We've got some big phone launches coming up this month – including the iPhone 12 and the OnePlus 8T – and we can now add the Huawei Mate 40 and Mate 40 Pro to that list, as Huawei just announced a launch event for October 22.
In a tweet from the official Huawei Mobile account, we're told that "unprecedented power is coming" and that the event is going to be getting underway at 2pm central European summer time – that's 5am PT, 8am ET, 1pm BST and 10pm AEST.
That would suggest that the performance of the Huawei Mate 40 is going to be one of the key features highlighted – Huawei usually debuts new chips with new Mate phones, and the talk is that the Mate 40 will be the first handset with the Kirin 1000 processor inside.
- Check out the Huawei P Smart 2021
- The iPhone 12 is almost here
- We've got questions about the OnePlus 8T
In fact it could be the last phone with a Kirin processor inside as well: the rumors are that Huawei's ongoing problems with the US, and the companies operating from it, will mean that it'll have to source chipsets from elsewhere instead of building its own.
Unprecedented Power is coming.Don’t miss the announcement on 22.10.20 #LeapFurtherAhead #HUAWEIMate40 pic.twitter.com/Be5u0AY4fjOctober 10, 2020
There have been relatively few leaks about the Huawei Mate 40 series so far, with the release date one of the small number of information tidbits we've had in advance (and that leak has now turned out to be accurate).
What we do know is that the Mate 40 phones will be following on from the Huawei Mate 30 and the Huawei Mate 30 Pro that we saw last year – phones that impressed in many areas, but which were held back by not being able to run any of the official Google apps.
With Huawei still unable to do business with companies in the US, Google included, it's a case of the hardware being let down by the software at the moment. It was a similar story with the Huawei P40 that was unveiled in March.
Still we're excited to see what Huawei has in store with the new Mate, and we will of course bring you all the news and details as it happens: expect some interesting camera upgrades as well as a performance boost this time around.
