I just saw Honor's presentation at MWC, and honestly, these guys never stop surprising me. They introduced two quite interesting devices: the Magic V6, which is their most refined foldable phone so far, and the Robot Phone, which is... well, something you probably didn't expect to exist.

Let's start with the Magic V6. It's a book-style foldable phone, but with details that make it different. It has a thickness of just 8.7mm when closed, which is impressive considering it contains a 6660 mAh battery inside. The inner screen is 7.9 inches, and the fold is 44% less visible than in previous generations, solving one of the main issues with these devices. The hinge withstands 500,000 folds, it has a 6.5-inch external display, triple rear cameras, and Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5. In other words, it's a serious foldable phone with solid specifications.

But what’s really crazy is the Robot Phone. It has a 200-megapixel camera that emerges from the phone with a mechanical arm that rotates 360 degrees horizontally and vertically. It integrates a 4DoF gimbal to keep the video stable without you having to move the phone. So far, it sounds like a gimmick, right? The interesting part is what comes next.

This camera isn’t just a camera: it’s the eye of an AI assistant integrated into the phone. It reacts to what you tell it, autonomously tracks people while recording video, and can respond to queries about what it’s capturing. This is where it differs from Gemini Live or ChatGPT: it has the freedom to reframe without the user having to contort the phone into uncomfortable positions. It can even nod or shake its camera side to side, giving it a body language that other assistants don’t have.

When you don’t need it in robot mode, the camera retracts inside the phone with the sensor facing outward, functioning as a conventional camera. Honor says the Robot Phone will be released in the second half of the year, although they didn’t confirm the price.

Here’s the dilemma: these designs with moving parts appeared on the market between 2018 and 2020, and most failed because they didn’t justify the complexity, fragility, and additional cost. Honor will have to prove that this time is different. The concept is smart, but the question is whether people really need this or if it’s just technology for technology’s sake.