Release of Huawei Mate 10
Like Samsung and LG, Huawei also releases more than one flagship smartphone a year. Samsung's comes in the form of the Note series, LG's in the form of the V series and Huawei's in the form of the Mate series.
The Mate 10 is therefore the next device in the pipeline, after it was confirmed to be coming by Huawei's chief of consumer division Richard Yu, but what will it bring with it? Here are all the rumours and speculation surrounding the Huawei Mate 10.
Release date and price
- Invites sent out for 16 October event
- Rumoured to cost $1100
Huawei Mate devices don't follow a hugely predictable cycle so it's difficult to guess exactly when we will see the Mate 10 appear. The Mate 7 was announced in September, while the Mate 8 and Mate 9 were both revealed in November, a year and a couple of weeks apart.
Rumours previously suggested the Mate 10 will be unveiled on 16 October in Munich, Germany, and Huawei has now sent out invites for an event on this date with a faint number 10 etched into the background. It is therefore assumed the rumour was true and this will be the launch date for the Mate 10, which is apparently "the device worth waiting for", according to the invite.
In terms of price, it has been reported by TableTowo that the Mate 10 would cost around $1100. If this is the case, it would make it one of the most expensive Huawei devices to date. Apparently it will launch alongside the Mate 10 Lite though, which is claimed to be smaller and we'd assume slightly cheaper.
Design
- Premium design likely
- Full metal build expected
- Improvements on Mate 9 likely
The Huawei Mate series is similar to Samsung's Note range in that it offers a wider stance than other flagships like the Huawei P10 or Samsung Galaxy S8. The Mate 9 measures 156.9 x 78.9 x 7.9mm and weighs a hefty 190g, making it quite a large device.
It offers a lovely premium design though with a metal body, vertical dual-rear camera and a circular fingerprint sensor beneath the camera setup. There is no physical button on the front of the Mate 9, though there is on the Mate 9 Porsche Design model that launched at the same time. This model moves the fingerprint sensor to the front and introduces a curved display.
We're expecting the Mate 10 to continue with a premium, solid build offered by the Mate 9 though it is not yet clear if it will deliver a new design or stick with what it knows. According to Huawei's chief of consumer division Richard Yu, the Mate 10 will be "improved in virtually all areas" so we expect design will be one of those areas. Perhaps waterproofing will be added or a curved display.
Yu also said the Mate 9 would offer a "full-screen display", suggesting it will follow the same path as the Samsung S8 and S8+, as well as what is expected for the Note 8.
Display
- 6.1-inches rumoured
- Full-screen display pretty much confirmed
- Increase in resolution would be good
The Huawei Mate 10 is rumoured to be coming with a 6.1-inch display, which would be slightly larger than the Mate 9's 5.9-inch screen. If a full-screen display is adopted as planned on the new device though, we wouldn't expect the footprint of the Mate 10 to differ too much from the Mate 9.
That said, some rumours are suggesting the 18:9 aspect ratio screen will only appear on a more premium device going by the name of the Mate 10 Pro, while the standard Mate 10 may have a regular 16:9 panel. There have also been reports of a smaller Mate 10 Lite device that is reported to be coming with a 5.8-inch display.
The Mate 9 opts for an IPS LCD display with a 1920 x 1080 pixel resolution that puts its pixel density at 373ppi. We'd love to see improvements here for the Mate 10, especially in terms of resolution. A Quad HD resolution at the reported size for the Mate 10 would mean a pixel density of 482ppi, which would at least put it closer to its competition.
Whether Huawei will also switch to an AMOLED screen remains to be seen and it also isn't yet known whether the Chinese company might opt to include other technologies too, such as Mobile HDR. Richard Yu did say improvements in virtually all areas so we'd expect some change between the Mate 9 and Mate 10 in terms of display.
Camera
- Dual-rear cameras likely
- Probably Leica branded
- Improvements over Mate 9 certain
Huawei is gunning for Apple with its Mate 10 device with Richard Yu claiming the Mate 10 will offer "better photographing capability" to help it compete with the Cupertino company's next iPhone that is due to launch in September.
The Mate 9 features a dual-camera setup on its rear, as we briefly mentioned previously, and given the trend for dual cameras in smartphones, we'd expect the Mate 10 to continue to offer this feature.
Huawei has been in partnership with Leica for the cameras on its latest flagship smartphones so it is likely the Mate 10 will also offer Leica-branded cameras, which too is shown in the Weibo leak.
We'd also expect one of the rear sensors to be a monochrome sensor and the other an RGB sensor, like the Mate 9 and P10 devices, though Huawei might change things up. What resolutions the Mate 10 will offer in the camera department are not yet known but expect optical image stabilisation, laser detection autofocus and phase detection autofocus all on board.
Software
- Android Nougat with EMUI
The Huawei Mate 10 will launch on Android Nougat with Huawei's EMUI software over the top. It means you'll get bloatware on top of pure Android but the experience is likely to be similar to that of the P10 and P10 Plus with a few additional tweaks.
There haven't been any substantial software leaks as yet but we will update this feature if we see any appear.
The Huawei Mate 10 will be announced before the year is out, likely mid-Octoer and it will bring with it a whole host of improvements over the Mate 9 if Huawei's chief of consumer division is to be believed.
There haven't been a huge amount of leaks as yet, aside from an event invite, a couple of renders, a rumoured price and a rumoured screen size but we will update this feature as soon as any reports surrounding the device appear.