Huawei has officially entered the foldable laptop category. The company today unveiled the MateBook Fold Ultimate Design, its first commercial notebook with a folding display. But the device is notable in more than one way.
It’s also the first to debut with in-house HarmonyOS for PC with its own chip inside (more on that later). But no prize for guessing, the biggest highlight of the MateBook Fold is its display.
Design and Display
It unfolds to reveal an 18-inch screen with a 3.3K resolution in a 4:3 aspect ratio. Fold it shut, and it becomes a more compact 13-inch machine.
The panel itself uses dual-layer LTPO OLED with a dynamic contrast ratio of 2,000,000:1 and peak brightness of 1600 nits. There’s a carbon fiber support layer under the screen, which is said to triple the display’s impact resistance.
For all its design flexibility, the MateBook Fold doesn’t stray far from Huawei’s broader design language. It weighs 1.16kg and measures just 7.3mm thick when unfolded. It’s still an unusually thin and lightweight machine for this kind of hardware.
The body features a leather finish and is available in three colors: Forged Shadow Black, Sky White, and Cloud Blue. The black variant has a few extra flair to it. It has what Huawei calls a “Forging Shadow Cloud Pattern” on the back with a “Black Gold Waistline” design.
The folding mechanism is also central to the MateBook Fold’s design. It uses what Huawei claims is the industry’s largest folding hinge at 285mm. The hinge has a three-stage shaft with uniform torque to improve both the feel and precision of the opening and closing mechanism.
The hinge itself opens and closes in a water-drop shape, which Huawei says helps reduce stress on the screen when folded. The company is also touting a 400% increase in hovering torque and double the machining accuracy for the spindle.
That hinge has functional benefits, too. It supports flexible angles for ergonomic use, from a barely open 0 degrees up to a stable hover at 150 degrees. The cooling system has been upgraded to match, with a diamond aluminum dual-fan setup and an ultra-thin anti-gravity vapor chamber to help maintain performance under load.
Performance and Software
Under the hood, the MateBook Fold runs on Huawei’s in-house silicon—although details about the specific chip remain vague. It boots on PC, the company’s own operating system.
The latest version, HarmonyOS 5, brings a handful of new features, including “one system, unified ecology,” meant to help unify mobile and desktop experiences.
It supports distributed soft bus interconnection, which allows for higher-speed file sharing and multitasking across devices. Huawei says data transfer speeds can hit 160MB/s, and the system now supports up to four concurrent device connections.
The laptop also introduces a range of touch and gesture controls. You can swipe up to view videos and down to see comments, or cast one part of the screen while interacting with another.
There are also more unusual inputs like five-finger “waterfall screen browsing” and eight-finger taps to bring up the virtual keyboard. It’s not entirely clear how intuitive these gestures are in real-world use, but they mark a clear attempt to differentiate the device’s UI experience from other Windows-based hybrids.
Price and Availability
Huawei has priced the MateBook Fold in the premium bracket. The 32GB + 1TB variant comes in Sky White or Cloud Blue and costs 23,999 yuan (roughly $3,300). The top-tier 32GB + 2TB model in Forged Shadow Black is 26,999 yuan (~$3,720). The device is now available for reservations in China from Vmall.
Huawei MateBook Fold Ultimate Design Specifications
| Specification | |
| Size and Weight | |
| Width | Unfolded: 382.5 mmClosed: 288.5 mm |
| Depth | Unfolded: 288.5 mmClosed: 193.7 mm |
| Height | Unfolded: 7.6 mm (left) / 7.3 mm (right)Closed: 14.9 mm |
| Weight | Approx. 1.16 kg (without keyboard) |
| Display | |
| Size | Unfolded: 18 inchesFolded: 13 inches |
| Type | Double-layer OLED (flexible display) |
| Screen-to-body Ratio | 92% |
| Aspect Ratio | Unfolded: 4:3Folded (half screen): 3:2 |
| Resolution | Unfolded: 3296 × 2472Folded (half screen): 2472 × 1648 |
| Brightness | Typical: 700 nitsPeak: 1600 nits (HDR) |
| Color Gamut | P3 wide color gamut |
| Contrast Ratio | HDR Mode: 2,000,000:1Normal Mode: 1,000,000:1 |
| Storage | 1 TB or 2 TB SSD |
| Memory | 32 GB |
| Wireless Connectivity | |
| WiFi / Bluetooth | WiFi 6 / Bluetooth 5.2 |
| Battery | |
| Type | Lithium polymer |
| Capacity | 74.69 Wh (rated) |
| Ports | |
| Folded State | USB-C × 1 (left side)USB-C × 1 (upper side) |
| Biometric | Fingerprint scanner (in power button) |
| Camera | 8 MP front camera |
| Audio | 6 speakers 4 microphones |
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