Huawei Mate XT Ultimate review

Tri-fold with nice cameras - why not?

Foldables are often challenged in the camera department, as makers try to balance weight, volume, cost, and image quality - somehow image quality always tends to suffer. Huawei, on the other hand, has a history of being above the rest in camera hardware on its bendy phones, but then the Mate XT Ultimate is unlike all other bendy phones in terms of, well, weight, volume, and cost, so it's several layers of complicated.

Despite all space constraints, the XT Ultimate comes with the same main camera as the X6 - a reasonably-sized 1/1.56" sensor (especially for a foldable) coupled with a vari-aperture lens (f/1.4-f/4.0).

The X6's ultrawide didn't make the cut, so instead of a 40MP sensor, the XT Ultimate has a 12MP one (more like 12.6MP, but Huawei insists on 12MP in official specs).

Then there's the telephoto. It's got a periscope lens that has an equivalent focal length of 125mm as per the company's own data, and that's how it's reported in hardware apps, making for an almost perfect 5x zoom from the 24mm main camera. The thing is, both the XT Ultimate promo materials and the viewfinder state 5.5x zoom and the EXIF data from images captured on it does report 132mm. Huawei is no stranger to doing weird things with native vs. resultant focal lengths - 23mm main cameras that captured 27mm images were a thing for a while, so the 5x-5.5x discrepancy doesn't exactly surprise us.

The selfie camera - the one in the leftmost/topmost third of the display - is an 8MP f/2.2 unit with fixed focus. This one says 19mm in hardware apps and 23mm in EXIF and the latter is a lot more believable.

• Wide (main): 50MP (1/1.56", 1.0µm - 2.0µm), f/1.4-f/4.0, 24mm, PDAF, Laser AF, OIS; 4K@60fps
• Ultrawide: 12MP (1/2.9", 1.24µm), f/2.2, 13mm, PDAF; 4K@60fps
• Telephoto, 5.5x: 12MP (1/3.6", 1.0µm), f/3.4, 125/132mm, PDAF (80cm - ∞), OIS; 4K@60fps
• Front camera: 8MP (1/3.6", 1.22µm), f/2.2, 19/23mm, fixed focus; 4K@30fps

Daylight photo quality

Main camera

The Mate XT Ultimate captures great-looking photos with its main camera at 1x. They're packed with detail, which has a particularly fine quality to it albeit with the occasional case of jaggies and some slightly oddly rendered grass. Noise is non-existent. Contrast is on the high side of average, though we wouldn't say dynamic range is limited because of it - it's just a specific look. White balance is typically accurate while color saturation is slightly conservative, but nowhere near lifeless.

Daylight samples, main camera (1x)

People shots aren't half bad either, with great facial detail and nice skin tones. Portrait mode works well too.

Daylight samples, main camera (1x), Photo mode

Daylight samples, main camera (1x), Portrait mode

There are two different flavors of 50MP photos on the Mate - an AI-labeled one and a plain one. The AI version can be properly impressive, managing to capture finer detail in certain scenes and types of subject matter (or it makes it up, but in a convincing way). The downside is that it takes 3s to capture.

The regular 50MP shots aren't nearly as good - they're soft and noisy, and have a washed out quality to them.

Daylight samples, main camera (1x), 50MP, AI

Daylight samples, main camera (1x), 50MP, no AI

The 2x shots are also properly nice, with excellent detail and no signs of upscaling or overprocessing - it's as if the phone has a dedicated 2x camera.

Daylight samples, main camera (2x)

That excellence extends to photos of people, which maintain great detail. The 50-ish millimeter focal length is better for facial proportions, and here you don't have to sacrifice any quality to reap those benefits.

Daylight samples, main camera (2x), Photo mode

Daylight samples, main camera (2x), Portrait mode

There's no shortcut to 3x in the Photo mode viewfinder, but there is a 3x Portrait mode (72mm equivalent). It too is looking very good, with only a minor drop in pixel-level quality.

Daylight samples, main camera (3x), Portrait mode

Telephoto camera, 5.5x

The Mate XT Ultimate's telephoto camera takes pretty solid shots at 5.5x (or, again, 5x, depending on how you look at it). Detail is good, if not necessarily the finest and most natural rendition, and there's no noise. Contrast is pretty high again, but the tonal extremes are handled well. Colors are generally very good too. The one sort of major issue is close focusing - with a minimum focus distance of 80cm (with some coercing) this tele is better suited to distant subjects.

Daylight samples, telephoto camera (5.5x)

Shooting head-and-shoulder portraits will get you comfortably far from your subject for the phone to focus on them (if a bit too far from them generally). We'd say these are excellent quality shots, and the lack of a Portrait mode at this zoom level isn't strictly an omission you're going to feel.

Daylight samples, telephoto camera (5.5x), Photo mode

There's one extra zoom level in the viewfinder - it's 10x, and not 11x, adding an extra layer of weirdness to the zoom implementation. Or is the 10x a return to normalcy if we assume that 5x was the 'native' magnification? We digress. The results aren't exactly great on a pixel level, but will do for... certain applications.

Daylight samples, telephoto camera (10x)

Ultrawide camera

The ultrawide camera's coverage is pretty extreme, making its corner-to-corner sharpness all the more praiseworthy. Dynamic range is very good (pretty high contrast again) and colors are a bit more vivid than on the main camera, which is sort of welcome. An overall great showing here.

Daylight samples, ultrawide camera

Selfies

Selfies taken in the fully folded state, on the 8MP in-display camera, are surprisingly nice, both in terms of detail and color rendition.

Selfie samples, 'cover' camera

Still, it would pay off to do some finger gymnastics and unfold the Ultimate halfway, so that you have both the rear cameras and a portion of the display facing towards you. The 1x main camera's selfies are superb, and you can also use the ultrawide for weirder perspectives or to capture more of your surroundings.

Selfie samples, main camera

Selfie samples, ultrawide camera

Low-light photo quality

Main camera

In the dark, the Mate's main camera does a good job at 1x. It produces balanced exposures with great dynamic range. Detail is generally very good too, but shadows in some darker scenes can end up softer than ideal. Colors are typically on point, with dependable white balance and good saturation.

Low-light samples, main camera (1x)

We had established a policy of not doing dedicated Night mode comparisons, because phones seemed to have moved past needing that, but we figured that the Mate's... occasional missteps in Photo mode and the device's overall uniqueness warranted going the extra distance.

Night mode does crank up the sharpening and introduces some of that watercolor effect, but it's not the worst offender. A notable positive outcome is the livening up of the shadows and lower midtones, and that can also add some extra pop to colors. We'd say it's a sensible trade-off and it can be worth it in certain scenes. The 3s that each shot takes feels like a bit of drag though, and we had some shot-to-shot variation with white balance (minor, but often).

Low-light samples, main camera (1x), Night mode

At 2x zoom, things aren't as impressive in the dark as they were during the day. Shadows are typically quite soft, though the better lit areas in the same photo can be looking pretty good at the same time. Night mode doesn't really do a lot to help here - it may boost shadows and color, but shots get softer overall.

Low-light samples, main camera (2x)

Low-light samples, main camera (2x), Night mode

Telephoto camera, 5.5x

You shouldn't expect standout photo quality from the zoom camera at night - the images alright, but not more than that. Detail is decent in the well-lit areas and notably softer in the shadows. Dynamic range and colors are pretty good though.

Low-light samples, telephoto camera (5.5x)

Night mode can actually be quite beneficial on the telephoto, boosting detail and definition across the board - shadows and well-lit patches alike. You should probably just default to that when using the zoom camera in the dark.

Low-light samples, telephoto camera (5.5x), Night mode

At 10x, detail is pretty sketchy, Photo mode or Night mode.

Low-light samples, telephoto camera (10x)

Low-light samples, telephoto camera (10x), Night mode

Ultrawide camera

The ultrawide camera of the Mate XT Ultimate does decently in the dark. Shadows are on the soft side and colors can be a little muted, but dynamic range is quite good.

Low-light samples, ultrawide camera

Night mode gives exposures a nudge, delivering a boost to shadows and color saturation, but detail doesn't really benefit much.

Low-light samples, ultrawide camera, Night mode

Video recording

The Mate XT Ultimate can record video up to 4K60 with all three of its rear cameras. 4K30 is also an option, of course, but we didn't find a 24fps mode (not in Pro video mode either). There's no 8K capability or 4K120 either (not that these are mandatory or anything). The in-display selfie camera is good for 4K30, which must involve some upscaling, since it doesn't have the pixels for native 4K.

As usual, you get to choose between the h.264 and h.265 codecs. There's also a toggle to enable HDR Vivid recording, the yet another competing HDR standard, backed by Huawei and Mediatek (which is also supported by the handset's display).

There's an always-on electronic stabilization, as usual with Huawei smartphones. On top of that, you can also enable the 'Steady shot' mode, which only works on the ultrawide camera, applies a heavy crop, and limits resolution to 1080p (at 30fps or 60fps).

You can check out the playlist below, which includes multiple video samples.

Video sample playlist

Video quality out of the Mate is hard to like. The ultrawide's footage is passable in the context of ultrawides, the main camera's results look like they're coming from an aging midranger, and the telephoto's clips are much too soft. The ultrawide's colors are nice, for what it's worth, and stabilization is generally quite good on both the ultrawide and the main camera (also decent on the telephoto). Things don't magically get better at night and none of the cameras is any good in the dark, all of them delivering results that are way too soft.