Huawei Mate 10: News and rumors

Why it matters to you

Huawei’s Mate 10 smartphone could be one of 2017’s best phones. Here’s everything we know about it so far.

Huawei’s Mate 9, which boats a generous screen, a huge battery, and a high-quality camera, was one of 2016’s most impressive devices. Now, it seems the sequel — tentatively dubbed the Huawei Mate 10 — is right around the corner.

But the competition is fierce. Huawei’s upcoming flagship will go toe to toe with Samsung’s Galaxy Note 8 and Galaxy S8 Plus, and Apple’s iPhone 7 Plus. If rumors are to believed, though, the Mate 10’s hardware will speak for itself.

Here’s everything we know about the Huawei Mate 10 so far.

Specs

The Huawei Mate 10’s official specs remain a mystery, but rumors suggest they’ll pack quite a punch.

According to a report in gadget blog iGeekPhone, The Mate 10 will likely boast a metal body with plastic inserts for antennas, like the Mate 9. It’s expected to sport a curved, 2.5D Quad HD (2560 x 1440 pixels) screen — an upgrade from the previous generation’s HD (1920 x 1080 pixels) display — and up to 8GB of RAM.

Andy Boxall/Digital Trends

Android Headlines reports that the Mate 10 has an edge-to-edge design and innovative biometric sensors. Huawei’s handset has a screen-to-body ratio of 83.6 percent (higher than the Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8 Plus), rumor has it, and the fingerprint scanner embedded in its touchscreen.

Rounding out the Mate 10’s processor are accouterments like GPS and Bluetooth 4.2 radios, a fingerprint scanner, and a whopping 4,900mAh battery with support for Huawei’s Super Charge 3.0 rapid charging tech. The handset is said to be compatible with LTE Cat.12 networks, and ship in storage configurations up to 128GB.

Processing power

The Mate 10 could have a beast of a mobile processor.

It’s said to pack Huawei’s new Kirin 970, an eight-core, 64-bit chip made on a 10nm FinFet+ process that comprises four Cortex-A73 high-speed cores (up to 3GHz), four low-power Cortex-A53 cores (up to 1.8GHz), and an i6 co-processor that juggles sensor data. A paired chip, the eight-core ARM Mali-G71 MP8, will reportedly supply graphics muscle.

There’s more to the Kirin 970 it than meets the eye. According to iGeekPhone, the processor boasts improved thermal dissipation, increased power efficiency, and better overall performance than its predecessor, the Kirin 960.

Camera

Andy Boxall/Digital Trends

The Mate 10’s processor might be the headliner, but its cameras are no slouch either.

According to a report in iGeekPhone, the Mate 10 will feature dual rear cameras in the form of a 16MP RGB sensor (up from the Mate 9’s 12MP) and a 23MP monochrome sensor (up from 20MP), both with apertures of f/2.0, phase and laser autofocus. Interestingly, it’s rumored to sport a dual-sensor selfie camera with a 12MP and 8MP camera. It wouldn’t be the first — Oppo’s F3 has a dual-sensor selfie cam — but it would no doubt help the Mate 10 stand out in an increasingly crowded field.

Release date and availability

Huawei has yet to reveal the Mate 10’s release date, but it won’t be long if history is any indication.

We’re expecting the Mate 10 to debut this December, ahead of a ship date during the holiday season. It’ll likely fall in line with the Mate series’ historical pricing — around $600 — but we’ll have to wait until later this year to find out for sure.