The appearance of a new flagship is always an event. Some devices turn out to be very successful and become cult role models, others come out just passable. But in any case, these devices are interesting to test, look at improvements and improvements – in general, there is something to pay attention to.
The new flagship OnePlus 10 Pro received a brand new Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 processor. In addition, specialists from the reputable company Hasselblad helped to work on the camera. Let’s add an interesting appearance to the treasury of advantages, a bunch of opportunities for entertainment, and the device is still hard to get, a kind of rare exotic.
Recognizable design
The OnePlus 10 Pro is hefty, as befits a large flagship. It does not look massive, and due to the smooth rounding of the back to the sidewalls, the smartphone seems a little smaller than it actually is.
The OnePlus 10 Pro is a pleasure to hold in your hand: the aluminum case has no sharp edges, nothing digs into the palm of your hand, and matte, rough Gorilla Glass Victus on the back of the case gives you an atmospheric feeling. The smartphone comes in two colors: in addition to the neutral black version, there is also a gray-green version.
The body is not slippery, which is especially important for a large device. You can’t even talk about convenient one-handed control, this has long been in the past. The main thing is that all the buttons are in their places, you get to them without errors – there are no questions about ergonomics.
The fingerprint scanner is located in a convenient place, at a sufficient height from the bottom edge, so that the finger intuitively lies in the desired area the first time. The response speed is excellent – it reacts accurately and instantly.
On the front side, everything is extremely concise: a huge screen with thin frames, a round cutout for the front camera in the upper left corner and a speaker slot.
On the sides are the power and volume keys, as well as the OnePlus-invariant lever for quickly switching between alert modes. You can choose between silent, vibration or return all sounds back. The physical button for switching the sound notification may not be the main feature, but it is very convenient. I enjoy it every time I get to use a OnePlus device.
The block with cameras is located on a large ceramic platform protruding above the case. The smartphone wobbles slightly on the surface when it is placed face up when the screen is touched. Dust accumulates along the edges of the site, and this also applies to slightly protruding sides of the lenses. So you have to wipe all this beauty regularly – when using a smartphone, fingers often get into the area with cameras.
There is no dust and moisture protection, last year’s OnePlus 9 Pro was IP68 certified, but the OnePlus 10 Pro does not have this standard. At least not officially mentioned. Although if you get the tray for SIM-cards, you can see an elastic band to isolate from moisture.
But here I want to note that last year the head of OnePlus, Pete Lau, noted that the company does not want to focus on moisture protection. The position is logical in principle: it’s one thing to test a phone in a laboratory, and another thing is unpredictable user usage scenarios. It is difficult for a manufacturer to guarantee non-failure operation, despite the additional dust and moisture protection.
Great screen
The screen of a smartphone with curved edges – I would prefer a simpler option, with a flat display. But in this case, look towards the OnePlus 10 “not Pro”. It’s not that I’m a hater of screens with curves, it’s just that they are more convenient to live with.
The front, as well as the back, also uses Gorilla Glass Victus. From the experience of using other devices with such glass, I can say that it is durable and does not scratch. Just in case, a factory protective film is also pasted on the screen.
Display with a 6.7-inch diagonal, a resolution of 1440 × 3216 pixels and a beautiful picture. The screen has an excellent margin of brightness, there is support for HDR10 + and HLG. The LTPO screen supports a refresh rate from 1 to 120 Hz in automatic mode: this way you can save energy, the device adapts depending on the tasks. For example, when the Always-On Display mode is enabled, then the 1 Hz mode is active for minimal power consumption.
You can choose between a refresh rate of 60 Hz and 120 Hz, but I did not notice a very noticeable difference in operating time, but the sensations when using a smartphone still differ in favor of a higher frequency. You can change the color reproduction in the settings using several ready-made color profiles.
The camera is not top
Last year, OnePlus launched the OnePlus 9 Pro in partnership with Hasselblad, famous for its medium format cameras. The companies decided to continue cooperation, so OnePlus 10 Pro received support for the second generation Hasselblad Pro mode with RAW shooting in 12-bit mode, as well as post-processing of frames taking into account the features of the shooting style of Hasselblad cameras in Pro shooting mode. A small but nice decor feature is the orange shutter button, just like the Hasselblad shutter button.
The camera system is as follows:
- Main camera: 48 MP, optics 23 mm (f / 1.8);
- Wide-angle: 50 MP, optics 14 mm (f / 2.2);
- Telephoto: 8 MP, optics 77 mm (f / 2.4);
- Front camera: 32 MP (f / 2.2).
Unlike the OnePlus 9 Pro, there is no longer a modest monochrome module, but oh well. But the front camera with improved aperture and twice the resolution, and the wide-angle one takes pictures with a coverage of 150 °. Turning on this mode is not very convenient, you need to make a few extra clicks, but this is unlikely to stop lovers of creative shots.
It’s hard to say how much people will appreciate such a “fisheye”, but the fact that the wide-angle sensor has become almost two times smaller is already bad. Moreover, while shooting with this lens, the smartphone “cuts out” the central part of the frame in order to get a less extreme and more familiar 110 ° angle for everyday use.
The wide-angle lens, for my taste, turned out to be controversial: they wanted to add something new, but in fact it shoots very average when using the notorious “fish”. In addition, strong distortion is embarrassing – the pictures are too unnatural. According to my feelings, this is the worst “width” for flagships that I have ever tested.
Among the settings you can find the XPan mode, as in the Hasselblad XPan camera. If you activate it, then we get a shooting mode with an aspect ratio of 65:24 and a couple of profiles: one black and white, the other with a film effect. Moreover, during the shooting, you can see an unusual effect, as if you are developing a film. The whole process is not fast, but in the world of retro there is no hurry. The effects quickly get boring, and you soon forget about this Hasslblad option.
The camera shoots perfectly during the day on the main module: a wide dynamic range, natural colors, good detail. Although you can find fault with the fact that the image sometimes turns out to be too contrasty – I want to reduce the black color.
At night, a decent result is also obtained, the automation often turns on the long exposure mode, glues the frames quickly and you don’t have to hold the smartphone very tenaciously. But you can turn on a separate “Night mode” manually in the settings – then the frames will be even better.
For shooting distant objects, a telephoto lens with a 3.3x optical zoom is useful. By modern standards, it is very average, even a separate night mode does not save it. The quality is still not so hot for a top-end device.
The front camera in portrait mode often misses objects: it may not notice the earpiece in the ear or blur part of the down jacket. In addition, the camera, even outdoors in daylight, is very demanding on shaking: you move your hand a little and you get a series of blurry selfies. Therefore, you have to freeze and not move – usually front-end cameras in top-end smartphones think faster.
Filling
For me, this is the first device with the latest Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chip. After the long-suffering Snapdragon 888, which warmed up and throttled in tests, it was interesting to see what happens in a new generation device. In stress tests, the body heats up, performance drops to almost 80%, the same is true in toys. Probably, someone will turn a blind eye to this and will wait for new firmware, but so far the temperature is over 40 degrees in games.
The smartphone comes in different versions: the initial 8/128 GB, then 8/256 GB and the top 12/256 GB. LPDDR5 RAM, UFS 3.1 built-in memory – everything is as it should be in a flagship. The speed of work is excellent both in the menu and in games and applications.
There is no slot for a memory card, so if you plan to shoot a lot of video, take the 256 GB version. In general, it is strange that they did not add a 512 GB option, because 4K video, not to mention 8K, quickly eats up memory.
The speakers are loud, but not the highest quality by the standards of the flagships, I would add low frequencies. But a very pleasant vibration is a rare occurrence for Android.
Soft
The independent company OnePlus has passed under the wing of powerful brother OPPO, and the Oxygen OS shell will no longer be developed. Instead, OPPO Color OS, familiar from smartphones, is used, and at times OPPO “tails” come out if you dig deeper into the menu.
The smartphone came to us from China, so it impressed us with a rich set of pre-installed software, taking into account local specifics. Fortunately, all this can be removed, leaving only the necessary applications. Of course, there are no difficulties with using Google services, all the usual programs are in place, but what is missing can be installed from Google Play.
There are themes, icon replacement, not to mention Always On with notification settings. You can also run effects during a call: a light wave will run along the edges of the phone, it looks very nice, especially in the dark. Chips like a split screen for the simultaneous use of two applications or duplication of programs are difficult to surprise, but they are worthy of mention.
Doesn’t last very long, but charges quickly
The battery capacity is 5000 mAh, a decent figure for a flagship. Let me remind you that the OnePlus 9 Pro had a 4500 mAh battery, and the dimensions of the old and new devices are almost the same, so we thank the engineers for optimizing the insides.
I haven’t used the OnePlus 9 Pro, so I can’t say if battery life is better on the new phone or not. Therefore, I will simply give the results in everyday use. For an hour of playing CoD, the smartphone sits down by 22-25%, and for an hour of watching a video on YouTube, it discharges by 6-7%. In mixed mode, when you use all the functions of the device, you get about 4-4.5 hours of active screen per day.
Complete with a smartphone, we get an 80 W adapter for very fast charging. The whole process takes a modest 35 minutes – SuperVOOC technology works as it should. The whole magic lies in the fact that the smartphone has not one, but two batteries, they are charged in parallel, so the process goes much faster and without damaging the battery in the long run.
Among the shortcomings, I want to note the power adapter with a USB Type-A cable – after all, it is more convenient to use USB Type-C, as it was in OnePlus 9 Pro.
There is also a very fast 50W AirVOOC wireless charging, and in the settings you can turn on reverse charging.
Equipment
A powerful 80 W charger, a cable, a case, a SIM card clip, branded stickers – by the standards of the “economical” kits of our time, it’s just a luxurious option.
What is the price
The OnePlus 7 Pro cost $670 in 2019, the OnePlus 8 Pro went up to $720 in 2020, and the OnePlus 9 Pro raised the bar even higher in 2021 to $950. The OnePlus 10 Pro, on the other hand, costs about $750 in China, but there are no prices for global markets yet, and it is unlikely that the phone will cost less than usual.
At the beginning of February 2022, OnePlus 10 Pro in the initial version of 8/128 GB costs about 80,000 rubles in Moscow.
OnePlus 9 Pro immediately comes to mind as the main competitor, in comparison with which the improvements in OnePlus 10 Pro are not so significant, and in some ways the smartphone has even become worse. So, OnePlus 9 Pro can be bought for 47,000 – 50,000 rubles. However, this is the fate of all new products: at first, prices are at a maximum, but after a few months they return to normal. The same OnePlus 9 Pro at the time of release cost about 80,000 rubles in Russia.
Therefore, if you choose between the old and the new, then of course the choice falls on the OnePlus 9 Pro – for 20,000 rubles of the difference, you can buy excellent headphones.
Impression
So is the OnePlus 10 Pro worth dreaming about, or should you be looking at something else? After all, OnePlus and OPPO have merged development departments, which means that the more popular OPPO has every chance to absorb OnePlus features. Moreover, OnePlus has long since lost its key trump card – a low price that covered all the shortcomings. While smartphones were cheap, there was demand, and when prices began to rise – you need to not only develop a fan base, but also bring profit – the company started having problems.
Judging by the OnePlus 10 Pro, the idea of merging OPPO and OnePlus is still more of a plus than a minus. Maybe there will be fewer identical devices, and there will be more time to develop smartphones with well-balanced features.
So far, after using the OnePlus 10 Pro, there are mixed feelings. It has an excellent screen with 120 Hz, very fast charging, but at the same time, in terms of photo quality, this is not the ultimate dream, and the battery life is also not impressive. Especially now you can buy a cheaper OnePlus 9 Pro if you don’t want to overpay for a beautiful, but not the best flagship of its kind.
However, it becomes more and more difficult to improve smartphones with each new generation, and OnePlus is no longer different from the rest. If I were OnePlus 9 Pro owners, I would wait for the next generation, and I would advise others who are thinking about buying to wait for the OnePlus 10 Pro price drop.
We thank the friendliest gadget store Big Geek for the provided smartphone.
