As per tradition (except for the years of the coronavirus), the period between the end of February and the beginning of March is that of the Mobile World Congress, the Barcelona event in which the smartphones that we will see during the year are presented or announced. And like every time for quite some time now, also the MWC 2023 (here all the news) has one feature that is impossible not to notice: it takes place in Europe, but there are fewer and fewer Western companies, even fewer European ones, and the lion’s share goes to Chinese companies.
It happens every year, but this year is even more significant, because this thing fits into a particularly delicate historical period, with relations between China and the West at its lowest point ever and (news these days) the European Union that it even tries to hinder the activity of TikTok on the community territory. The climate looks worse than when Trump’s absurd ban against Huawei arrived.
Despite this, it is impossible not to recognize that it is precisely from China that at the moment are arriving innovations and the most interesting products, when it comes to phones. Below we have collected some of the novelty most important, among those that will surely be in Barcelona and net of any surprises. Also taking into account that, as usual, Apple will not be present at the MWC, and Samsung has already unveiled its top of the range, the Galaxy S23, in early February.
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Honor
Born from a rib of Huawei, but independent since 2020the brand brings to Barcelona both the new Magic5 Lite and Magic5 Pro and above all the Magic VShis first leaflet also destined for Europe: will go on sale in Italy in June and we wrote about it here.
Huawei
It seems that Huawei has big plans for MWC 2023 and that it will have a huge stand, to remember that it has been a few years makes among the top three smartphone manufacturers in the world. The P60 and the Mate 60 will probably be seen, almost certainly with the Mate X3, the new generation foldable phone, which could also have satellite communication functions. Little or nothing will arrive in Italy, and if it happens, even the new smartphones will not have access to Google’s services and platforms. Thus, for reasons of opportunity, the Shenzhen company will focus less on smartphones and more on everything around them for the European markets. Such as wearable devices, for example: in Barcelona there will be the new Watch Buds, the first smartwatch with two earphones inside. It can already be ordered, even in Italy, and costs 499.90 euros.
Realm
The company has confirmed that the new one will be at Mobile World Congress GT3somehow heir to the GT2 Pro that we saw last year and already sold at home as GT Neo 5. Among other things, it has an incredible 240W super-fast charge, the fastest in the world.
TCL
In Barcelona, the Chinese multinational will again focus heavily on the concept of “affordable price”, with the smartphones of the 40/400 family which they start at less than 100 euros and the 40R model which is among the cheapest 5G models on the market, at less than 250 euros. There is also curiosity about the new version of the NXTPaper tablet, which we tested last July and has been renewed in hardware and software.
Xiaomi
By now a giant, light years away from the low cost brand we knew until a few years ago, Xiaomi will certainly be in Barcelona with the full range of family smartphone 13, which have already been on sale in China for a couple of months. It will be interesting to understand how the collaboration with Leica works, which contributed to the creation of the photographic sector. But, considering Xiaomi’s vast catalogue, we also expect products for the home and smart devices, as well as computers and tablets of course.
OnePlus, Oppo e Nothing
Among the stands there will certainly be those of OnePlus, which has just unveiled the new 11 also for western markets, and which will present a “concept” based on this model. There will be those of Oppo, where the most photographed will be the Find N2 Flip that we really liked at the London presentation, and there will be Nothing: Carl Pei’s startup should unveil a new pair of earphones and perhaps some indication of the next smartphone; he will certainly insist on the comforting sales data of his only telephone that didn’t even exist 8 months ago and above all on the ad update Android 13 just arrived on Phone 1.
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And the others
It will be Lenovowhich is very active on smartphones also thanks to the Motorola brand: at CES in Las Vegas we had appreciated the new ThinkPhoneexhibited in Barcelona next to a interesting folding computer prototype (this one); at the fair there will also be HMD, which with the brand Nokia resists in Finland. At the borders of the European Union but still in Europe. There will be Qualcomm, which produces the chips mounted on almost all mid-range and high-end smartphones, with the new Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, there will be Mediatek, which produces the rest of the smartphone chips, and there will be telephone operators from all over Europe . We will talk about 5G, with the first Millimeter Wave networks capable of fully exploiting its potential from the start also in the old continent, but last year there was already discussion of 6G, and this year we will certainly know more.