Weekly poll results: the Huawei Mate XT Ultimate is an innovative form factor that has potential

Last week’s poll suggests that Huawei may have discovered the next popular form factor for foldables with the Huawei Mate XT Ultimate. The first tri-foldable drew a lot of interest, though the device itself may not be all that popular. Huawei knows this, of course, and the retail package is loaded like this is a premium limited edition – which it is, in some ways.

Let’s look at the results – more than half of voters are interested in a tri-foldable. Again, the XT Ultimate probably isn’t it. Still, 22% voted that they want one, which is higher than we expected, given the device’s €3,500 price tag.

The majority wants something like the XT Ultimate – price is the biggest issue, though Huawei itself is a problem too. The company’s chipsets are years behind the competition and there’s no Google Play Store, which makes this device a no-go for most.

Other companies, ones not subject to the same export restrictions as Huawei, are working on tri-foldables of their own, so there should be alternatives soon-ish. Would they be better, though? In terms of performance and software access, sure, but Huawei has proven itself to be a whiz at making thin foldables, something that Samsung hasn’t been able to match yet.

Naturally, some see the tri-fold design as a gimmick – but then even more people think that the whole “foldable phone” is a gimmick. But the rest see the XT Ultimate as innovation.