Huawei has confirmed that its new smartphone sub-brand, OSTA, will make its first public appearance at a launch event on 20 November 2026. Richard Yu, chairman of Huawei's consumer business group, announced the date on the Chinese social platform Weibo on 11 November, ending weeks of rumours about the new brand.

The event, which starts at 2:30pm Beijing time, will also see the Enjoy V8 go on sale and the SAIC Z7T smart vehicle appear on stage. It is the first time Huawei has officially confirmed OSTA's existence, after reports about the brand circulated for nearly a month among technology bloggers and retail channel partners.

What Huawei has confirmed about OSTA

Yu's Weibo post carried the device label OSTA O1 Pro, the same model name that appeared in earlier reports about the brand's first phone. The post confirmed the brand name and the debut date, but Huawei has not yet disclosed specifications, pricing or a launch schedule for any OSTA device.

The brand's Chinese name is Xingmang, and public trademark records show Huawei first filed for the name in 2023 before submitting a renewed application in July 2026 covering smartphones and chips. Huawei has also opened a dedicated OSTA account on Weibo, revealing the sub-brand's logo for the first time and creating a page that will carry news about OSTA phones and other device categories, including wearables, tablets and computers.

Reports in the Chinese press suggest the first products will be the OSTA O1 and OSTA O1 Pro, positioned in the mid-to-high-end market with a wide, straight-bar design. A leaked retail box image suggested the O1 Pro could offer up to 16GB of memory and 1TB of storage in black, white and purple. Market reports have also pointed to a Kirin 9-series chip and HarmonyOS, with system-level AI features as the main selling point. None of these details has been confirmed by Huawei, which has said only that official information will prevail.

A new sub-brand six years after Honor

OSTA is Huawei's first new phone sub-brand since Honor, the brand it launched in 2013 for younger buyers and lower prices before selling it in November 2020 while United States trade restrictions were squeezing its phone business. Industry watchers quoted in Chinese media have described OSTA as an attempt to build another Honor, covering phones, tablets, computers, wearables and chips under one name.

The timing reflects pressure in the Chinese smartphone market. Yu said in September that rising memory prices add more than 200 US dollars to the cost of every phone, squeezing the low end of the market and pushing manufacturers towards mid-range and premium devices. A new sub-brand aimed at the mid-to-high-end segment would fit that shift, although Huawei has not said how OSTA will be priced or how it will sit alongside its existing Mate, Pura and Nova lines.

What to expect on 20 November

The launch event on 20 November is expected to reveal the first OSTA phones and explain where the brand fits in Huawei's range. Until then, the only confirmed facts are the brand name, its Chinese name Xingmang, the debut date and the OSTA O1 Pro model name shown on Yu's own Weibo post.

It is not yet clear whether OSTA phones will sell outside China. No leak seen so far has pointed to an international launch, and Huawei has given no date, price or list of countries for the new brand. For now, the 20 November event is the moment when the rumours give way to official detail, and it will show whether OSTA is a full new device family or a more limited addition to Huawei's line-up.