Huawei beats Apple and Samsung with new wide foldable

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.

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.