First tri-foldable Mate XT phone lands with 10-inch display and $3,000 price

Some call the design dual-fold because the screen can bend at two places, but with the Mate XT the term tri-folding phone became more popular as there are three distinct screen sections when the phone is closed.

Huawei set the Mate XT release date for September 20, as if to coincide with the iPhone 16 series launch, and announced its wunderphone just a day after Apple's Glowtime event where it presented its latest and greatest as if to juxtapose the innovation ratio of its tri-foldable handset with whatever Apple was able to muster. With a good reason, too.

Move over, Honor Magic V3, there is a new thinnest foldable phone on the horizon! While the V3 is just 4.35 mm when unfurled, the tri-folding Mate XT offers the incredible 3.6 mm thinness!

Needless to say, Huawei was advantaged by the tri-folding form factor that is both in- and out-folding, so that the user can chose any screen size that fits their activity. The Mate XT offers a huge 10.2-inch main display when fully open - the largest on any handset so far - and can spread its internal components across a much larger area inside, allowing it to craft the thinnest phone ever.

In the promo materials, however, Huawei remains shy in sharing the Mate XT thickness when closed, but it shouldn't be more than the sum of the three parts, which would make it thinner than, say, Samsung's Galaxy Z Fold 6 phone. Samsung has demonstrated multi-foldables many times before, but only as concepts, whereas the Mate XT is the first such device that will be available to willing buyers.

That is not all, though, as the Mate XT comes with a top-shelf quad camera with a periscope zoom lens, as well as a huge 5,600 mAh battery and ultrafast charging. Thus, not only did Huawei notch the title of the first phone maker with a tri-foldable device on the market, but it also made it an absolute flagship in terms of specs.

The Mate XT may be powered by the Kirin 9010 5G chipset that powers the top-of-the-line Huawei Pura 70 Ultra model. This year, the Pura series replaced what used to be known as the "P-series," a flagship line that focuses on photography (hence the "P").

The Kirin 9010 has a CPU configuration made up of 2 cores TaiShan V121 at 2.30 GHz, 6 cores TaiShan V121 at 2.18 GHz, and 4 cores Cortex-A510 at 1.55 GHz. The chip is built by SMIC, the world's third-largest foundry, using its 7nm N+2 process node. While an enhanced 7nm chipset, it is considered to be a nice improvement over the 7nm Kirin 9000s 5G which was unveiled by Huawei last year for the Mate 60 series.

Moreover, the Mate XT works with Huawei's two-way satellite calling feature that allows the user to make calls even in areas without cellular or Wi-Fi reception.

Hints that Huawei is thinking about the Mate XT as a tablet replacement of sorts in those situations that call for it are the various accessories that ship with the $2,800 phone, such as a foldable color-coordinated keyboard with a touchpad to go with the 10.2-inch "handset," if one can call this monster with such a term.