Huawei’s three-fold mobile phone experience: a large screen that is not boring, and these hidden features
Huawei Mate XT, the world’s first commercial tri-fold mobile phone, is also the most anticipated and controversial technology product this year.
Today we will learn more about this new gadget that stole the limelight of the Technology Spring Festival Gala from three aspects: light and thin body, folding experience, and application adaptation.
Thin, ultra-thin, really thin
When the Mate XT is fully unfolded, it is 4.1mm. There is a slight difference from the official 3.6mm because we have also included the raised part of the screen edge to prevent scratches.
Compared with the current thin and light folding screens on the market, the Mate XT is very thin, even its big brother Mate X5 is far surpassed.
This thickness is so close to the size of the Type-C port that the interface has to extend to the back of the body, which is a bit of a compromise.
The flatness and weight control of the body also promotes the display of thinness from the visual and tactile perspectives. When you put the Mate XT on the table, it can fit perfectly with the desktop.
Compared with a mobile phone, 307g is a bit heavy, but when a device close to the size of a tablet is controlled at around 300g, the “lightness” becomes particularly obvious.
However, the thinness of the body makes the camera a bit awkward. Although Huawei has made this lens module look not that heavy through craftsmanship and design, you can still clearly feel the position of the lens when holding it in your hand.
Balance is an art and a challenge.
Super Transformation
After talking about thinness, let’s look at “folding”
First of all, how do you fold it? The most recommended way to open and close it is: to push up with your left hand and press down with your right hand, all in one go. If you want to do it step by step, the official recommendation is to move the right and left sides first, but it’s best not to do it the other way around.
The inner folding structure can hide the extra screen in the water drop structure, but the outer folding can only be telescopic to maintain flatness. After unfolding, a small part of the extra screen will shrink into the right frame. Therefore, the hinge on the right side must be unfolded first to allow the screen to move in and out smoothly. If you force the left side to open first for a long time, you can check the screen replacement quotation on the official website.
Compared with the order of opening, I think it is more important to remember the folding direction. The Mate XT has three folding modes: single, double, and triple screen.
In single-screen mode, it is just an ordinary mobile phone. The Mate XT does not compromise on the size of the external screen because of its new form. Unlike the folding screens with too narrow external screens in the early years, you are not always forced to unfold the phone to use the large screen. However, it is difficult to ignore the 13cm thickness in single-screen mode, plus the weight of more than 300 grams.
And you have to pay attention to the outer fold to avoid scratches. Although the official phone case has a special baffle, looking at the thickness of this thicker one, it is not recommended.
The dual-screen Mate XT is the same as other traditional folding screens, especially the Mate X5. The two screens on the right just offset the weight of the left lens, so it doesn’t tilt in your hand.
Moreover, both the inner and outer hinges can achieve multi-angle hovering, so in theory, the Mate XT comes with the most expensive mobile phone holder in history.
Application Amplifier
The three-screen display with the largest display area is also the biggest highlight of this phone. The 10.2-inch look and feel is amazing. Based on the responsive layout of the Hongmeng system, most applications can be adapted to this 16:11 screen.
Compared with traditional folding screens that are close to 1:1, the 16:11 horizontal screen mode is more suitable for viewing the market, playing games, and watching movies.
The black borders on the top and bottom are very narrow, even just the borders. Reading novels and articles in portrait mode can also display more information. The fully expanded screen is like an application amplifier: Xiaohongshu becomes Dahongshu, WeChat becomes Juxin, and Bilibili becomes Bilibili. Even without adaptive stretching software, it can become a parallel vision.
The third benefit of 16:11 is that the screen can be split properly. It is equivalent to using a standard phone and a folding screen to run different software, and the display ratio will not be unbalanced. Even if the average ratio is evenly divided, the content displayed is more than that of ordinary mobile phones. However, it currently only supports dual-opening applications. I am looking forward to the subsequent upgrade of triple-opening.
Moreover, when switching between single, double, or triple screens, the transition animation is also very smooth, seamlessly adapting to screens of different sizes.
After using the Mate XT for two days, I found that it was a little higher than I expected. It is not because of the new form factor and experience, but because it makes me feel that it is very mature, so mature that it does not seem like a new product.
- Mate X’s external folding attempt
- Mate X2’s inward-folding solution
- Mate X5’s breakthrough in thinness and lightness
- Adaptation modes for various MatePads
- There is also the Hongmeng ecosystem with more than 900 million devices
When all this is focused on the Mate XT, it becomes a natural thing. Of course, the far-leading mobile phone form factor also brings a far-reaching price height. Most of the arguments about the Mate XT “no one buys it and it’s useless” also stem from the price of 20,000.
In 2019, Huawei launched its first foldable screen, Mate X, with the same starting price of 19,999 yuan. It is also full of controversy and its future remains a mystery.
In the past five years, all major manufacturers have made their own folding screens (except Apple), and have updated several generations in succession. The prices have gradually fallen below 10,000 yuan, and some are even priced on par with ordinary mobile phones.
The current Mate XT is just back to the forefront of the storm five years ago. As for what will happen to it in the future, it is actually not that important to you and me. At least in the boring current situation where thousands of mobile phones are the same, Huawei has proved with the three-fold foldable phone that the form factor of the mobile phone is still there and can still develop.
This experiment itself is quite interesting, isn’t it?