Leaked information about the Huawei Mate 70 line suggests it could feature a 5nm processor
Picture of the Huawei Mate 60 next to a render of the upcoming Mate 70. Image credit-TechBoilers
While all of the attention on Huaweihas been focused lately on the tri-fold Mate XT, the beleaguered Chinese manufacturer has at least one more major device series to release this year. That would be the flagship Mate 70 line. Huawei has been known to release two different flagship series each year. Usually, in the first or early second quarter, it releases the "P" series. These are photography-based flagship phones which this year were given a new name when released as the Pura 70 line.
Huawei's second flagship series of the year usually makes its entrance during the fourth quarter. The Mate line typically includes new innovative features. Last year, the Mate 60 series shocked many since it included the first Huawei-designed application processor (AP) since the 5nm Kirin 9000 powered the Mate 40 in 2020. That was also the last Huawei phone to support 5G until last year's Mate 60 series which was powered by the 7nm Kirin 9000s AP. The chip was able to break through U.S. export rules blocking foundries from delivering 5G chips to Huawei because it was built by China's largest foundry, SMIC.
We have heard much about the Mate 70 series thanks to previous leaks. Now, Digital Chat Station, one of the more prolific leakers on China's Weibo social media platform, has leaked information about the Mate 70. According to the leak, the Mate 70 will feature a quad-curved display of an unknown size. The leaker does say that the screen sizes will be larger than those of the Pura 70 series.
Leaker Digital Chat Station has some info about the upcoming Huawei Mate 70 series. | Image credit-Huawei Central
The Mate 70 is expected to use a 3D facial recognition system which could make it as secure as Apple's Face ID. The fingerprint sensor might move from under the display to being integrated inside the power button. The rear panel will be made from a non-metal material. One possibility, which the manufacturer already used with the Mate XT tri-fold, is leather.
The rear panel has a giant camera ring and it could feature a 50MP main camera and a 50MP ultra-wide camera, There could be a telephoto camera with a periscope lens. The new Mate 70 lineup might debut a new in-house XMAGE imaging system. The MAte 70 series is expected to be equipped with a new processor which is interesting since Huawei is pretty limited unless it was able to work with SMIC on the production of a 5nm chipset for the phone.
Digital Chat Station says that the new chipset has greater energy efficiency and improved performance. That sounds exactly what you would expect when going from a chip made using the 7nm process node to a 5nm chip with a larger transistor count. The problem all along has been that Chinese foundries have been banned from obtaining extreme ultraviolet lithography machines which are needed to etch complex circuitry patterns on the silicon wafers that are sliced and diced into chips.
There have been rumors that Huawei or SMIC have developed a way to produce 5nm chips using older deep ultraviolet lithography machines. This will be interesting to watch out for when the company unveils the Mate 70 line in November.
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