Huawei Mate Xs is official with Kirin 990 5G, improved hinge

Huawei introduced the foldable Mate X at last year's MWC, and while its market arrival was delayed several times its successor is much more punctual. The company just unveiled the Huawei Mate Xs, which adds some polish to an already great-looking formula.

The new foldable phone comes with the Kirin 990 5G chipset, upgraded hinge structure, and improved cooling system, while the screen, cameras and overall design remain virtually unchanged.

The Huawei Mate Xs has a 2-layer structure with added strength over the foldable OLED panel - it is a sandwich of two polyamide films with optically clear adhesive between them. The diagonal of the unfolded display remains 8” with a resolution of 2480 x 2200 pixels.

When the Mate Xs folds, there is a main 6.6” screen with a 19.5:9 ratio, while the back has a super tall 25:9 screen that you can use as a viewfinder for selfies.

The Huawei Mate Xs has a 40MP f/1.8 main shooter, 8MP f/2.4 telephoto lens with OIS and 16MP f/2.2 ultrawide snapper. There is also a ToF module for even better edge detection and great-looking bokeh shots.

There are no front cameras - you just fold the Mate Xs and take selfies looking at the backside of the folded device.

On the inside the Mate Xs brings a new Falcon Wing hinge that Huawei says should be more robust. It does look a bit better, as we established in our hands-on, but on the front the crease where the panel folds remain visible.

The battery of the Mate Xs is 4,500 mAh with 55W fast-charging capabilities, with the required charger included in the box.

Huawei Mate Xs

Huawei Mate Xs arrives with EMUI 10, based on the open-source version of Android 10, and unsurprisingly, there are no Google services. Huawei is relying on its ecosystem called HMS (Huawei Mobile Services), which it's extensively working on, but it still misses a bunch of vital apps.

The price of the 8/512GB phone is €2,499 and will start selling globally starting next month, confirmed Richard Yu, Huawei CEO.