Hands-on with the most anticipated smartphone of 2025 – Huawei Mate XT Ultimate Design tri-fold

Huawei has ushered in a new era of foldables with the Mate XT Ultimate Design – the world’s first-ever commercially available tri-fold smartphone.

The most ambitious foldable yet, the Huawei Mate XT Ultimate Design boasts the world’s largest foldable display at 10.2 inches, and it is the thinnest foldable smartphone in the world, measuring just 3.6mm in thickness when unfolded.

While its most notable feature is the remarkable architecture of its large, folding display, there is much more to love about the Mate XT.

This includes its luxurious design, sophisticated craftsmanship, and refined hinges, which exude elegance at every level.

Huawei sent us the new Mate XT to review, and below, we unpack our experience putting this revolutionary smartphone to the test.

The king of foldables

The Huawei Mate XT is the pinnacle of foldable smartphone design because it achieves what foldables should strive for – a true smartphone-to-tablet transformation.

In fact, at its core, the Mate XT is not just a folding smartphone; it is a tablet with a pocketable form factor.

When folded, the Huawei Mate XT offers a familiar-sized 6.4-inch display that is compact and perfect for on-the-go one-handed use, such as texting.

You can then step up your experience by unfolding it to a 7.9-inch display, which strikes a perfect balance between portability and usability.

This dual-screen mode is great for browsing online, reading the news, and light multitasking.

Finally, the Huawei Mate XT lets you fully unfold the display into an expansive, tablet-sized, 10.2-inch screen.

Here, you get a widescreen 16:11 golden aspect ratio that is great for extensive multitasking with apps side-by-side, editing documents, or enjoying YouTube videos and movies – which you can store tons of, thanks to its massive 1TB internal storage.

This 10.2-inch display offers next-level immersion, not only due to its size, but also thanks to its bright OLED panel and its 90Hz refresh rate.

An elegant symphony

The Huawei Mate XT is more than a foldable smartphone – it is an artistic statement that offers a seamless blend of precision engineering and sophistication.

Its Advanced Precision Hinge system provides smooth and precise operation, while masterful craftsmanship ensures a premium, elegant appearance.

The gold metal finishes are distinguished by the iconic Star Diamond design, which intertwines light and shadow to provide a glistening sheen, while the intricately layered, forged, and twisted Eonic Curves ensure a unique one-of-a-kind pattern for each device.

This gold is complemented by elegant red vegan leather on our model, while a durable Aramid Fibre case with a built-in stand is also included.

Capture life’s moments

Emerging from this elegant red and gold architecture is an XMAGE triple camera array that is headlined by a 50MP sensor, 5.5x optical zoom, and an exceptional aperture.

This camera offers a 10-size adjustable physical aperture ranging from f/1.4 to f/4.0, giving you extensive creative control and adapting to a variety of lighting conditions, from bright daylight to challenging low-light scenes.

Optical image stabilisation (OIS) then ensures crisp images even at 5.5x telephoto range, while also offering up to 50x digital zoom.

More than a smartphone

After spending several days testing the Huawei Mate XT Ultimate Design, it became clear that this was much more than just a new foldable smartphone.

The Huawei Mate XT Ultimate Design is a statement of innovation and elegance that redefines the future of foldable smartphones.

It sets a new benchmark for the industry, and is an excellent blend of form and function, proving that innovation can be elegant.

• Click here to get the Huawei Mate XT Ultimate Design today.

The specs of the Huawei Mate XT Ultimate Design are listed in the table below.