Ever since Samsung first debuted its “Privacy display” on the Galaxy S26 Ultra, we’ve been wondering why nobody thought to make our larger screens harder to spy on. China-centric brand Huawei claims it already figured out how to add such a screen to a laptop, and now it’s a feature we want on every large-screen device going forward.
You can see this new display in action on the Huawei MateBook Pro S (via Android Authority), a thin and light laptop sporting a 3.1K-resolution OLED display. The “Smart Shield Privacy Screen” will keep your screen visible to the person sitting directly in front of it. Depending on the steepness of your angle from the screen, you may only see a dim or completely black screen.
Huawei claims the laptop will detect if there are any onlookers with the webcam, and users can enable the privacy screen by clicking a popup. You can also flick a physical switch to turn privacy mode on or off. Sure, there are existing, cheap privacy shield covers you can buy for laptops, but any filter will inevitably reduce the clarity of the display.
Huawei further says its displays use a two-layer pixel design The second set of pixels activates when you click the privacy setting, and the company claims you’ll still get the same brightness as you would during regular use. We’re not so convinced, considering the Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra’s display quality and brightness take a hit with the feature enabled. The MateBook Pro S can reach 1,600 nits of peak brightness in HDR, but we doubt you’ll get nearly as much luminance with the privacy mode enabled.
This feature makes so much more sense on a laptop, rather than a phone. If you’re sitting on a plane or at a local Starbucks, you don’t necessarily want nosy neighbors peeping in on sensitive spreadsheets, documents, passwords, or any of your other data. Sure, it’s handy on small screens for the same reason, but to a lesser degree. The best use of the “Privacy display” feature on Samsung’s top-end smartphone was to stop a packed subway car from watching your movies during your daily commute.
You can’t easily buy the MateBook Pro S in the U.S.—it’s a China-only product that costs around 8,000 Chinese yuan, or approximately $1,185. It’s not running on Windows, either, but on Huawei’s own, Linux-based HarmonyOS. As for the processor, the MateBook Pro S is making use of a HiSilicon Kirin XE90, a 9-core, 14-thread ARM-based chip you’ll only find in devices overseas.
So, no, you’re unlikely going to end up buying Huawei’s laptop. It’s one of those features we hope will come to laptops stateside. We can’t let China have all the coolest tech, right?
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