Honor joins an expanding list of companies that have either released, or are planning to launch their own foldables

Honor has teased the launch of its first foldable smartphone, the Magic V, on Twitter and Weibo. The former Huawei sub-brand called it ‘Honor’s first foldable flagship, and said it will be released ‘soon,’ though the company didn’t provide an exact date.

Honor has been open about its desire to release a foldable for some time. As early as 2019, the company’s CEO George Zhao told CNET that he was interested in producing a foldable under the Honor brand, but expressed concerns that the device would be too expensive for Honor’s younger target market.

In June this year, reports emerged that development of such a device was underway at the company, and that its folding display panels were being provided by BOE and Visionox.

Other details are scant, but a rumour from The Elec stated that an upcoming Honor folding phone would use ultra-thin glass with an 8.03-inch folding display and 6.45-inch exterior screen. If accurate, that means it would be much like Samsung’s Galaxy Fold 3 and not the Galaxy Flip 3. Given that it’s a flagship, it should have a relatively high-end processor and other parts.

Huawei sold Honor in November 2020 in order to ‘ensure its survival,’ so Honor has been independent for just over a year now. Unlike with Huawei devices, Google apps are available on Honor smartphones.

Honor joins an expanding list of companies that have either released, or are planning to launch their own foldables.

Samsung and Huawei were two early entrants, but more recently there have been foldables from Xiaomi, Motorola, and Oppo, which officially announced its Find N phone earlier this month. As well as Honor, Google is also rumoured to be planning to announce as many as two foldables of its own in the near future.