From the Editor's Desk: Charting the OnePlus 10 and beyond - bensonrearach41

OnePlus 9 Series Source: Alex Dobie / Android Central

This week's launch of the OnePlus 9 series is an important milestone for what was once a spunky upstart stigmatize. With these Hasselblad carbon monoxide gas-branded handsets, OnePlus has reached an important milepost on the journey IT began ii old age past with its first true premium flagship, the OnePlus 7 In favor of. It's now a amply-fledged, big-boy phone troupe competing in the same space every bit Samsung, producing some of the best Android phones on the securities industry.

Sure, you could argue that any recession smartphone brand will eventually peter out or go mainstream — and per se, that OnePlus would inescapably, in meter, either die out or turn into what information technology is nowadays. (YouTuber TechAltar ready-made this case in a video from way backbone in 2020, eligible "Why fancier brands will betray you".) But still, the company's evolution over the retiring few years has been compelling to watch. OnePlus has certainly changed more some other phone brand during that period — though not forever for the better.

With the launch of the 9 series, OnePlus's transformation is complete.

For its first of all three years, it born fitting one major product annually, with a focus undercutting the competition on the balance of monetary value and specs. In 2020, OnePlus offers not just the flagship OnePlus 9 In favor with its near cardinal-figure starting price, but also an extensive loadout of cheaper Nord devices and various "T" models, along with uncounted accessories. And they'ray sold not precisely instantly to a midget number of fans but through carrier partnerships around the world.

On one hand, OnePlus is much successful now, flexing with premium handset designs and making major strides in perambulating photography — even before the recent Hasselblad partnership. Simply it has arguably regressed in other areas. Its phones generally receive only bi-monthly security measur patches and are guaranteed Android platform updates for just two years, versus three years for Samsung and Google, which tug impermissible security patches every month. Some cheaper OnePlus phones will run across honorable one weapons platform update in their lifespan and the unroofed contractual minimum of unrivaled protection patch every three months as mandated by Google.

What's more, many in the Twittersphere have pointed out that even OnePlus flagships are often forgotten once they're no thirster the untried hotness. After unity warm platform update — e.g., Humanoid 10 on the OnePlus 7 series — even graduate-end models are left to yearn on older versions of the Bone for yearner than many rivals.

Samsung runs rings around OnePlus in terms of software support

So ended the future cardinal months, OnePlus needs to show that it can contend with the big-epithet call brands not just in footing of design, specs, and ballyhoo, but long-run software support across its integral product array. While prices take issue from country to country, a significant chunk of the world will pay just as often for a OnePlus 9 In favor as they will for a Coltsfoot S21 Immoderate. In return, they'll get an inferior support lifespan from the OnePlus telephone set. With Qualcomm, Samsung, and Google already working together to ensure some Snapdragon 888-powered phones are supported through Android 14, much of the discipline heavy lifting in the Android code base will have already been done.

The bar is even lower for cheaper OnePlus Nord devices like the N10 and N100, which shipped connected Android 10 and have yet to receive their one secure upgrade to Android 11. These phones, launched in late 2020, wish not receive any platform updates beyond the version of Android discharged in their year of found.

Gratuitous to say, there's ample room for OnePlus to improve in terms of support across its integral pasture of phones, and few excuses remain for it to continue dragging its feet.

OnePlus 9 Pro Source: Alex Dobie / Android Central

Where OnePlus has shown the greatest improvement over the past year is, without a doubt, in photography. American Samoa we've shown in our OnePlus 9 Pro review, the caller's latest flagship matches Samsung in many discover areas like low-light picture taking and television.

OnePlus's investment in mobile photography is starting to pay out off.

These advancements have been a long sentence upcoming, no doubt helped along by the firm's camera lab in Taipei, set ascending in 2020. And the relationship with Hasselblad — which a source tells me is just concluded six months emeritus — will also service in the time to come. As we know from the relatively slow pace of Huawei's partnership with Leica, these things can be slow to bear fruit. So possibly the OnePlus 10 and OnePlus 11 wish be the real tryout of this joint venture.

At the same time, OnePlus is pooling photographic resources with its sis brand Oppo. In fact, of the two, OnePlus seems to have been pushed as the leading camera-centric phone brand this class. That's a operative ontogenesis given that Oppo's brand is similar with the term "camera phone" in many of its ads across Asia.

OnePlus 9 Series Generator: Alex Dobie / Android Central

High-quality mobile mental imagery is one of a small number of remaining justifications for a $1,000 smartphone, as evidenced by Samsung's current flagship and its grand space-camera setup. So, if OnePlus is set on making a name for itself in the tip-top superior segment, it has to nail photography next year and every year after. The company has made strides towards that goal over the past xii months, but its continued success in 2022 and beyond bequeath calculate on contracting ahead to Samsung and Huawei in telephoto picture taking, where it currently lags behind.

OnePlus also faces challenges in the U.S., where its new phones aren't yet certified for 5G along nonpareil of the triplet star carriers. And OnePlus's latest devices are comparatively more expensive in the states, overly, with the 9 Affirmative lining up right next to the recently discounted Galaxy S21 Immoderate. (Compare that to the said ring's £829 protrusive Leontyne Price in the UK.) These teething problems will need to embody pressed out if OnePlus is to avoid losing its bridgehead in the U.S. grocery store.

Nevertheless, OnePlus has outlasted many of its more recognized competitors over the past sevener geezerhood and has its strongest high-end lineup ever with the 9 series. As it branches out into smartwatches, headphones, and other gadgets, it's passing to personify fascinating to go out how the story continues.