We’re approaching the end of the year soon, but it seems like Infinix just isn’t showing any signs of slowing down. They’ve just recently introduced their newest gaming-focused smartphone — the Infinix Note 11s.
Let’s take a look at what this bad boy has to offer.
Box that stands out
My first experience with an Infinix device was with their Hot 10s and to be honest, I wasn’t really feeling their previous box design. Infinix had a revamp of their packaging with this more sophisticated and minimalist-looking neon-green color which just pops above the other smartphone boxes you’ll see in smartphone stores.
Taking the top cover off the box, we’re immediately greeted by the phone, and right underneath it are the accessories.
A clear jelly case, a SIM ejector pin, a USB-C cable, and a 33W fast charger. Unfortunately, no earphones in sight.
Big but not bulky
The phone itself is shockingly big, sporting a massive 6.95-inch, FHD+, 120Hz refresh rate with a 180Hz touch sampling rate IPS display. That’s just a little shy of a 7-inch device but manages to impressively maintain a relatively slim body despite also carrying a 5,000mAh battery.
You’re still obviously going to need two hands to operate this, but at least the back case is a textured plastic which feels good to grip.
It also has a rather professional-looking design that doesn’t give away the feel of a gaming phone.
In a recent news article I came across, more affordable phones might soon lose the audio jack. Thankfully, we’re still getting that here on the Note 11s, and it’s placed on the bottom of the device beside the USB-C charging port and the speaker grille.
Like its sibling, the Infinix Note 11, we’re also getting a side-mounted fingerprint scanner comfortably placed on the right side of its matte silver frame.
The camera
Just as you would expect from a more premium smartphone, the camera design on the Note 11s looks really good. It rocks a triple camera setup that has a 50MP f1.6 main shooter and a 2MP macro sensor with a 2MP depth sensor.
And for the selfie camera, Infinix went with a 16MP shooter for this one, and it’s placed right in the middle of the display in a punch hole design.
Quick rundown of the specs
The Note 11s is packing some serious firepower under its hood. It has the new MediaTek Helio G96 chipset baked in it. The new chipset is the successor to the Helio G95 chip, a very popular chipset that has had quite a following because of its exceptionally good performance. A smartphone with the G95’s successor might prove worthy of its promises of performance.
Paired with 8GB of RAM and a 128GB UFS 2.2 internal storage, we’re looking at a phone which can do serious damage for gamers.
I won’t be diving into gaming tests right now, but I’ve already tried it with a few games like Genshin Impact. So far, the results have been very promising, so better watch out for our full review, if you’re interested in knowing more about that.
Price and availability
The Infinix Note 11s is priced at PhP 9,990 and is available in this Mithril Gray or Haze Green color variant.
Infinix is slashing off PhP 800 from its original SRP for its launch promo price of PhP 9,990 to only PhP 9,190 on November 30 and December 1.
Accessories
Jackery Explorer 300D: Power and portability in one
Uninterrupted workflows for digital nomads, freelance creatives, more
For digital nomads, freelance creatives, and even work-from-home professionals, staying productive on the move means carrying around multiple gadgets, cords, adapters, and power banks to survive the day.
Having to carry such weight, quite literally, is vital for maintaining workflow continuity.
For a more seamless experience and to have just one extra portable device to power all working parts, there’s the Jackery Explorer 300D.
Launched just last month, this grab-and-go offering from Jackery is designed for the modern lifestyle.
It moves away from Jackery’s traditional aesthetic with a sleek, speaker-like form factor. It weighs just 2.5 kilograms and is 64% smaller than standard 300W units in the market.
This ultra-compact size was made possible by a smart engineering choice of swapping bulky traditional AC wall outlets for highly efficient DC-only and USB-C ports — which also helps eliminate idle power loss.
With a 288Wh capacity, the Jackery Explorer 300D holds enough juice for up to nine power banks.
It can keep a Type-C fast-charging laptop for up to three to four full cycles, a Wi-Fi router alive for hours, and recharge cameras or drone batteries up to five times for a lengthy production day.
For smaller gadgets like smartphones and portable fans, the power station can juice them up for up to 22 times.
It can even charge five devices simultaneously with a total of three USB-C ports, a USB-A port, and a DC 12V car charger port.
All these ensure users are never disconnected, wherever they may set up their mobile office.
Another brilliant touch is the two-in-one shoulder strap that easily unclips to double as a heavy-duty 140W USB-C charging cable.
The everyday carry is available via Lazada and Shopee, and at the official Jackery kiosk in SM Fairview, as well as other partner stores.
There’s a passport-sized revolution upon us, and we’re here for it.
After the HUAWEI Pura X Max and Samsung Galaxy Z Fold8, September 2026 showed us two more joining the fray: the Xiaomi 18 Fold and the much-awaited and plenty-rumored iPhone Duo.
While all four share a similar form factor, they don’t exactly all share the same approach to it. And while we’ve yet to spend significant time with most of them, we’re gonna go ahead and jump the gun and list what we think each one did right.
Think of this as more of a collective first impression or Match Pulse.
Samsung gets the weight right
Samsung being a foldie veteran shows up here.
When I first held the Galaxy Z Fold8, I was pleasantly surprised by how light it was. At 201g, it’s the lightest of these four by a pretty significant margin. The Xiaomi 18 Fold comes in at 219g, the HUAWEI Pura X Max at 229g, and the iPhone Duo at 254g.
That’s thoughtful design, and definitely a result of Samsung having at it for years.
This is one of those things that doesn’t necessarily jump out on a spec sheet. But it matters when you actually have the phone in your hand. A passport-sized foldable is supposed to give you more screen without feeling like you’re carrying around a tiny tablet.
Samsung seems to understand that balance particularly well.
Xiaomi gets the cameras right
We’re not gonna talk about camera performance here. Just the cameras present and how they’re laid out.
In that regard, the Xiaomi 18 Fold is a runaway winner for me.
It has a 200-megapixel main camera, a 50-megapixel ultrawide, and a 50-megapixel 3.5x periscope telephoto. All three are part of Xiaomi’s Leica camera system.
That telephoto alone makes the setup feel much more complete than what some of the other passport-sized foldables are offering.
Then there’s the physical layout. Xiaomi puts the three cameras in a horizontal arrangement across the upper portion of the rear panel. It looks clean, but more importantly, it should help keep the phone from rocking around as much when you put it down on a flat surface.
That’s the kind of small design decision I appreciate.
You’re not just getting a foldable with cameras slapped onto the back. You’re getting a flagship-style camera system that also happens to fold.
Android gets the big screen right
This is where Android still has Apple beat.
The whole point of opening a passport-sized foldable is getting more screen. Android has spent years figuring out what to actually do with all that extra real estate.
On Samsung, you can run apps side by side, resize windows, use pop-up windows, save app pairs, and take advantage of Samsung’s broader Multi Window and DeX features. Huawei has also built out its own split-screen and floating-window tools.
Apple is finally entering that conversation with the iPhone Duo. Its iOS 27 implementation allows two apps to run side by side (you just can’t resize them like you can on Android), two windows of the same app, quick app swapping, and saved app pairs.
That’s actually a pretty big deal. But Android has been doing this for years.
The passport-sized foldable isn’t just a bigger screen. It should let you do more things at once. Android understands that part of the assignment.
Apple gets the transition right
@gadgetmatchiPhone Duo maxxing 😮💨♬ original sound – GadgetMatch
This might be Apple’s biggest contribution to the passport-sized foldable.
The iPhone Duo doesn’t simply take iOS and stretch it across a bigger display. Apple has reworked the experience around the fact that the phone can physically change shape.
Both displays share the same aspect ratio, which means content can move between the outer and inner screens without feeling like you’re jumping between two completely different phones. iOS 27 also moves controls to the side when the Duo is open, adjusts app layouts for the wider canvas, and introduces Split View for the first time on iPhone.
There’s also the rather clever StandBy implementation. Put the Duo down in a tent orientation and it can turn into a little smart display, even without being plugged in.
Apple Pencil support is coming later this year, too, and it works on both displays.
This is very Apple.
The hardware is new, but the software is doing a lot of the work to make the new thing feel familiar.
Samsung gets the overall shape right
This one is completely subjective.
Personally, I prefer the square-ish, sharp-edge look of the Galaxy Z Fold8. I’ve seen plenty of people praising the D-like shape of the Duo — was that deliberate or just a happy coincidence? — and the more rounded look of the Pura X Max and Xiaomi 18 Fold.
But looks-wise, the Galaxy Z Fold8 just stands out to me.
There’s something about the balance and more symmetrical look of the Fold8 that seems more user-friendly compared to the no-love-for-lefties approach of the Duo, especially software-wise.
That’s obviously a personal preference. But that’s kind of the point.
We’re now at a stage where these devices aren’t all trying to look like the same thing.
The passport-sized foldable is becoming a design language of its own.
Android gets customization right
@rodneil Galaxy Z Fold8 – 3 different wallpapers: Folded, Landscape unfolded, Portrait unfolded #GalaxyZFold8 ♬ Kitty (MOMO) – MISAMO
Much has been said about the unfolding animation of the iPhone Duo. That’s cool for sure.
But if you’re after making a passport foldie truly feel like yours, Android is still the playground.
With Samsung specifically, Good Lock is your customization best friend.
You can tweak the interface, the lock screen, gestures, multitasking behavior, and plenty of little things that make a Galaxy feel less like the phone Samsung shipped and more like the phone you set up.
It’s not necessarily the sexiest feature to put on a spec sheet.
But after you’ve lived with a foldable for a while, those little things add up.
Samsung dropped the ball on the stylus
This is a weird one.
Samsung had S Pen support on the Galaxy Z Fold3, Fold4, Fold5, and Fold6. Then it dropped support with the Fold7. The Galaxy Z Fold8 and Galaxy Z Fold8 Ultra doesn’t support the S Pen either.
That’s a pretty significant omission for a device that unfolds into something approaching tablet territory.
The S Pen had plenty of fans. And you can absolutely argue that a stylus makes even more sense on a foldable because you suddenly have a much larger canvas for writing, drawing, editing, and annotating.
Apple, meanwhile, has promised Apple Pencil support for the iPhone Duo later this year.
Now, they’ve broken (or at least delayed) some promises before, so this is still a wait and see.
But it’s funny seeing Apple move toward a feature Samsung had already established on its Fold line.
The battery race is getting interesting
We still can’t fully compare this usage-wise. We haven’t spent enough time with all four devices to make any meaningful real-world battery call.
So we’re just gonna give you the numbers on paper.
The Xiaomi 18 Fold is the battery monster here with a 6,000mAh cell, alongside 67W wired and 50W wireless charging. Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold8 has a 4,800mAh battery with 45W wired charging.
Apple doesn’t publish the iPhone Duo’s battery capacity in the same way, so we’ll leave the mAh comparison there rather than pretending the numbers are directly comparable.
This is one area where Xiaomi’s approach is particularly interesting.It has managed to put a 6,000mAh battery into a device that weighs 219g. That’s a pretty compelling combination on paper.
And then there’s performance
Same refrain as the battery here.
We’re not going to pretend that chipset names alone tell us which phone is going to be faster in actual use. Especially with four different platforms, operating systems, thermal designs, and software stacks involved.
But the hardware underneath is certainly no joke.
The Galaxy Z Fold8 runs on Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 for Galaxy. The Xiaomi 18 Fold introduces Xiaomi’s own XRING O3 processor. And the iPhone Duo gets Apple’s A20 Pro, the same chip family used in the iPhone 18 Pro models.
The interesting part isn’t really which one wins the benchmark race. It’s that none of these companies seem to be treating the passport-sized foldable as a compromise device.
They’re putting flagship-class silicon, serious cameras, big batteries, and increasingly sophisticated software into this format.
And that’s probably the biggest thing to get right.
The passport foldable is becoming a thing
Exciting times are unfolding for the passport-sized foldable.
What’s interesting isn’t that these four phones are similar. It’s that they’re different.
Samsung has spent years figuring out how to make a big foldable thinner and lighter. Xiaomi is going all-in on cameras and battery. Huawei has its own interpretation of the compact, wide form factor. And Apple has arrived with a completely new take on how iOS should behave when the screen itself changes shape.
Between the Galaxy Z Fold8 being a big hit and the buzz generated by the iPhone Duo, it’s not far-fetched to think other brands will throw their own take at the form factor pretty soon.
And we’re totally here for it.
Apple’s first ever foldable is finally here! Say hello to the iPhone Duo.
In this video, THE Michael Josh shares his first impressions.
Those include the design, display, cameras, performance, and what it’s actually like to use Apple’s latest iPhone.
Is the iPhone Duo the future of the iPhone or just an interesting experiment?
We take a closer look and share everything that stood out during our hands-on experience.
-
Reviews2 weeks agovivo V80 review: Good phone, tough sell
-
News1 week agoOPPO Find X10 Series: Price, availability in the Philippines
-
Cameras1 week agoDJI Osmo Pocket 4P Pearl White now available globally
-
News1 week agoOPPO Find X10 Series: Price, availability
-
News2 weeks agoSony unveils three premium Walkman music players
-
Entertainment1 week agoCyberpunk: Edgerunners 2 now streaming, Cyberpunk 2077 update coming
-
Gaming1 week agoHP OMEN Max 16 review: Gamer-maxxing in deep black
-
Laptops2 weeks agoLenovo expands Yoga lineup with new AI PCs and tablets

























