OnePlus 10 Pro Review

OnePlus 10 Pro |5G Android Smartphone |U.S. Unlocked |Triple Camera co-Developed with...

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The OnePlus 10 Pro is the company’s most complete phone yet, and it’s OnePlus all-grown. We used to consider OnePlus phones scrappy flagship challengers, as they had similar features to premium rivals from Samsung, Apple and Google, but at a much lower cost. Over time, the company has reversed that approach and is now creating flagship phones it previously sought to undercut, and that was clear with last year’s OnePlus 9 and OnePlus 9 Pro, which roped in true flagship specs and prices to match.

This year, OnePlus has sharpened its resolve and created a truly gorgeous flagship phone to challenge the dominance of the big brands, and the result is an impressive, sleek device. The 10 Pro is no longer a cheaper flagship alternative; instead, it’s a legitimate competitor to Samsung and Google, with fantastic features that give it an identity of its own.

From the improved cameras to the beautiful display and sleek design, the OnePlus 10 Pro certainly takes competition to the Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra’s doorstep, but still rings a much lower price. I’m hard pressed to say which phone is better since OnePlus hasn’t polished its productivity potential – nor has it matched Samsung’s new update policy.

In use, the OnePlus 10 Pro stacks up well against the Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra and for hundreds of dollars less. Starting at $899 (at the time of writing this review – latest prices in links), the 10 Pro costs much less than the $1,199 Samsung S22 Ultra. The OnePlus 10 Pro isn’t alone in this, however. The other device is the Google Pixel 6 Pro which matches the $899 price of the OnePlus 10 Pro but offers kick-ass cameras.

Overall, the OnePlus 10 pro is the best handset from OnePlus, and once again, we can say it’s ‘OnePlus all grown up”. It’s an impressive phone, and one of the best Android phones you can get for the price – perhaps our favorite feature is the display, as the phone comes with a 6.7-inch 2K screen that looks great and is fine-tuned for streaming TV shows, playing games or binging on your social media app of choice.

About the OnePlus 10 Pro

The OnePlus 10 Pro was launched in December 2021 in China, and then it was available globally in March 2022 – it was released within months of the Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra, Xiaomi 12 Pro, and Oppo Find X5 Pro. It undercuts all those handsets, in some cases by a big margin, despite packing specs that go toe-to-toe with them.

The closest competitor is certainly that Oppo flagship, which is the result of OnePlus’ merger with Oppo, which has resulted in two very similar phones. They have almost identical software, the same Hasselblad camera modes, and displays that look identical – however, the OnePlus 10 Pro is a bit cheaper.

So, if you’re thinking of upgrading to a top-end mobile, the 10 Pro is the most affordable option available, but it’s sad that no ‘standard’ OnePlus 10 is coming.

OnePlus 10 Pro Specs

Android version: 12, OxygenOS 12.1
Display: 6.7-inch AMOLED (3216 x 1440)
Refresh rate: 1-120Hz
CPU: Snapdragon 8 Gen 1
RAM: 8GB, 12GB
Storage / Expandable: 128GB, 256GB / No
Rear cameras: 48MP (f/1.8) main, 50MP (f/2.2) ultrawide, 8MP (f/2.4) 3.3x telephoto
Front camera: 32MP (f/2.2)
Video: Up to 8K 30 fps, 4K 120 fps, 1080p 240 fps
Battery: 5,000 mAh
Battery life (Hrs:Mins): 11:52 (120Hz), 12:39 (60Hz)
Size: 6.42 x 2.91 x 0.34 inches
Weight: 7 ounces
Colors: Volcanic Black, Emerald Forest

The OnePlus 10 pro has been on sale since April, though it was available much earlier in China, originally starting at $899 for a model with 8GB of RAM and 128GB of storage. With the launch of the OnePlus 10T, though, the OnePlus has dropped the price of its flagship device. You can now get the OnePlus 10 Pro for $799, a substantial drop from the original cost. There’s also a 12GB/256GB version available for $869 (all prices at the time of writing this review and are subject to change).

If you’re interested in saving even more, the OnePlus 10T is an excellent choice that starts at $649 and rocks a faster chipset than the OnePlus 10 Pro. However, you’ll sacrifice camera performance on the less expensive device.

OnePlus 10 Pro design

OnePlus has been improving the design of its phones over the years, but the OnePlus 10 Pro is one huge gorgeous design above even the OnePlus 9 Pro. Our review unit is the Volcanic Black which comes with a soft touch material on the back. One feature you’ll like about the new design is that it’s now resistant to fingerprints, something you wouldn’t say with the OnePlus 9 Pro that came before it.

Also, it gets a new camera module design, which obviously takes cues from the Samsung S22. The entire array blends into the frame easily, just like the Galaxy S22’s contour cut. Made with ceramic, the OnePlus 10 Pro’s camera module looks durable and sleek, better than it does on most phones released this year.

One feature that OnePlus has maintained in all its phones since the OnePlus 2 is the alert slider, it is still available on the 10 Pro, too. Apple has something similar to this hardware switch on the iPhones, but we haven’t seen any other Android phone with a slider. It’s a very useful feature on the OnePlus 10 Pro to vibrate or silence it instantly. I love that setting, and I love that OnePlus has kept it alive – it simply shows that the company’s old design language persists. Not a bad thing, especially if that feature is incredibly useful as the slider.

As with other OnePlus phones, especially those released after the OnePlus 6, the OnePlus 10 Pro feels luxurious to hold. At just 7 ounces, it’s surprisingly light to hold on one hand, and at just 3 inches wide, you never have to stretch your thumb too far to reach parts of the screen.

You’ll notice the OnePlus 10 Pro is narrower and lighter than the Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra. Simply put, OnePlus innovatively made a comfortable phone to hold, though it’s still big. The 10 Pro’s in-display optical fingerprint sensor is fast and responsive, in fact, much fast than the Pixel’s slow fingerprint scanner. All around, it’s an enjoyable phone to carry around and use.

OnePlus 10 Pro display

With a 6.7-inch screen, the OnePlus 10 Pro is without a doubt, a big phone. It features a 1440p LTPO OLED panel that has a gentle curve on the long edges. Its 20:9 aspect ratio is a smidge taller than the displays on both the Samsung S22 Ultra and Pixel 6 Pro, but it does match their top refresh rate of 120Hz. Stacked side by side, you can tell that the display on the OnePlus 10 Pro doesn’t get quite as bright as the Galaxy S22 Ultra display when both are exposed to direct sunlight, but it’s bright enough and comfortable during use, even outdoors.

The 10 Pro sports an aluminum frame along with Gorilla Glass Victus on the front and Gorilla Glass 5 on the rear panel. OnePlus certainly takes cues from Samsung and blended the metallic camera bump housing into the side rails of the phone, and it looks great. They may be taking notes from someone else’s work, but at least it’s one of the smart guys in the class.

The second-generation LTPO technology on the 10 Pro allows the display to intelligently scale its refresh between 1Hz and 120Hz depending on the content being viewed on the screen. You can also choose FHD+ and QHD+ for the resolution, the former lets you save on battery life.

Watching videos and playing games on the OnePlus 10 pro display is exciting, and that is thanks to the display’s 3216 x 1440, or 2K resolution with a high max brightness of 1,300 nits. OnePlus has introduced an algorithm that learns how bright you like the phone in different environments, whether you change the brightness manually at all, and adjusts how bright the display is as a result.

Overall, the OnePlus 10 Pro has a gorgeous display. If only the Galaxy S22 didn’t exist, I’d say this phone has the best display we’ve seen so far on an Android phone. But we’re reviewing the OnePlus 10 Pro in a world where the Samsung S22 Ultra firmly exists, and it has set the bar high this year. Its display is incredibly beautiful and super vivid.

OnePlus 10 Pro cameras

The OnePlus 10 Pro has three rear cameras, and the fourth cutout on the camera bump belongs to the flash; at least it doesn’t have a boring monochrome sensor or something like that. There haven’t been any major updates to the rear camera hardware (but the software gets some improvements) over the OnePlus 9 Pro, but the selfie camera has been upgraded with double the resolution.

Main: 48-megapixels f/1.8 with OIS
Ultrawide: 50-megapixel f/2.2
Telephoto: 8-megapixel f/2.4 with OIS
Front: 32-megapixel, fixed focus

Having said that, the OnePlus 10 pro is a great shooter, but if cameras are the only reason you’re buying a smartphone, we can’t recommend this over its same-price rivals. Using the 48MP f/1.8 main, 50MP f/2.2 ultrawide and 8MP f/2.4 telephoto (for 3.3x optical zoom) camera trio is generally pleasing, but the performance has a few gripes that hold the photography experience from being perfect, or simply, better than what the Samsung S22 Ultra offers in the camera department.

On the 10 Pro, sticking with the main camera is exciting and you can have a great time. Photos are vivid, bright, and colorful, with natural-looking depth for close-up shots and a good amount of detail for wider snaps.

The ultrawide camera is perhaps the most impressive feature yet. It has a 150-degree field-of-view, which is pretty wide for a lens, so the OnePlus 10 Pro offers a ‘fish-eye’ style mode. Some people will find this mode to be fun, but you’ll have to try it out to know if you’ll be using it again or not.

Still, you can take standard ultrawide pictures, but we just don’t think you’ll need all that kind of high-res ultrawide pictures. The pictures are good and are surprisingly free of distortion despite the lens being used, but you’ll notice some oversharpening in some images.

Then, there’s the zoom camera – 3.3x is a decent range for a telephoto lens like this, but we’ve seen some flagships with periscope lenses that offer 5x to 10x zoom. Plus, 8MP isn’t exactly breathtaking when it comes to phone sensors. Pictures at this zoom level look good, but going to the upper limits of 30x the shots begin to get grainy.

Once again, it’s a great idea to stick with the standard photo mode when using the 32MP f/2.2 camera or manually turn down the blurriness on Portrait shots. Video recording goes up to 8K, but when using the phone’s AI features like stabilization or AI coloring, you’ll have to drop down to 1080p, which makes them a bit redundant to mobile filmmakers who need to shoot in 4K.

OnePlus partnered with Hasselblad back in 2021, and it’s the second year we’re seeing OnePlus flagships with the camera brand’s name splashed all over the body of the phone, and of course, the marketing material. That partnership brings a few modes – there’s a revised Pro mode, which adds a few tweaks to the formula that makes it better than the Pro mode on any other camera phone out there, and also XPAN mode, which takes letterboxed shots with a wide field of view (just like Hasselblad’s niche XPAN camera).

We’ve mentioned a few issues here, and that’s because it’s our job to point out the flaws, but we’re glad none of the problems are deal-breakers. They’re just evidence that the OnePlus 10 pro camera experience isn’t quite on par with its rivals, especially the sharp-shooting Galaxy S22 Ultra.

Performance and Software

The OnePlus 10 Pro packs the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset, which is the most powerful processor available to Android as of its release. It’s paired with a choice of either 8GB RAM/128GB and another variant with 12GB RAM/256GB storage to be available at a later date. These specs offer plenty of processing power for day-to-day tasks.

Like all other 2022 flagship phones, the 10 pro offers 5G connectivity. It’s a sub-6GHz 5G, not super-fast millimeter wave (mmWave), which isn’t a problem for most people. There’s full low- and mid-band 5G support on T-Mobile and Verizon, but the 10 Pro doesn’t work on AT&T’s 5G network, and looks like there’s no plan to add support for it at a later date. The Samsung S22 Plus and Pixel 6 Pro both offer full 5G support on all major carriers without limitations, so that’s a significant miss on the 10 Pro, especially if you’re hoping to use it on AT&T.

The OnePlus 10 pro runs Android 12, with the company’s Oxygen OS 12 splashed all over the top. Since OnePlus merged with its sister company and the companies promised to share a unified codebase, we felt like OnePlus’ OxygenOS software was starting to act too much like Oppo’s ColorOS. The merger was meant to allow them to put out software updates much faster since OnePlus was a bit on the slower side.

While the old OxygenOS is long gone, the software on the OnePlus 10 Pro certainly works in the phone’s favor. The interface is clean, albeit with a striking resemblance to Samsung’s ONE UI. There are traces of Google’s vision for Android spread throughout the system, but the overall feel leans heavily towards ColorOS. That’s not a bad thing at all.

For audio, it gets dual stereo speakers that produce great sound to fill a midsize room. However, it doesn’t have a 3.5mm port for connecting your wired headphones. That means you’ll have to do with a pair of wireless headsets – like the Sony WH-1000XM4 – if you need to enjoy some music or a movie on the go.

Battery life and Charging

The OnePlus 10 Pro’s battery life is a bit of a mixed bag – it doesn’t disappoint, but it doesn’t impress either. This could be the benchmark for almost all premium phones in the same price range.

The phone can last about a day on a full charge, but you can’t rely on it to last much longer than that – no way are you getting a 2-day battery here by any means. Still, it handily beats the Galaxy S22 Ultra, despite both having the same 5,000 mAh battery capacity and Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset.

Sure, the 10 Pro gets a big 5,000mAh battery, but bracing that large, bright screen, the 120Hz refresh rate, an always-on display, a powerful processor, and constant 5G connectivity is no mean feat. When you factor all that in, a whole day of use is absolutely fine.

At least charging is fast, but again, it depends on where you live. Most regions of the world are getting the OnePlus 10 pro with 80W charging, which gets you from empty to full in about half an hour – nice and fast. There’s a charger included in the box.

However, in the US, the phone’s charging only goes up to 65W, partly due to the different power provided by mains and the differences in OnePlus’ charging tech. That may sound like a downgrade, but remember rival phones from Samsung and Apple power even slower in the US.

Wireless powering is the same in all regions though, at 50W, which is quite fast. There’s also reverse power-sharing, meaning you can use the OnePlus 10 Pro as a powering pad to charge up other devices.

OnePlus 10 Pro Review | Verdict

There are lots of things to like about the OnePlus 10 Pro, starting with fantastic day-to-day user experience. It looks and feels nice. Its software is great. It isn’t loaded with lots of apps you won’t need. It’s pleasant to use, and that’s how a phone should be. OnePlus has taken a different approach in the evolution of its flagship offerings, and the results are impressive. This feels like a device that knows what it is and who it’s for, much better than the 9 and 9 Pro.

However, it’s not easy to recommend this phone when the Pixel 6 Pro is right there, at the same price with full 5G on every carrier and a much better camera. Then, there’s the Samsung Galaxy S22 that, while a little expensive, packs a much better camera system, wider 5G support, and will get an additional year of OS upgrades so that extra $100 might be money well spent in the long run.

Should you buy the OnePlus 10 Pro?

As a whole, the OnePlus 10 Pro receives an easy recommendation as one of the best Android flagship phones you can buy in 2022. While the competition packs better cameras and offers broader 5G support, the 10 Pro does just about everything right – cameras, battery life, display, name them all. For 2022, OnePlus did a fantastic job, even better than 2021. And for that, the OnePlus 10 Pro is my new favorite Android phone.

The Review

OnePlus 10 Pro

4.3 Score

The OnePlus 10 Pro is a gorgeous flagship phone that does everything right – a bright screen, fast charging, and powerful hardware, but cost less than other Pro phones from Samsung, Google, and Apple.

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