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With the Mate 30 series launching in one week, the leaks and rumours are out in full force. It is going to be an interesting release for sure, likely mired by the issues with Google.
As always with the Mate series, this will be the first phone to launch with the new flagship system on a chip from Huawei / HiSilicon.
We already know all the details of this, but at the moment there is no clue on what variations will be launched with the Mate 30 series. There are two Kirin 990 chips, one with 5G that is also clocked higher.
The Mate 30 Pro will definitely come with the 5G variant, but they may have a 5G model and a none 5G model. Hopefully, the Mate 30 Pro will just be 5G by default, and the normal Kirin 990 will be used on the Mate 30 (none pro).
So how does the new phone differ from the previous generations?
All of the following information is based on leaks, and titbits of information Huawei has released. It is also not complete so hopefully, Huawei will throw out a few surprises.
The most recent leak comes from @RODENT950, and covers most of the specification.
Google Apps
Sadly, this is the most talked-about thing at the moment. It looks almost certain that the Mate 30 series will launch without any Google Apps and come with some form of cut back Android. The previous models obviously came with everything included.
It is expected that Huawei will somehow make it easy for users to sideload Google Apps.
SoC, RAM and Storage
We know for certain that the Kirin 990 5G will be launched on one of the models, likely the Kirin 990 on others.
Both the P30 and Mate 20 launched with the Kirin 980.
A more detailed comparison is available here. However, expect the usual, more performance, better power efficiency etc. The AI performance has dramatically improved so it will be interesting to see what Huawei do with this.
Camera
The P series is normally where Huawei make leaps and bounds progress with the camera. We saw this with the introduction of the new RYYB sensor in the P30 Pro, this allowed the phone to achieve exceptional low light performance.
The Mate 30 Pro is almost certainly launching with two lenses using this technology. Numerous leaks have happened, and Huawei has teased it. It is highly likely they will use the 40MP RYYB sensor in the wide lens, which in my opinion is fantastic news as wide-angle is my favourite choice.
While the underlying sensor technology will stay the same, the Image Signal Processor on the Kirin 990 series comes with a “brand new” ISP 5.0 that utilizes block-matching and 3D filtering (BM3D) for hardware-based noise reduction, letting phones theoretically capture brighter and sharper images in low light. Huawei claims this will give the chipset DSLR-grade noise-handling, improved by 30% compared to the Kirin 980.
The latest leak indicates no periscope zoom but instead, the 3x optical that was found on the Mate 20 Pro.
On the front, Huawei has gone back to the Mate 20 style again, and there is quite a large notch which hides a 32MP camera, and ultrawide camera with no specification revealed yet, and a TOF sensor.
Display
The phone will definitely be launching with a new waterfall display which extends the rounded edges down the side of the phone. How good this is in real life remains to be seen.
The latest leaks indicate some resolution has had to be sacrificed for this display. It is expected to run at 1176-2400 FHD, but it is also believed to have a high refresh rate of 90Hz.
The P30 Pro has a 1080 x 2340 pixel display, while the Mate 20 Pro had 1440 x 3120 pixel.
The exact screen size doesn’t appear to be known yet, but it looks like Huawei are going larger again with something between 6.6 – 6.8-inch vs 6.47 of the P30 and 6.39 of the Mate 20.
Battery
It looks like Huawei will continue their dominance in battery performance. The Mate 30 Pro is expected to launch with a 4500 mAh battery, 40W supercharge and 27W wireless charging!
The P30 Pro & Mate 20 Pro both had a 4200 mAh battery with 40W charging and 15W wireless.
Other Features
It looks like Huawei will be doing some other things with their Face ID tech, it should be more accurate, and it is also expected to be able to measure your heart rate and breathing rate. The advanced AI processing of the Kirin 990 is likely allow this to function.
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