Upmarket Huawei Mate 10 from Porsche Design (update)

Latest news (27/11/17):

The Limited Edition Porsche Design Huawei Mate 10 will be available from December 4th. With limited stock available, Huawei are now taking registration of interest. Customers who register will receive an email the day before the product goes on sale confirming the time that stock will be available for purchase, and an additional alert as soon as the product is available to buy.

You can register your interest at www.porschedesignhuawei.com.au

When Huawei announced the new Mate 10 and Mate 10 Pro phones three weeks ago, it was unclear if the super premium version of the latter was to also make it in Australia. But now Huawei has announced that it will be, on 4 December, at the not inconsiderable price of $1899.

For that you get a very fancy version of the Huawei Mate 10 Pro, the bigger of the two. The standard Huawei Mate 10 Pro is due for launch the same day as the Porsche Design version and will retail for $1099.

The only interior differences between the two are a boost in storage from the 128GB of the standard Pro to a massive 256GB in the Porsche Design version. The press release also mentions a boost to 6GB for working RAM, but our understanding is that that’s already the standard in the Huawei Mate 10 Pro.

Says Huawei, the other differences are:

  • Porsche rate track stripes design that combines the rear camera with other components for ​an ​elite ​look ​and ​feel.
  • A ​polished, ​ceramic-texture ​design ​in ​Diamond ​Black.
  • A ​hardware ​boost ​with ​6GB ​RAM ​and ​256GM ​ROM ​storage
  • A ​customised ​UI ​that ​showcases ​Porsche ​Design
  • Special premium packaging with a leather case, exclusive accessories and VIP member services.

I’m guessing that the “rate track stripes design” is actually a “race track stripes design”. I see from the pictures that rather than being branded Huawei at the bottom front, it says “Porsche Design”.

This version of the phone will only be available in a “limited run”.

The other basic specs which it shares with the underlying Huawei Mate 10 Pro are:

  • Six inch OLED display with 2160 by 1080 pixels in 18:9 aspect ratio
  • Kirin 970 Octa-core processor
  • Android 8.0 Oreo
  • Twin f/1.6 aperture rear cameras, one 20MP monochrome and one 12MP colour, with 2x hybrid zoom and optical image stabilisation
  • A 5 megapixel f/2.2 front camera
  • USB Type C, 802.11ac WiFi, NFC, Bluetooth 4.2 with low energy
  • A 4000mAh battery

This will be fascinating. These seem to be great phones, but will the lure of a solid phone and the Porsche Design name bring people over from the traditional ultra premium models from Apple and Samsung? I hope so. The more competition at all levels, the better.

Keep tuned. We’ll have a review of the Huawai Mate 10 (not Pro) up for you in a few days. We’re finding it quite the pleasure to use.