Huawei Mate 9 teaser confirms device's name ahead of next week's launch

posted by Ben R. / Oct 27, 2016, 5:19 AM

Huawei Mate 9 teaser confirms device's name ahead of next week's launch

Update: Huawei has pushed another Mate 9 teaser, which you can check out below.

The likes of Google, Apple and Samsung may have already unveiled their big smartphone releases for 2016, but we're by no means done for the year. With Xiaomi having roared into the spotlight with the contemporaneous announcements of the Mi Note 2 and Mi MIX, fellow Chinese OEM Huawei is poised to showcase another behemoth (or two) on November 3rd. In order to generate some anticipation, the company has already rolled out a teaser graphic and now, a second poster confirms the Mate 9 moniker.

It was always assumed that after the Mate 8, we'd get the Mate 9. Then again, smartphone makers have a knack for mixing and matching titles, so it's nice to see that Huawei is keeping things sensible. The teaser also essentially confirms that the Mate 9 will be the starring attraction on November 3rd.

As for the specs, the Mate 9 is expected to include the new Kirin 960 chipset, a 5.9-inch 1080 x 1920 display, a 4000 mAh battery and could max out at 6 gigs of RAM and 256 GB storage. It'll also get Android 7.1 Nougat out of the box, which is a real plus given that some new high-enders are launching with last year's Marshmallow on board. The Pro model, meanwhile, will be similar to the standard Mate 9 in most respects, but will purportedly include a dual-curved, QHD display with a resolution of 1440 x 2560.

After the likes of the P9 and P9 Plus saw Huawei collaborate with German optics firm Leica for their dual rear cameras, the Mate 9 family is expected to follow suit. Not too long ago, the companies formed a sustained partnership and set up a joined R&D center to continue this exciting effort to advance smartphone camera capabilities. With Leica's influence and the promise of 4x optical zoom with the Mate 9, we're very excited to see what's in store.

The supposed price of the top-end Pro/Plus handset -- a cool $1300 -- would undoubtedly price many out of the market. Murmurings indicate that this price may include a new wearable, perhaps the fabled Huawei Watch 2. Though competition hasn't exactly been fierce in the once-hyped smartwatch arena, the original Huawei Watch was one of the more elegant examples, so we won't be too disheartened if an upgrade is also on the cards.

Mate 9 and Mate 9 Pro leaked renders

source: PLAYfuldroid via GSMArena

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13 Comments

1. jellmoo

Posts: 2563; Member since: Oct 31, 2011

I still can't believe that they'd go with a $1300 price tag. It's absolutely mind boggling.

posted on Oct 25, 2016, 10:54 AM 3

2. abdoualgeria

Posts: 928; Member since: Jul 27, 2015

I wonder how the top brands, such as Samsung, LG, HTC, Sony, Apple, etc. will manage/ handle all this immense Chinese competition????

posted on Oct 25, 2016, 10:59 AM 3

4. SmartPhoneMobiles

Posts: 176; Member since: Oct 16, 2016

U sound so idiot when u mention "chinese" like auto it must be crap.. Well u uneducated without china u wouldn't hold your crappy iphone in hands or shagsung.. etc..

posted on Oct 25, 2016, 11:20 AM 0

5. jellmoo

The irony is so strong here...

posted on Oct 25, 2016, 11:24 AM 1

6. TerryTerius unregistered

It is interesting that you would somewhow interpret a comment saying that they didn't understand how the current major companies would be able to compete with these upcoming Chinese brands as somehow being an insult to China.

posted on Oct 25, 2016, 11:25 AM 5

3. Ordinary

Posts: 2454; Member since: Apr 23, 2015

Kirin 960 really impressed me this year. Cant wait what will Samsung do with G71 GPU.

posted on Oct 25, 2016, 11:18 AM 2

7. Sapere

Posts: 16; Member since: Jan 14, 2016

you are expressing my thoughts Ordinary. With the Kirin 960 in mind, what GPU will be used together with that processor? If its power will be on pair with the upcoming G71 Mali GPU, I would suck the absence of the (S-) pen, as apart from this missing feature, this Mate 9 Pro phone will far surpass all specifications of recently released and recalled Samsung galaxy note 7 (may be even 8), which I wanted to buy...

posted on Oct 25, 2016, 1:49 PM 0

10. lpratas

Posts: 398; Member since: Nov 09, 2011

It is in fact Mali-G71 but with octo core configuration but it will be weaker than the future gpu of Galaxy S8, which is also Mali-G71 but more powerful with 12 cores despiste each core have lower frequency.

posted on Oct 27, 2016, 6:19 AM 0

11. lpratas

Certainly the cores of the gpu inside of the Galaxy S8 will have increase of frequency compared with the cores of the gpu of Exynos 8890 if no the gpu of Galaxy S8 it wouldn't have 70% more performance in relation to gpu inside of Exynos 8890 chipset. Remember that the Mali-G71 gpu has 40% better performance compared with Mali-T880 in similar conditions.

posted on Oct 27, 2016, 6:35 AM 0

12. lpratas

It gives a result of 30% of the Kirin 960 gpu before the Exynos 8890 gpu and 40% for the Galaxy S8 gpu before the gpu of the Mate 9. Or summing up 265 GFlops for Exynos 8890 gpu, 345 GFlops for Kirin 960 gpu and 451 GFlops for Galaxy S8 Exynos gpu.

posted on Oct 27, 2016, 7:05 AM 0

13. Sapere

Thx for explanation, especially for the GFlops numbers, it is amazing to see, that mobile phone has reached the same Grafic power, as my alienware gaming laptop from 2008... With precisely 450 GFlops on gtx 880 cards... Also the rumours about coming Huawei Mate 9 Pro have shown to be false, as there will be no such a "Pro" variant with QHD OLED display - so for me this is complete no-go, as I will definitely not buy in 2016 - 2017 phones with only FHD resolution and only IPS totally outdated display technology... So the only adept for my future phone, after note 7 has been removed, is galaxy S8 or S8 Note...