Huawei beats Apple and Samsung with new wide foldable

theverge

Huawei beats Apple and Samsung with new wide foldable

The Pura X Max is launching in a similar ‘passport’ aspect ratio to the rumored iPhone foldable.

The Pura X Max is launching in a similar ‘passport’ aspect ratio to the rumored iPhone foldable.

The Pura X Max’s wide aspect ratio should make it a better option for watching horizontal video.
Image: Huawei
is a news editor with over a decade’s experience in journalism. He previously worked at Android Police and Tech Advisor.

Apple and Samsung have both been strongly linked with plans for foldable phones in a boxy, wide aspect ratio, but it looks like another company will get there first. Huawei has just revealed the design of the Pura X Max, a new foldable it’s launching in China next week, and its passport-esque form factor is a dead ringer for early leaks of the iPhone Fold.

We don’t know too much about the Pura X Max yet, which will get a full release on April 20th alongside the colorful Pura 90 series, but early images shared by Huawei show blue, white, orange, and black versions of the phone, all featuring a triple rear camera. The rear design, with gridded sections with different textured finishes, is taken from the original Pura X, which launched last year, and is also wider than other foldables — Huawei has previous here, and isn’t just chasing a trend.

1/4Image: Huawei

The Pura X is smaller than the X Max appears to be, and was marketed as a flip phone, with the odd expectation that you’d rotate the whole phone into portrait as you open it. The X Max looks more like a cross between the classic flip and book form factors, though it’s also reminiscent of early foldables like Google’s first-gen Pixel Fold or Oppo’s initial Find N. It’s telling that Huawei’s early imagery shows people using the opened phone in both portrait and landscape.

Just last week we saw an alleged first dummy unit of Apple’s long-rumored foldable iPhone, which is expected to be similarly wide. Samsung is also rumored to be working on a wider version of its Galaxy Z Fold phones, though neither Apple nor Samsung’s handsets are expected until the second half of the year.

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Source: theverge

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