A few days before the big iPhone 16 event, Huawei announced a press event for the same day as Apple. Huawei teased a mysterious device that looked like a triple-foldable phone. It happened after a different Chinese vendor, Tecno, unveiled a tri-fold concept.
Huawei’s event took place just a few hours after the big Apple keynote on Monday, in what was seen as a direct challenge to the iPhone maker. Since the initial teasers, we learned that the Huawei phone would be called the Mate XT.
Fast-forward to Tuesday, and the world’s first tri-fold phone has officially been announced. The Huawei Mate XT Ultimate Design is available for preorder in China, but it will cost consumers the equivalent of three brand-new iPhone 16s.
The base 128GB iPhone 16 starts at $799 in the US ($829 without carrier deals). The price doesn’t factor in tax. Buying three units would cost $2,487 before tax.
The cheapest 256GB Huawei Mate XT costs 19,999 yuan or around $2,810. If you want a 512GB variant, you’ll have to pay 21,999 yuan or $3,090. Finally, the 1TB tri-fold phone costs 23,999 yuan in China, or $3,370. You also get a pair of Freebuds 5 earbuds, USB-C cables, and two chargers in the package.
Rumors said Huawei’s tri-fold device would cost around $4,000, and they weren’t wrong. It’s likey the laptop’s international price would be higher, assuming Huawei wants to bring the Mate XT to other regions.
So far, the Mate XT is generating quite some buzz in China. That’s probably what Huawei wanted to happen on the same day Apple unveiled the iPhone 16 models. According to The Verge, Chinese retailer Vmall reported 3.7 million preorders before the pricing was revealed. It’ll be interesting to see how many units Huawei actually sells now that the price is official.
I’m a fan of foldable phones, but I’m not so sure that a tri-fold device is something I’d want to stress about.
I wouldn’t want to worry about the integrity of such a device despite Huawei’s durability claims. Tecno also said its tri-fold concept should be quite durable. I’d rather get a Fold-type foldable tablet/laptop contraption instead. That would be a device with a single hinge and two display halves.
That said, there’s no question that tri-fold phones will spawn technology innovations that might be used in other products. For starters, the Huawei Mate XT features two different hinge designs to accommodate two types of folding movements. The phone has a 6.4-inch screen when fully folded, and it’s just 12.8mm thick in this mode.
The phone has two hinges, and the foldable display features three sections. When fully unfolded, the phone is incredibly thin. It’s slightly thicker than a USB-C port, measuring 3.6mm at its thinnest points.
The Mate XT weighs about 298 grams, which is heavier than we’d want in a phone. But this isn’t a traditional phone.
The two hinges allow the screen to fold and unfold in a Z-shape, so you can use it in two different tablet modes. Fully unfolded, you get a 10.2-inch tablet with a 3K OLED panel. Open just one section of the screen, and you end up with a 7.9-inch display that’s more similar to phones like the Galaxy Z Fold 6 and Pixel 9 Pro Fold.
What’s also interesting is the battery structure. The tri-fold phone features three battery packs, one per display section. Each battery is just 1.9mm thick, which is impressive. The Mate XT has a total capacity of 5,600 mAh and also supports fast charging.
Despite being slim, the Mate XT has a large camera module on the back. It features a 50-megapixel main camera, a 12-megapixel ultrawide, and a 12-megapixel periscope camera. The selfie cam has an 8-megapixel sensor and is placed on the left screen, which is the display you’ll use in folded mode.
It’s unclear what processor Huawei used for the phone, but the Mate XT comes with 16GB of RAM. The HarmonyOS 4.2 operating system has built-in AI features, which is only the norm for 2024 phones, regardless of their folding abilities.
As exciting as the tri-fold Mate XT might seem, buying just one iPhone 16 instead of a tri-fold might be the better choice. Regular foldables like the Pixel 9 Pro Fold or Huawei’s other models are also better options.
