The release of the Huawei P50 Pocket is still somewhat surprising. After all, at the beginning of last year, Huawei executives said in an interview that they had done a vertical folding screen mobile phone solution, but after evaluation, they finally chose to give up. More than a year later, the Huawei P50 Pocket appeared in front of everyone's eyes.
However, under careful consideration, it is reasonable for Huawei to take out the P50 Pocket at this time. According to the DSCC survey, global folding smartphone shipments broke a record of 2.6 million units in the third quarter of this year, an annual increase of 480%, and shipments in the first quarter alone surpassed the results of the past year. Among them, Samsung took away 93% of the folding screen market. According to the distribution of models, the proportion of Samsung Galaxy Z Flip with longitudinal folding scheme is more than 60%.
Obviously, the popularity of vertical folding screen products far exceeds market expectations, which is perhaps one of the most important reasons for the arrival of the P50 Pocket.
Nickname "Treasure Box"
I don't know if anyone has counted the user portraits of the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip, but I guess that the proportion of female users must be extremely high. Even in advertising and marketing, it has a clear intention of moving closer to the female market. From the product form, the vertical folding screen mobile phone in the use of the folding action, indeed let people associate its form with the powder box of female friends.
The P50 Pocket is also designed. When held in the hand in the folded state, it is indeed as small and delicate as a "treasure box". The surface of the white fuselage we got was micro-carved, and through different diamond-shaped cutting textures, the fuselage presented a more layered light and shadow visual effect under the background of light. Compared with the ordinary white body, this treatment is more abundant in visual effects and meets the aesthetic preferences of some female users.
At the beginning, the name of the P50 Pocket was actually Mate V, after all, Huawei's folding screen flagships belong to the Mate series. But now, it makes more sense to give it a name to the P50 series. The P50 Pocket has some stylistic heritage in design with the P50 series, mainly reflected in the P50 Pocket's secondary screen and camera matrix. The combination of two circular spaces directly connects it to the Vientiane double ring design on the P50 series.
According to the standard of the folding screen, the P50 Pocket is very thin and light. In the combined state, the thickness of the whole machine is only 15.2mm, and the thickness is controlled within 8mm after unfolding. Since the ratio of the inner screen after the expansion is 21:9, this longitudinal distribution of the fuselage ratio coupled with the thin and light fuselage makes the phone have a good feel in the grip state.
With the smaller body, it becomes more casual to carry. Especially for girls, now some small handbags are often stuffed into a large mobile phone and can't hold anything. The P50 Pocket after folding, the fuselage is not much larger than the average powder box. Whether you carry it with you or put it in your bag, it won't take up too much space.
Horizontal folding and vertical folding are fundamentally different in design ideas: the former pursues a larger screen display area based on not affecting portability as much as possible; while the latter folds a mobile phone with ordinary display sizes through folding, making it more compact and portable. From this point of view, both Huawei and Samsung have done a very good job.
The crease control is excellent
Since it is a folding screen solution, the core component must be the hinge. The P50 Pocket also uses a "drop type" scheme in the hinge design this time. In addition to Huawei, the folding screen new products of brands including OPPO and Honor have adopted this scheme. It has two main advantages, one is to bring a more "seamless" folding effect; the other is that its bending radius is larger, which can reduce the crease of the screen.
In terms of crease control, the P50 Pocket does a great job. In the folded state, the naked eye observes that there is indeed no gap between the mobile phone screens. I took an A4 piece of paper and stuck it in the middle of the screen for testing, and I was able to pick it up easily. Anyone who knows a little bit about mechanics should know that this means that there is a large enough contact surface between the paper and the screen to provide friction for both.
As for creases, the advantages of the P50 Pocket are not very obvious. From the side of the phone, you can still see two more obvious dents on the folding of the screen. Since the P50 Pocket's inner screen is a regular phone screen size. The high-frequency area of daily finger manipulation just fits in the crease position of the screen. Therefore, compared with the horizontal folding scheme, the finger's perception of the screen crease will be more obvious during daily operation.
Another important factor that affects screen creases is the material. The P50 Pocket did not use UTG (Ultra Thin Glass, Ultra Thin Flexible Glass) this time. The reason is also clear to everyone, or because of well-known factors. However, as far as I know, at present, the relevant upstream supply chain manufacturers in China have made breakthroughs in the supply of UTG materials. This means that the next generation of Huawei folding screens will be expected to use this material, and the crease problem of its screen will be further alleviated.
Another hinge-related problem is hovering. Someone on the Internet said before that the P50 Pocket does not support folding hover at any angle. It is true that the P50 Pocket cannot achieve stable hovering at folding angles that are too large or too small. However, in the most commonly used folding state such as 90 degrees, its hover state is still relatively stable, and this folding hover state can still be used to carry out some operations such as time delay or long exposure shooting. Of course, Huawei has also specially optimized and adapted the camera interface. Compared with most folding screen mobile phones, there is no essential difference in use.
But it has to be said that not supporting free angle hover is still a point worth improving on the P50 Pocket. After all, if you want to shoot a scene such as a star track that requires large-angle hovering, or some girls like to take multi-person selfie scenes, the screen hover of the P50 Pocket needs additional support, and does not play the shape advantage of the folding screen.
External screen interaction is very distinctive
Due to the use of a relatively standard screen ratio, the P50 Pocket inner screen does not have obvious adaptation problems in the content display. It is not much different from ordinary smartphones. However, the quality of this screen is still worth saying: the screen panel is provided by BOE, using a diamond-like arrangement, display clarity and color temperature, color accuracy performance are not bad. Combined with 1440Hz high-frequency PWM dimming, it can significantly reduce the damage to vision. The outer layer of the screen is also equipped with the latest nano-optical film, which reduces the reflectivity. In the daily environment, the screen permeability is better than the previous folding screen products.
Compared with the inner screen, the external screen of the P50 Pocket has more highlights in the experience. If the outer screen experience of the horizontal folding screen product is more similar to that of ordinary mobile phones, then the outer screen of the P50 Pocket is more like a smart bracelet or watch mounted on the surface of the fuselage.
Because the outer screen adopts a circular scheme, it is more like a bracelet or watch in terms of display and interaction. For example, the message notification can be swiped down directly on the outer screen. Swipe left and right, you can enter the music, camera and other apps. What is more interesting is that Huawei has made a "mirror" application on the outer screen this time. This application is very practical for girls, such as need to see if their makeup is spent, you can directly use the ultra-high-definition shooting ability of the rear main camera on the outer screen to use the mobile phone as a small mirror.
In addition to the mirror, Huawei also integrates two functions for this application: skin detection and sun protection detection. In fact, skin detection can also be achieved on previous Huawei mobile phones, by taking high-definition pictures of faces, and then using AI to analyze and judge your current skin health, providing some guidance and suggestions on skin care.
The advantage of the P50 Pocket in skin health management is that it has a hyperspectral lens that can detect the deep state of the skin, which is much more accurate than before in terms of relevant detection accuracy. Also based on hyperspectral technology, the P50 Pocket is also capable of sun protection detection. The light emitted by this lens can visualize the sunscreen applied to the surface of your skin, so that you can determine whether the sunscreen is evenly applied. This function is also very useful for daily life.
Performance and battery life are reliable
Let's talk about some of the regular parts of the P50 Pocket. It is equipped with a Snapdragon 888 processor, does not support 5G, and there is nothing to worry about in terms of performance.
In terms of cameras, the P50 Pocket's rear camera module consists of a 40-megapixel primary color camera, a 13-megapixel ultra-wide-angle camera, a laser focus sensor, and a newly added 32-megapixel hyperspectral camera. Some of the functions of the hyperspectral lens have been mentioned earlier, and it also has a fluorescence photography function in terms of imaging. The general principle is that in the environment of extremely dark light, the special spectrum emitted by the mobile phone can make some objects emit special fluorescence, so that the mobile phone can take fluorescent photos.
As for the 40 million main camera and 13 million ultra-wide angle lens, it is a classic combination of Huawei's flagship mobile phone before. Judging from the actual imaging experience, there are still obvious differences between its main camera and the latest P50 series in terms of imaging style. Especially in Leica vivid mode, the overall contrast and color perception of the sample are more intense. In low-light environments, the details of the shadows are not as good as those of their own P50 series, and with the blessing of Leica color, the sample can be seen to have obvious vignetting. In addition, in terms of high-light suppression, there is also a little gap with the current Huawei flagship products.
In terms of endurance performance, because the overall body size of the P50 Pocket is larger than that of the current competitors on the market, the advantage in battery capacity is still obvious. The P50 Pocket has a battery capacity of 4000mAh, while the Samsung Flip3 has a battery of just 3300mAh. At the same time, the P50 Pocket is also equipped with a maximum of 40W fast charging, coupled with a series of optimizations in terms of power consumption of the Hongmeng OS itself, the overall performance of the P50 Pocket is better in terms of endurance performance. Maintaining a full day of battery life every day, there is no big problem.
Fashion groups don't just need to beautify their faces
Previously, we wrote an article specifically analyzing the importance attached to the female market by various large manufacturers this year: "Under the competition of the stock market, the mobile phone manufacturers set off a war for female users". It mentions that in the current market competition environment, the women's market is becoming increasingly important. Mobile phone manufacturers want to stand out, need to find new functional breakthrough points in addition to beauty selfies, so that "people have my excellence, people are excellent, people are excellent, people are excellent."
The P50 Pocket is a product born in response to this market trend and product ideas. Far away, Huawei mobile phones have used several generations of products to achieve the transformation from a very early business and tough style to a fashionable and mass consumer market. And this year, in addition to mobile phone products, Huawei also released star fashion items such as "lipstick headphones". The P50 Pocket, like them, can be seen as a cater to the needs of women and fashion consumers.
Being light, thin, and beautifying should not be the whole means to define a mobile phone suitable for the fashionable, women's market. The consumption habits and consumption characteristics of users in this part of the market determine that they actually have unique considerations and needs when choosing products. The design of the P50 Pocket powder box, a series of software and hardware experience optimizations for women's actual needs, and even the ritualistic action itself that is folded each time, has enough attraction for many fashion groups and female friends. In contrast, the issue of not supporting 5G is less important.
I'm sure a lot of people will think that it's not cost-effective to buy a P50 Pocket for close to $9,000. But the reason why you think so may be because the P50 Pocket was not originally for you.