The Verge is in Barcelona, Spain, for Mobile World Congress, the biggest phone show of the year.
CES may dominate the headlines when it comes to TVs, computer components, and AI inanity, but for all things mobile, MWC has it beat. Since it’s a global show, that includes all manner of announcements of phones, tablets, and wearables that won’t necessarily release in the US.
Xiaomi has already launched its 17 and 17 Ultra flagships, including a special edition Leitzphone collaboration with Leica, while Honor has given us a first proper look at its Robot Phone along with its impressive new Magic V6 foldable. Vivo revealed its X300 Ultra flagship alongside a professional camera cage and extender lens that will be sold outside of China, and Lenovo introduced a Framework-like modular laptop and Windows-gaming concept with a screen that folds in half.
Nothing showed off some new colors of its Phone 4A ahead of a planned London launch on March 5th, while Qualcomm insists that 6G is on the way, whether we like it or not. Samsung and Google are here too, but mostly to talk about the already-announced 10A and S26 models, while Apple made a point of announcing the iPhone 17E during MWC, but not actually in Barcelona.
Keep this page bookmarked for all the news, commentary, and first looks from the show floor.
Oppo is going Ultra in Europe too.
Not to be outdone by yesterday’s news that the Vivo X300 Ultra will launch in Europe, Oppo has confirmed its Find X9 Ultra will also get the series’ first release outside China. And… that’s all we know, except that it’s coming “later this year.” Will it beat the Find X9 Pro’s excellent 7,500mAh battery?
GrapheneOS and Motorola collaboration could lead to more secure smartphone options.
The privacy and security-focused Android fork currently only has official support for Pixel devices, but that could be changing. Motorola announced on Monday at MWC that it has struck a long-term partnership with the GrapheneOS Foundation to “strengthen smartphone security and collaborate on future devices engineered with GrapheneOS compatibility.”
Vivo rarely has a presence at MWC, but this year it bucked that trend in a big way, with the reveal of its next flagship phone, the X300 Ultra, alongside an upgraded telephoto extender lens and professional camera cage. The company isn’t ready to launch the handset just yet — or even reveal very many of its specs — but gave us an early look at what it’s cooking up; that smartphone-sized 400mm lens is wild to behold in person. Vivo also confirmed that whenever it does arrive, it will be the first Ultra to go on sale outside China.
The only concrete detail about the X300 Ultra itself Vivo would confirm is that it will have a 200-megapixel telephoto camera. That was true of last year’s X200 Ultra too though, so we’re still waiting to find out what upgrades Vivo has in store from my favorite phone camera of last year.
Photo: Dominic Preston / The Verge
Mobile World Congress 2026 opened its doors today in Barcelona, Spain, but some of the biggest announcements from the mobile-focused show were already made over the weekend.
To make sure you don’t miss the best new smartphones, laptops, concepts, and accessories, we’re rounding up all the most newsworthy gadgets that have debuted so far at MWC 2026. And if you want to stay on top of all the news, you can follow our full coverage of the show right here.
Four shades of Nothing.
We already knew what the Nothing Phone 4A would look like, including its pretty perfect pink option and new Glyph Bar lighting, but now we’ve seen it in a sharp blue and the inevitable black. We’ll see more, including its Pro sibling, at Nothing’s full launch on Thursday.
1/4Photo: Dominic Preston / The Verge
Hang on, my cat is calling.
I got a look at a device called PetPhone, which promises two-way connectivity to your pet no matter where you are. The device clips to a collar and includes speakers so your pet can hear your voice when you’re away. The kicker? GlocalMe, the company behind PetPhone, says your pet can call you.
You just have to train them to jump in the air three times in six seconds. Which means your dog could… butt dial you by jumping around too much? I have questions.
It brings me no pleasure to say this, but friends: The next G cometh.
The standard formally known as 6G is still being established, but it’s going to be a major topic of discussion at Mobile World Congress 2026, which gets started today in Barcelona.
Just watch those pixels flex.
Samsung Display has a helpful visual on its MWC booth showing how the Flex Magic Pixel technology in the Galaxy S26 Ultra’s Privacy Display works. The technology itself isn’t new — it debuted at MWC 2024 — but its application in a real, shipping product is.
After teasing a magnetic, modular smartphone concept the other day, Tecno has followed that up with another two phone designs centered around color-changing finishes: one with E Ink, and the other incorporating neon.
I’m the most taken with the Pova Neon, which the company says includes genuine neon lighting, not just bright colors: it uses “ionized inert gas lighting technology” to create a glowing effect.
Qualcomm joins the Wi-Fi 8 silliness era.
The company just revealed its “AI-native” Wi-Fi 8 portfolio at MWC, led by the FastConnect 8800 mobile chip. It promises 10+ Gbps speeds while packing Bluetooth 7.0, UWB, and Thread onto a single chip.
Alongside it, five new Dragonwing platforms will power your next ultra-fast router. The company expects commercial products by late 2026, before most of us have switched to Wi-Fi 7, and two years before the Wi-Fi 8 standard is officially ratified.
1/2Image: Qualcomm
Qualcomm’s new smartphone modem is skipping ahead.
The X105 5G modem-RF is the X85’s successor, which is 20 more X by my count. The modem comes with a familiar emphasis on enabling AI applications; it also “predicts RF conditions” with the help of sensing software to try and maintain a stronger connection.
It’s 15 percent smaller and 30 percent more power efficient compared to the last one. Shrinkflation strikes again, but in a good way, maybe?
Like it or not, more AI wearables may be on the horizon – or at least Qualcomm seems to think so. Today the company announced its new Snapdragon Wear Elite chip.
At a press briefing, Qualcomm said it considers the Elite to be a “wrist plus” chip. Meaning, it won’t replace the previous W5 Plus, but exist alongside it. The company said it expects the Elite will appeal to gadget makers looking to create AI wearables such as pendants, pins, and potentially display-free smart glasses. (More powerful smart glasses will likely use its AR chip.)
Motorola has revealed a little more about its upcoming folding phone, and all signs point toward a premium option — not the budget-friendlier alternative the category could use.
For starters, the Razr Fold will cost €1,999 (about $2,350) bundled with the Moto Pen Ultra. It’ll go on sale first in Europe, with North America to follow “in the coming months.” Motorola hasn’t confirmed how much it will cost without the stylus, or what the price is in US dollars.
Hey 3D artists, do any of you actually want a laptop like this?
One of Lenovo’s MWC 2026 concepts is the Yoga Book Pro 3D, a chonky dual-screen laptop with glasses-free 3D. You can see models in 3D, control them via hand tracking, and drop custom tools on the lower screen with specialized cutouts.
Check out our hands-on video. Is this concept cool, weird, or something else?
Lenovo put a foldable display on a gaming handheld. The Legion Go Fold Concept is a Windows-based handheld with a flexible POLED display, detachable Joy-Con-like controllers, and a folio case to turn the whole thing into a mini laptop.
You can use it as a standard Steam Deck-esque handheld with the display folded down to 7.7 inches and controllers attached at its sides, or you can unfold it for a bigger experience. When unfolded, the controllers can be repositioned to all four sides, allowing you to play with the screen in vertical or horizontal orientations.
One of Lenovo’s big laptop concepts for MWC 2026 is a modular ThinkBook with two screens. Officially called the ThinkBook Modular AI PC Concept, the proof-of-concept is a 14-inch productivity machine with two plug-and-play interchangeable ports and a second 14-inch display magnetically attached to the rear of its lid. The second display is removable and can be propped up on a magnetic kickstand (stored under the laptop) and plugged in via USB-C.
But this concept PC has one more trick: removing the keyboard / trackpad deck and replacing it with the second screen, turning the whole thing into a dual-screen laptop you use with the keyboard and trackpad connected via Bluetooth — like the Asus Zenbook Duo.
Lenovo is announcing five new ThinkPads and a new ThinkBook laptop for MWC 2026. There are various new chip offerings and updates for this swathe of ThinkPads, but the device I find the most interesting is the X13 Detachable. We haven’t seen a major update to Lenovo’s tablet-style ThinkPad in years, when it was the X12 Detachable.
The new releases (and starting prices) are:
Lenovo has a few new Yoga laptops it’s announcing at MWC 2026: the 14-inch Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition, 15-inch Yoga Pro 7a, and 14-inch Yoga 9i 2-in-1 Aura Edition.
The most interesting of the pack is that 9i 2-in-1, outfitted with a 2880 x 1800, 120Hz OLED touchscreen. It includes a Yoga Pen Gen 2 stylus with a case that attaches to the laptop’s lid. Fold the convertible back with the pen case attached and the screen sits at a slightly elevated angle. This should be more ergonomic while drawing and taking notes than writing on it flat, and the laptop has rounded edges and corners for a comfier grip. The 9i’s main specs include an Intel Core Ultra 7 355 Panther Lake processor, 32GB of RAM (soldered), and up to 2TB of storage. It’ll start at $1,949 when it launches in May.
Here comes another gaming laptop built around integrated graphics.
Lenovo’s 15-inch Legion 7A is its first with an AMD Strix Halo APU. The 7A will charge via 180W USB-C and be configurable with a gaming-focused Ryzen AI Max Plus 392.
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This $299 mechanical keyboard has a giant glowing knob.
The Yoga Creative Keyboard Angry Miao Edition is Lenovo’s latest collaboration with Angry Miao. Based on the Dry Studio ATM 98, it features silent switches, a translucent top, and an oversize RGB-illuminated volume knob that’s customizable to control creative apps. Lenovo’s model adds a USB-C hub and a key for audio controls on select Yoga devices.
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Alongside a handful of new laptop concepts (and a range of real products too), Lenovo used MWC to announce a pair of AI-based productivity companion concepts. Both are standalone desk devices designed to boost productivity while providing office workers with a bit of artificial dystopic companionship.
Lenovo describes its AI Workmate Concept as an “always-on desk companion,” but it looks like a tiny robotic arm on a swiveling base with a bulbous screen on the end displaying an expressive pair of eyes. It doesn’t look as engaging as a human coworker, but through local AI processing you can interact with the device as a smart assistant via voice commands and physical gestures.
We finally saw the Robot Phone move.
Honor’s gimbal-equipped smartphone is here at MWC, and unlike at CES, it’s actually turned on. I got to see the phone unfold, look around, and dance to Imagine Dragons, and Honor has promised me I should see a few new demos on its booth tomorrow.
Image: Anker
We finally have an update to the Soundcore Space One that launched two and a half years ago. At MWC 2026, Soundcore has announced the Space 2, which will be available in the US on April 21st in three colors — linen white, jet black, and seafoam green — for $129.99. That’s $30 more than the Space One’s original price.
According to Soundcore, the Space 2 have had a full-band noise cancellation upgrade with the focus of those improvements on the low-frequency sounds we all generally use ANC headphones to block — things like airplane, train, and bus engine sounds while traveling. The Space 2 use the same number of microphones as the Space One for noise canceling, instead relying on optimized mic placement and structure and materials improvements for the boost in performance.
Hands-on with the Magic V6.
Honor’s new foldable is the thinnest one yet (though only just), but packs a bigger battery than any before. Here are a few of my first impressions from playing around with the upcoming phone.
Honor has revealed more details of its so-called Robot Phone at MWC 2026, and finally showed a working unit in action alongside a dancing humanoid robot. Specs are still thin on the ground, but the company has confirmed it plans to release the phone in the second half of this year — though I’ve been told that will only be in China.
The Robot Phone doesn’t quite live up to the name — really it’s a smartphone with a gimbal-stabilized camera arm crammed into the back. Honor has now revealed that the main camera will have a 200-megapixel sensor, and is built into what it says is the smallest 4DoF gimbal system in the industry, though those are all the official specs we have so far. It includes various AI camera tracking modes, along with more robotic features like the ability to nod or shake its head in conversation, and “dance” to music.