Xiaomi’s folding phone really exists, and it looks amazing

A few weeks ago, a leaked video showed a tablet-like device, allegedly made by Xiaomi, that folded in two places to create a pretty sleek smartphone. 

Now we know that this phone is real, and that it’s made by Xiaomi. 

Xiaomi’s president Lin Bin posted a teaser video on China’s Weibo, giving us a 51-second look at this upcoming device — and it looks better than any other foldable phone we’ve seen so far. 

In the accompanying post, Bin says Xiaomi has conquered a number of technical obstacles to create the device, which he calls the “world’s first double-folding mobile phone.”

The device is a small tablet that lets you fold both of its sides and thus turn it into a more compact, smartphone-like device, not entirely unlike Royole’s foldable phone which launched late last year. But there are several key differences. 

First, Xiaomi’s folding phone has incredibly small bezels, which makes it far more attractive, both in tablet and smartphone form. Second, the UI is fast and fluid, and even switching from tablet to smartphone mode takes about one second. Finally, now we can see the phone from the back, and it doesn’t really look very clunky, even when folded. 

Numerous questions remain. The sides of the phone’s screen remain on even when folded which may look awkward or cool, depending on the beholder. Hopefully, accidental touches aren’t a problem. Selfie camera isn’t visible, and it looks unlikely that it could fit inside those tiny bezels. Heat dissipation in smartphone mode is a potential issue as well; a couple years back, when I spoke to engineers that worked on the dual-screened YotaPhone, they told me that the biggest design challenge they had was getting rid of excess heat. 

In his post, Bin claims the phone is still a prototype and calls for user comments — he’s even asking for a name, suggesting Mi Dual Flex and Mi MIX Flex — so it’s unlikely that we’ll see a finished version soon. But overall, it looks pretty good even in this stage, and it seems to already be ahead of some of its competition, which will soon include Samsung’s secretive Galaxy F.