HUAWEI P50 Pocket launched: A $1,400 rival to the Galaxy Z Flip 3

Huawei joined Samsung in being part of the first wave of foldable phones back in 2019, and the company’s foldables have all been big-screen affairs to date. Now, the firm has decided to go after the Galaxy Z Flip series by launching the HUAWEI P50 Pocket clamshell foldable.

The device is available in a Diamond White variant with a diamond pattern on the back, a black model, and a premium gold edition. The P50 Pocket also boasts a rather interesting design, featuring two circular housings. One housing hosts a triple rear camera system, while the other hosts a 1.04-inch external display (340 x 340). This screen can be used for the date/time, notifications, selfies via the rear cameras, and more.

Unfold the HUAWEI P50 Pocket and you’ll be greeted by a 6.9-inch foldable OLED display (2,790 x 1,188), offering a 120Hz refresh rate, anti-reflective coating, and 21:9 aspect ratio. The firm also claims that the foldable has a proprietary hinge which enables a zero-gap design when folded.

The meat and potatoes

Huawei’s latest foldable is powered by the Snapdragon 888 4G SoC, which isn’t the latest Snapdragon flagship silicon anymore. Nevertheless, this should still be powerful enough to accomplish almost any task and play the most advanced Android titles on the market without issue.

A 4,000mAh battery keeps the lights on as well, which is significantly bigger than the Galaxy Z Flip 3’s 3,300mAh capacity. We also get 40W wired charging here. HUAWEI didn’t reveal how long it’ll take for the phone to reach full capacity, but previous HUAWEI devices with 40W charging topped up in roughly an hour.

Moving to the camera side of things, the P50 Pocket’s circular housing hosts a triple rear camera system. More specifically, you’re getting a 40MP main camera (26mm, f/1.8), 13MP ultrawide camera (13mm, f/2.2, 120-degree field-of-view, macro shooting), and a 32MP “super-spectrum” sensor (30mm, f/1.8).

HUAWEI has also implemented a weird but cool fluorescent photography mode via the super-spectrum sensor. In fact, HUAWEI says this sensor can also be used to check whether you’ve applied sun-screen correctly or if you’ve removed all your make-up. We’ll be sure to give this a try if we get our hands on the device, as both features certainly sound unique in the smartphone space.

Otherwise, a 10.7MP camera in a center-mounted punch-hole cutout handles selfies. But you can also use the external display to take selfies via the rear cameras.

Other notable features include Harmony OS, a side fingerprint scanner, face unlock (via the external camera or selfie camera), dual-SIM support, NM card support (a disappointment when microSD is the industry standard), Bluetooth 5.2, and Wi-Fi 6.

HUAWEI P50 Pocket availability and pricing

HUAWEI says sales start in China from today, starting at 8,988 yuan (~$1,411) for the 8GB/256GB model. The gold premium edition model will set you back 10,988 yuan (~$1,725), coming with 12GB of RAM and 512GB of storage. That’s a pretty penny compared to the Galaxy Z Flip 3’s $999 price tag and will likely be higher outside China.

Speaking of wider releases, we asked HUAWEI about global availability of the P50 Pocket and will update the article if/when it gets back to us. Although one certainty is that it won’t ship with Google support if it launches outside China.

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