Update Mobile Best Company Review – OnePlus 9 Pro has the best camera ever to come out of the phone. But overall, is the phone still worth buying today?
Every year OnePlus introduces a new device that aims to get the best of the original devices. In 2021, that device was the OnePlus 9 Pro – one of the first phones from the company to sit in the big leagues of Samsung and Apple. In our OnePlus 9 Pro review, we were hoping to call it the company’s best phone in years.
Update Mobile Best Company Review
However, it all happened six months ago. Since then, we’ve seen a lot of new phones launched, while we’ve also heard about big changes coming for OnePlus in general. How does the OnePlus 9 Pro fare now that it’s out? Let’s see in this OnePlus 9 Pro review.
The Best Cheaper Smartphones: Fewer Features, But Not By Much
We gave the OnePlus 9 Pro four and a half stars and gave it our Editors’ Choice award, meaning it’s one of the best phones on the market. As you can guess, that kind of generation ages well, so there’s still a lot to like about the phone six months later.
When you first take the OnePlus 9 Pro out of the box, there’s no mistaking its original quality. It looks and sounds like a $1,000 phone (good, because it is). The edges are smooth and comfortable, the weight is evenly distributed, and the glossy back has enough texture to keep you from thinking it’s going to slip out of your hand.
What surprised me even more was how big the phone didn’t feel. The Galaxy Note 20 Ultra feels like a giant, and the Galaxy S21 Ultra feels pretty big too, although it and the 9 Pro are roughly the same size. Still, the 9 Pro feels right. Granted, this isn’t a compact phone, but to me it felt like you nailed the formula.
However, the real wonder of the phone is its display. In our original review, we talked about it. However, even today, I haven’t seen many phones above. And I say all this without mentioning the 1,440p resolution combined with the silky smooth 120Hz refresh rate. When you add them to the equation, this becomes one of the best smartphone screens I’ve ever used.
Oneplus 7t Review: Best Oneplus Phone For Most People
My only gripe with the phone’s overall design is the curved edges of the screen. OnePlus made these things steep, which made it difficult to make the “back” gesture. There were many times while using this phone where I swiped back, only to have to repeat the gesture because my finger didn’t go the full length of the curve. Hopefully, manufacturers will soon figure out how to make curved nails – or stop the trend altogether.
In our original OnePlus 9 Pro review, we said the camera system “surpasses its predecessors.” In fact, this is the best camera system on any OnePlus phone to date.
Six months later, that is still true. The camera can easily stand up to the big players like Samsung and Apple (see the link above to see how competitive it will be). It has the requisite flagship trifecta of solid wide-angle, wide-angle and telephoto lenses. It even throws in a monochrome sensor for fun.
While I was on the phone, I took a trip to New York City. Here are the pictures I took there. The images below are unedited but compressed for speed. For uncompressed images, check out this Drive link.
Oppo Find X6 Pro Review: The Best Phone You Won’t Care…
The first thing you’ll probably notice about the pictures is the muted colors. This is because OnePlus (and partner Hasselblad) have tried to make the color reproduction of the camera as realistic as possible. Although this is good for accuracy, many smartphone users prefer strong, saturated colors. Ultimately this makes sense, but the important thing to note here is that things haven’t changed in the last six months. Software updates have come in, but the camera still produces the same true colors.
However, OnePlus has introduced a new camera feature since the phone’s launch: XPan mode. You can read all about it (and see some of my model photos) in our article here.
Finally, the OnePlus 9 Pro camera is an exceptional camera. It doesn’t disappoint. The only problem OnePlus faces here is the fact that it took eight generations of its original phones to get to this point. Can it win over people who have already written off the brand as a subpar camera maker? Time will tell.
In 2020, Apple started a new line of phones that come without a charger in the box. Samsung quickly followed suit (after teasing Apple for it, of course). However, OnePlus still provides a charger with all its phones. In the case of the OnePlus 9 Pro, it’s not just any charger: it’s a 65W monster.
Best Huawei Phones 2023: Best For Camera, Design And Apps
OnePlus claims the phone can charge from 0% to 75% in 20 minutes and from 0% to 100% in 29 minutes. Our objective testing supports this claim, and my experience so it agrees with it. With the 65W charger, I could plug the phone in empty, jump in the shower and get the phone back to about 50%. Of course, it probably won’t help me all day (see the bottom of this article for more), but it will come in handy the next time I get the chance. For people who travel a lot or do a lot of work from coffee shops, this can be very expensive.
Plus, the built-in charger can handle anything you throw at it. It can charge your tablets, other phones, headphones and yes, even most laptops. This brings us closer to a true single cable solution.
Interestingly, the OnePlus 9 Pro is only the third OnePlus phone to feature wireless charging. This increases the convenience of turning on the device as it will work with all your Qi-compatible charging devices. If you want to have a great addition, you can grab the 50W wireless charging pad from OnePlus and get the fastest wireless charging speed. I didn’t mind though – basic wireless and fast internet racing worked fine for me.
Inside the OnePlus 9 Pro is the Snapdragon 888, Qualcomm’s Android mobile processor of the year. It’s no surprise that the 9 Pro is fast, smooth and completely reliable for memory management based on our sample processor with 12GB of RAM.
Vivo V19: Good Cameras, Appealing Design & Long Battery Life
For this OnePlus 9 Pro review, I’m setting aside my daily driver, the Galaxy S21. That phone has the same chipset inside, but the 9 Pro surpassed it in my personal opinion. Applications seemed to start up quickly, transitions were easy, and heat wasn’t an issue. This comes in hardware and software upgrades and shows that packing Snapdragon 888 in a phone isn’t all it takes to make a great flagship.
But what about the throttle argument? For those of you who don’t know, OnePlus found itself in hot water when it emerged that Oxygen OS was deliberately damaging the performance of the Snapdragon 888. Basically, you don’t get the full power of the SD888 when you do things, that it doesn’t require as much energy as scrolling through Twitter or typing a message. It does this to save battery.
In my experience using the phone, this has not become a problem for me. Everything worked as I expected, and there was no way for me to tell which devices were using the full power of the chip and which were not. It is true that OnePlus should not have tried to cover up this controversy. It was really a bad move. But if you’re worried about it, I don’t think it’s a big deal. Also, the company has promised to provide a toggle to turn off the “feature” in an upcoming Oxygen OS update, so stay tuned for that.
There’s still a lot to like about the OnePlus 9 Pro. However, no phone is perfect, and in fact there are a few things about the device that haven’t improved over the years. But are they winners?
Review: Oneplus 5 Is The Best Smartphone You Can Buy, Bar None
In the previous section, I talked about how good the charging features of the OnePlus 9 Pro are. Unfortunately, fast charging is necessary as the battery life on the OnePlus 9 Pro is still not good.
Let me be clear: the battery life on this phone is good. It got me through the day without a problem, even on a day in New York City where I used it to navigate, stream music and make seemingly non-stop NFC payments. But even on days of light use, there was no way I could get through another day. This is a 1 day line, maybe 1.5 days no matter how you slice it.
Battery life on the OnePlus 9 Pro is no better than it was six months ago.
Unfortunately,
