OnePlus is back with a new globally available flagship handset,
the 6.7-inch OnePlus 10
Pro. The pricing is attractive, starting at
$899/£799/€899 with 8GB of RAM and 128GB of storage, in Volcanic Black and
Emerald Forest (Volcanic Black only in the UK). In the UK and Europe, you can
also get a 12GB/256GB version for £899/€999 (Emerald Forest only in the
UK).
OnePlus is now much more embedded with its BBK Electronics
stablemate Oppo, a fact that's particularly noticeable in the overlay that's
applied onto Android 12. OnePlus retains its OxygenOs,
but there are now many similarities with Oppo's ColorOS,
The color option, Volcanic Black, shares the same backplate
design, but lacks the eye-catching color. By contrast to the backplate,
the sides of the phone are shiny and reflective, and a shade of green that
doesn't tone especially well with the back. This is a pity, when the back
itself is so nicely done.
Although the T-Mobile version of the OnePlus 10 Pro in the US
has an IP68 rating for dust and water resistance, this is absent from
international versions, including my UK-sourced review unit. IP68 signifies
that a handset is 'dust tight' and can handle immersion in up to 1m of water
for up to 30 minutes. Its omission is puzzling, to say the least, on a
flagship-class handset -- especially as the OnePlus 9 Pro was IP68-rated across
the board.
The size and weight are in the expected area for a flagship
phone: 73.9mm wide by 163mm tall by 8.55mm thick and 200.5g (2.91in. x 6.42in.
x 0.34in. & 7.09oz). OnePlus doesn't pander to those who still prefer
a 3.5mm headset jack, the only slot being a USB-C port on the bottom edge,
where there is also a speaker grille and a dual 5G SIM slot. The volume rocker
is on the left, and on the right are the main power button and OnePlus's
signature Alert Slider, sporting a slightly textured finish that makes it easy
to locate by touch alone. This three-position slider lets you quickly jump
between ring, vibrate and silent modes. Thank goodness the closer relationship
with Oppo has seen its demise. Screen technology may have reached a sort
of plateau in terms of the key metrics, but OnePlus has found a couple of areas
where it has been able to improve on last year's 9 Pro model.
One of these is a faster change in refresh rate, which in turn
helps with battery life conservation. The other is related to screen
brightness, and there are a couple of aspects to this. OnePlus has introduced
Dual Color Calibration, where the display is calibrated at 500 nits and 100
nits. This matters because displays are usually calibrated at one brightness
level, and color accuracy is lost as you move away from that level. Here, color
fidelity should be maintained across a range of brightness settings.
In addition, the handset monitors changes to brightness settings
made manually, and accommodates user preferences in its automated brightness
changes. This makes a big difference to usability: I found I didn't need to
make manual brightness adjustments after just a couple of days of intensive use
of the phone. The stereo speakers deliver plenty of volume, and while there's
a little distortion at the top of the range it's acceptable. Bass tones are
fairly strong, treble a little light, but in general everything from spoken
word to orchestral music sounded fine.
The OnePlus 10 Pro is an attractive handset if you're looking
for flagship-class performance on a budget. The 6.7-inch AMOLED screen is
fabulous, and the speakers, while not outstanding, are perfectly acceptable.
The 80W fast charging is welcome (if you're outside the US), and OnePlus
reprises its popular Alert Slider. On the other hand the 30x camera zoom
is rather pointless, while the lack of an IP rating (except for the US T-Mobile
model) and the somewhat bland Android 12 overlay mean that OnePlus's top-end
2022 phone has lost a little of its shine. The OnePlus 10 Pro's main competitor
at this price point is Google's Pixel 6 Pro.
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