Foldable smartphones have made a formidable entry into the South African market, with the scores of the country's billboards punting devices by manufacturers who have embraced the format.
While it is still early in adoption to predict whether the design format may become just another fad, the latest foldable by Huawei - the Mate Xs 2, has the potential to showcase foldable functionality and lead to the adoption of the design by other manufacturers.
Until recently, foldable smartphones, which made their way to local shores, provided an aesthetic appeal coupled with the convenience of more compact storage. Other than the fold, these devices sported regular premium smartphone features.
Cue the Huawei Mate Xs 2, which adopts a more unique and practical design than other foldable, including its predecessor, the recently launched Huawei P50 Pocket Pro Premium.
The fold
Of course, the most important feature of this smartphone is the fold. However, the Mate Xs 2 sees major upgrades, offsetting the downsides of foldable devices, such as the crease and flimsiness seen in other devices. The Mate Xs 2 adopts a falcon-wing mechanism to accommodate its fold, meaning that the smartphone unfolds from the bottom up, much like opening a book with pages facing downward.
Convenience?
The rear screen of the fold, however, doesn't span the entire back of the device but is close to a protruding catch, which also houses other important components of the smartphone, including its cameras. While this may sound like a hindrance, it plays in favour of the device by offering a sturdy grip.
Display
At first glance, the Mate Xs 2 does appear bulkier than regular smartphones. However, its size is easily compensated by the screen real estate unfolded. To further this, when unfolded, the display is incredibly thin, making it even more impressive, given its sharp picture clarity and output for video and imagery.
Gaming and Apps
Given the US trade ban affecting Huawei's inclusion of Google Mobile Services (GMS) in the device - lacking a Play Store and other useful Google apps is barely an obstacle for the Mate Xs 2, which easily compensates for this through Huawei's own Mobile Services (HMS) and functionality of the smartphone itself.
The everyday user might not even notice the difference without GMS. This is also thanks to Huawei's expansion in apps it offers through the Huawei App Gallery, encompassing almost every app used by South Africans, from banking to gaming.
The expanded list of apps and games makes the Huawei Mate Xs 2 the best gaming smartphone available right now. Choose to either run games in the closed format or become the envy of other mobile gamers by expanding the display to almost the size of a tablet.
Influence to drive the fold
The 'fold' in smartphone design is probably the biggest aesthetic inclusive after massive adoption by all manufacturers of the slate design, which replaced physical keys on smartphones.
While Samsung's newest foldable Galaxy Z Fold4 features a similar unfolding mechanism to the Mate Xs 2, the latter features higher specifications for almost all aspects of the device, inducing the display size and battery life.
Despite this, as OLED technology, the material used to produce foldable displays, decreases in production cost, both smartphones have the potential through their functionality to drive the adoption of this kind of fold-in method among more affordable smartphones to be released in the future.
IOL Tech