black finishes. We believe Huawei chose this material since it would last longer than the others, with the device itself touting a dual-hinge design that employs a large UTG screen for the internal panel and a non-Newtonian fluid for the external unit. Both of these displays have scratch-resistant attributes and can withstand cracks and folds several times a day.
There are slim battery packs measuring an unfathomable 1.9mm, with their total capacity reaching 5,600mAh that supports 66W wired charging and 50W wireless charging. As for the optics, the Huawei Mate XT Ultimate Design has a notable rear camera bump with four cutouts to accommodate the various sensors. The primary one is a 50MP shooter that also touts variable aperture technology and a 12MP ultrawide-angle unit with an F/2.2 aperture.
The third sensor features a periscope telephoto lens with up to 5.5x optical zoom while supporting OIS. The maximum image resolution that this camera can capture for stills is 12MP, with digital zoom expanding to 50x. The fourth camera is a laser focus sensor, with the front-facing unit being 8MP. The entire array comes under Huawei’s XMAGE branding, highlighting the very best in smartphone cameras. Regarding the price, there are three versions of the Huawei Mate XT Ultimate Design, with all of them shipping with 16GB RAM as standard.
The base version sports 256GB of internal memory and is priced at 19,999 yuan, or $2,809, making it relatively affordable if you consider that this is the world’s first tri-fold smartphone, with nothing else like this anywhere in the world. The 512GB will set you back by 21,999 yuan, or $3,090, with the top-end version sporting 1TB of space priced at 23,999 yuan, or $3,371. As expected, the Huawei Mate XT Ultimate Design will be available in China, and some European countries and the company is already accepting bookings. The official release date of the smartphone is September 20, which is the same time as Apple’s iPhone 16 family.
