Honor Unveils World’s Thinnest Foldable Smartphone with Built-In AI Agent

Honor has launched the Magic V5, which it claims is the world’s thinnest and lightest foldable smartphone, as it intensifies its push into artificial intelligence hardware.

Credit: HONOR

The Shenzhen-based company introduced the Magic V5 on Wednesday, pricing it from 8,999 yuan (USD 1,256). The device measures 8.8 millimetres thick when folded and weighs 217 grams.

Credit: HONOR

The Magic V5 is the first flagship device since Honor announced a strategic shift to become an AI hardware company, according to Chief Executive Officer James Li Jian.

Credit: HONOR

A standout feature of the Magic V5 is Yoyo, an AI agent that can generate presentation decks from shared articles and coordinate ride-hailing orders across multiple apps. The agent cancels other bookings once a ride is confirmed by communicating with AI agents in other applications.

Honor plans to expand Yoyo’s capabilities through a partnership with Alibaba Group Holding, focusing on productivity, transportation and shopping.

Credit: HONOR

The launch comes amid growing competition in China’s foldable smartphone market. According to IDC, Chinese vendors shipped 2.84 million foldable smartphones in the first quarter of 2024, a 53.1% increase year on year.

Huawei led the market with a 76.6% share, while Honor followed with 9.1%. Huawei released the Mate XT, the world’s first trifold smartphone, in September 2024 for domestic sale and globally in February.

Honor’s previous foldable model, the Magic V3, launched in July 2024, weighed 226 grams and was 9.2 millimetres thick. Former CEO George Zhao Ming had cited thinness as a key advantage of the device.

Founded in 2013 as a budget brand under Huawei, Honor was sold in 2020 to a consortium after US sanctions on Huawei. Though it gained traction in Europe, Honor lost market share in China to rivals like Huawei and Xiaomi.

In March, Honor pledged to invest USD 10 billion over five years to become an AI-focused ecosystem company under its “Alpha” investment plan.

As part of this strategy, Honor announced in May that it would develop its own robots and collaborate with partners to expand its AI capabilities.

AI also played a role in manufacturing the Magic V5. The company used a 1-billion-parameter industrial model to simulate 125,000 component assembly options, helping it optimise the hinge design.

---

• Honor launched the Magic V5, the world’s thinnest foldable smartphone

• The device features Yoyo, an AI agent for presentations and ride-hailing

• Priced from USD 1,256, it weighs 217 grams and is 8.8 mm thick

Source: SCMP