It was only a matter of time before another company got into the folding smartphone game. Honor has revealed the Honor Magic V, its brand-new folding flagship. It’s destined for China only at the moment, which may be a good thing. For Honor, that is. The design looks… a little familiar.

And not just because most phones — even brand-new folding ones — tend to look like what came before. The few images that exist show a spine and camera bump that Samsung might have designed. It uses what Honor calls an “advanced waterdrop hinge”, but they don’t go into any details. It’s supposed to be “the slimmest compared to similar products in the market”, but how it works…? That has to wait till someone dissects one.

Keeping the Magic V alive

As for the internal specs. Honor’s gone for an OLED display for the interior and external section. There’s a 7.9in panel inside the phone with a resolution of 2,272 x 1,984. Outside is a 6.45in display (2,560 x 1,080), which has a 120Hz refresh rate. The larger screen runs at a mere 90Hz. Pity.

But there’s less of a pity about the rest of the Magic V. It’s packing Qualcomm’s new Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 processor, backed by 12GB of RAM, 256GB or 512GB of storage, and a 4,750mAh battery. Fast-charging is, obviously, a thing. The company promises that users can get a 50% charge in fifteen minutes, or a full charge in 40.

Camera hardware, as expected from a phone-maker that was recently owned by Huawei, promises to be excellent. There’s a triple-camera rear array living in that bump, which sports a trio of 50MP sensors. These cover the standard, wide and ultra-wide options. There are also two 42MP selfie cameras, so you can snap shots of yourself whether the Magic V is open or closed.

Available in China from 18 January this year, the Honor Magic V arrives in Black, Silver, or Burnt Orange shades. It runs Honor’s own OS, Honor Magic UI 6.0, so don’t expect it to have Google’s services installed. It’ll start, in China, at the equivalent of R25,000 (for the 256GB version). At that price point, even a mediocre folding phone like this might have Samsung sweating a little nervously.