Huawei has launched the Huawei Mate 90 Pro in China as the first phone powered by the new Kirin 9035 chip. The phone starts at CNY 6,999 (about $1,045) for the 12GB+256GB model. Huawei announced it alongside the Huawei Mate 90 Pro Max.

The Kirin 9035 sits below the Kirin 9050 (Pro) of the Mate 90 Pro Max. Compared with the Kirin 9030 in the Huawei Mate 80 Pro, Huawei says the new chip delivers an 11% CPU improvement, a 10% GPU improvement, and a 51% boost in NPU performance. Its own app testing on HarmonyOS 7 and HarmonyOS 6 shows a 10% overall performance gain.

The chip also supports hardware-level ray tracing, which can process up to 31 million rays per second, although the feature is limited to certain scenes.

Design, build, and durability

The Huawei Mate 90 Pro keeps the central-axis design used on previous Mate phones. Its back features a lattice pattern with a floating star ring around the camera module, while the body is made from a single machined piece. It comes in Emerald Green, Amber Orange, Crystal White, and Obsidian Black.

Like the other Mate 90 series models, the phone has a flat front and a 3D ToF system for face unlock. The setup includes a depth-sensing transmitter and receiver, a front camera, and an AI posture sensor.

Huawei uses its “Kunlun Xuanwu” protection across the display, body, and camera lenses. The main protection features include:

• Third-generation Kunlun glass: Huawei says it offers more than 50% better drop resistance than the Huawei Mate 80 series.
• Kunlun optical glass: Used over the camera lenses, with Huawei claiming 20 times better drop resistance than the Huawei Mate 80 Pro.
• Nylon fiber material: Added inside the body for extra protection.

The phone has an IP68 rating for submersion at up to 6 meters and an IP69 rating for high-temperature, high-pressure water jets.

The Mate 90 Pro has a 6.75-inch display on the front. Huawei calls it the second-generation Linglong display and rates it for up to 12,000 nits of peak brightness at 1% APL, meaning a small bright area of the screen. The Mate 80 Pro was rated at 8,000 nits.

The panel uses a dual-layer OLED structure with Huawei’s custom Zhuque display chip and pixel-level AI tuning for brightness uniformity. Huawei claims a 100% increase in peak brightness, a 138% increase in screen lifespan, a 140% increase in the period of sustained high brightness, and a 30% improvement in uniformity.

However, the company doesn’t specify what each percentage is measured against, so we will hold off on treating the numbers as improvements just yet.

Cameras on the Huawei Mate 90 Pro

The Mate 90 Pro has three rear cameras:

• Main: 50MP RYYB sensor with optical stabilization and a variable aperture from F1.4 to F4.0.
• Telephoto: 50MP RYYB sensor with 4x optical zoom and 8x optical-quality zoom. It also works as a macro camera with a minimum focusing distance of 5cm.
• Ultrawide: 40MP RYYB sensor.

Huawei has also added its third-generation Red Maple primary-color camera, which the company says improves color accuracy by 37%.

The variable aperture gives the main camera two different ways to handle shots. At F1.4, it can create more background blur for portraits, while F4.0 keeps more of a group in focus. Huawei also says the aperture can help maintain consistent video brightness when moving between bright and dark areas.

The camera software includes XMAGE features for shooting guidance. In photo and portrait modes, the phone can suggest one of 13 poses for group photos and one of 14 composition layouts within the 4x zoom range. The composition suggestions have to be enabled manually.

There are also food recommendations and a live-streaming mode that tracks products in focus while helping keep the user’s voice clear in noisy environments.

Battery and charging

The Mate 90 Pro packs a 6,600mAh battery that accepts 100W wired and 50W wireless charging. To note, the 50W wireless speed requires Huawei’s own wireless charger and a 66W or higher charging kit. The Mate 80 Pro supported 80W wireless charging, so the new model has a lower wireless charging rating.

Huawei rates the Mate 90 Pro for up to 41 hours of video playback. The test used a cached 2-hour-34-minute video played on a loop with auto-brightness turned off.

Its outdoor exploration mode can extend battery life to up to 15 days when satellite messaging and tracking are used. The phone can also provide up to 36 hours of screen-off route navigation through Petal Maps. The equivalent mode on the Mate 80 Pro was rated for up to 13 days.

Connectivity, satellite messaging, and outdoor tools

The Huawei Mate 90 Pro uses a combined Wi-Fi and cellular antenna design that can switch between antennas automatically. Its multi-device network sharing feature lets up to four HarmonyOS 7 devices share their connections. Huawei says this can improve file transfer speeds by up to 40% in crowded areas.

Satellite messaging is also supported through BeiDou. The feature now allows users to send pictures as well as text, although it is limited to mainland China. It requires an open view of the sky and must be activated through MeeTime or a carrier while the phone still has a mobile connection.

Pictures sent over satellite are heavily compressed to fit within the available bandwidth. Once the feature is activated, users can also access 12-hour and three-day satellite weather forecasts.

The outdoor mode can record routes and work with third-party apps such as TwoStep and Walker. If an accident occurs, a paired Huawei watch can start an emergency call through the phone and share location information. At launch, this emergency feature only works between Huawei Mate 90 series phones.

HarmonyOS 7 and AI features

The Huawei Mate 90 Pro ships with HarmonyOS 7, while several AI features will arrive through later HOTA updates. A few of them are:

• Xiaoyi Notes allows users to swipe down to save things shown on the screen, including social media posts and to-do items. The phone can then organize the saved content automatically.
• Xiaoyi call help can handle tasks such as booking restaurants, answering calls when the user is unavailable, translating conversations in real time, and creating call summaries.
• With Trigger-based AI, users can long-press the Xiaoyi navigation bar to have the phone read what’s on the screen and suggest the next action. For example, copying a password, address, or cloud drive link can prompt the phone to open the relevant app.

The phone also supports 3D dynamic photos, which turn still images into short 3D clips. Huawei says the feature works best with photos containing a single person or pet.

For security, the Mate 90 Pro has a dedicated Mobile Security Processor with support for post-quantum cryptography for unlocking and payments. A voice-changer detection feature can also warn users about potentially fake voices during calls.

The voice detection system works with carrier calls, MeeTime, and WeChat calls. Huawei says its warnings are only for reference and shouldn’t be treated as a guarantee.

The phone also includes child-safety controls under Settings in the Healthy Use of Mobile Phone menu.

Huawei Mate 90 Pro Price and Availability 

Huawei is selling the Mate 90 Pro in four configurations in China:

• 12GB+256GB: CNY 6,999 (~$1,045)
• 12GB+512GB: CNY 7,999 (~$1,194)
• 16GB+512GB: CNY 8,499 (~$1,269)
• 16GB+1TB: CNY 9,999 (~$1,492)

The base model costs CNY 1,000 more than the Huawei Mate 80 Pro, which launched at CNY 5,999. The 512GB and 1TB versions are CNY 1,500 to CNY 2,000 more expensive than their Mate 80 Pro counterparts. These prices are for China, and Huawei’s launch announcement does not include international pricing.

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The post Huawei Mate 90 Pro launches with Kirin 9035, variable-aperture camera, and 6,600mAh battery appeared first on Gizmochina.

Huawei is getting ready for its biggest smartphone launch of 2026. The Mate 90 series is likely to launch in China in the last week of September, around two months earlier than the Mate 80 and Mate 70 series. This puts Huawei’s new flagship lineup in the same launch month as Apple’s latest iPhones, and most of us probably know why. 

The Mate 90 series is expected to include four models: the standard Mate 90, Mate 90 Pro, Mate 90 Pro Max, and Mate 90 RS Ultimate Design. Huawei has not confirmed the full lineup yet, but several tipsters have shared similar details, giving us a good idea of what to expect.

The chip: Kirin 9050 series and LogicFolding

The biggest change could be inside the phone. Huawei is expected to use the new Kirin 9050 chip based on a technology called LogicFolding. It is part of a wider design approach Huawei refers to as the Tau scaling law.

Instead of relying only on traditional transistor shrinking, the technology stacks logic circuits vertically. This allows Huawei to fit more computing power into the same space without depending on the most advanced chip-making processes.

Huawei has already shared some details about the technology. Compared with last year’s Kirin 9030 Pro, transistor density is said to increase by 53.5%, reaching around 238 million transistors per square millimeter. The chip area is also reportedly about one-third smaller, while power consumption at the same performance level drops by more than 40%.

The different Mate 90 models are expected to use different versions of the chip. The Mate 90 and Mate 90 Pro could get earlier versions, while the Mate 90 Pro Max and Mate 90 RS Ultimate Design are tipped to use the full Kirin 9050 Pro.

The same chip is already used in the Mate XT 2 tri-fold, which launched earlier this month. Huawei claimed a 42% performance improvement over the previous generation, including a 24% increase in single-core performance and a 52% gain in multi-core performance.

Display

The display could be one of the more familiar parts of the Mate 90 series. All four models are expected to use a 6.9-inch flat OLED panel with Huawei’s dual-layer tandem OLED technology.

This setup uses two emissive layers to improve brightness while keeping power consumption under control. Huawei first used the technology on last year’s Mate 80 RS Ultimate Design, but it is reportedly bringing it to the entire Mate 90 lineup this time.

A recent leak also points to a 1.5K resolution and an LTPO backplane, which would allow the refresh rate to adjust depending on what’s happening on the screen. The display is also expected to have large, rounded corners, giving it a softer look instead of sharp 90-degree corners.

The front design could remain largely unchanged, with the Mate 90 series reportedly keeping the three-hole punch cutout used on the Mate 80 series.

Huawei Mate 90

The standard Mate 90 will be the entry point into the lineup. Its rear camera setup is expected to include a 50MP main camera, a 40MP ultrawide camera, and a 50MP telephoto camera. A smaller multispectral sensor is also expected to help with color accuracy. 

Charging is reportedly limited to 66W, making it the slowest-charging model in the series. The phone is expected to come in black, white, green, and pink. Its dimensions are tipped at around 162.1 x 75.5 x 7.85mm, which should make it fairly manageable despite the large 6.9-inch display.

Huawei Mate 90 Pro

The Mate 90 Pro is expected to bring a noticeable upgrade in both charging and cameras. It will reportedly support 100W charging, while the main camera is tipped to use a large sensor with a variable aperture.

A variable aperture can help the camera adjust how much light enters the lens, which can be useful in low-light photography and when controlling depth of field.

The Pro model could also feature two periscope telephoto cameras. Having two separate periscope lenses would give the phone different optical zoom ranges instead of relying on a single telephoto camera.

Battery capacity is expected to be between 6,800mAh and 7,000mAh across the Pro-tier models. That’s considerably larger than the roughly 5,400mAh battery reportedly used in the iPhone 18 Pro Max.

Huawei Mate 90 Pro Max

The Mate 90 Pro Max is expected to have a large 1-inch-type main sensor alongside two periscope telephoto cameras. One of them could support up to 10x optical zoom.

Huawei could also change the camera design. The Pro Max is tipped to use a square camera module instead of the circular camera housing found on the Mate 80 Pro Max. 

The fingerprint scanner could remain on the side, however. Leaks suggest Huawei is not moving to an ultrasonic under-display fingerprint sensor on this model, despite the technology becoming more common on competing flagship phones.

The Pro Max is also expected to feature the Kirin 9050 Pro, a 6.9-inch dual-layer OLED display, and Wi-Fi 7.

Huawei Mate 90 RS Ultimate Design

The Mate 90 RS Ultimate Design will sit at the top of the lineup. Huawei’s RS models usually focus heavily on camera hardware and premium materials, and the Mate 90 RS is expected to follow the same approach.

It is tipped to feature two periscope telephoto cameras and the same Kirin 9050 Pro chip as the Pro Max. Premium materials and higher-end finishes are also expected to set it apart from the other models.

The RS could also offer the fastest charging speeds in the series, along with more exclusive color options aimed at buyers looking for a more premium design.

Software: HarmonyOS 7

All four Mate 90 models are expected to run HarmonyOS 7 out of the box. Huawei introduced the new software earlier this month alongside the Mate XT 2.

One of the biggest changes is Huawei’s focus on what it calls the “agent era.” The company’s Xiaoyi AI assistant is being turned into a system-level agent that can handle multi-step tasks instead of simply responding to individual questions.

HarmonyOS 7 also brings a redesigned interface with new lighting and motion effects, along with deeper AI features across the system. Huawei says the update also includes performance improvements that can lead to faster app launches and better battery efficiency when combined with the new Kirin chip.

Since HarmonyOS 7 has already debuted on the Mate XT 2, the Mate 90 series should launch with a more established version of the software rather than being the first devices to receive it.

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The post Huawei Mate 90 Series: Everything We Know Before Launch appeared first on Gizmochina.