Huawei foldable phone Mate X finally went on sale in China today. The much-delayed Huawei Mate X was supposed to land in October globally.
Huawei has previously confirmed that it will launch the Mate X foldable phone in India in the second half of this year – it would be interesting to see if that plan stays put. In China, the Mate X is launching sans Google services, and chances are something similar will happen in India also but it should bring the Huawei foldable to India.
The company is the No. 2 smartphone behind Samsung Electronics Ltd. The Mate X uses Huawei’s Kirin 980 and Balong 5000 chipset instead of chips from Qualcomm or other U.S. suppliers. It comes loaded with Chinese alternatives to Google apps like music, maps, and others.
The Mate X’s OLED display folds outwards giving users access to three screen sizes – two independent smartphone-like screens with 6.6-inch and 6.38-inch sizes respectively, and an 8-inch tablet form factor. Huawei calls it a falcon-wing design. It also comes with triple cameras, 8GB of RAM, 512GB storage, and a dual-cell 4,500mAh battery with 55W fast charging.
The company has yet to announce Mate X sales forecasts or plans to sell it outside China. Huawei has priced the Mate X at 16,999 yuan ($2,400) in China.