After weeks of teasing, OnePlus finally unveiled its first mid-range smartphone in years. The OnePlus Nord 5G was announced alongside the company’s first-ever truly wireless earphones, the OnePlus Buds. The OnePlus Nord goes up against mid-range phones like the Galaxy A51 and the Galaxy A71 and affordable flagships like the Realme X2 Pro.
The OnePlus Nord 5G brings a lot of features that we’ve seen on flagship smartphones from the company, including a high-refresh rate screen, quad-camera setup, a premium design, and fast charging. Let us have a look at the OnePlus Nord’s features, pricing, and specifications.
OnePlus Nord 5G Specs
The OnePlus Nord sports a 6.44-inch OLED screen with Full HD+ resolution, a 90Hz refresh rate, and HDR10/HDR10+/HLG content playback. The display has a pill-shaped cutout in the top-left corner for the dual-selfie camera setup. The screen is protected using the Gorilla Glass 5. The phone also has an in-display optical fingerprint reader.
The smartphone runs the Android 10 operating system with OxygenOS. The OnePlus Nord is equipped with the Snapdragon 765G processor, 6GB/8GB/12GB RAM, and 64GB/128GB/256GB UFS 2.1 internal storage. The device has a 32MP+8MP dual-selfie camera with up to 4K 60fps video recording. At the rear, the phone has a 48MP wide-angle camera with OIS, an 8MP ultrawide-angle camera, a 2MP macro camera, and a 5MP depth sensor. Unfortunately, the rear-facing camera tops out at 4K 30fps.
Int terms of connectivity, the OnePlus Nord features a dual-SIM card slot, 5G, LTE, GPS, Wi-Fi ac, Bluetooth 5.0, NFC, and a USB Type-C port. The smartphone lacks a headphone jack, though. It also lacks stereo speakers, something that is appearing in some mid-range smartphones. The device is powered by a 4,115mAh battery with 30W fast charging.
OnePlus Nord Price
The OnePlus Nord has a starting price of INR 24,999 and goes as high as INR 29,990. Here’s the pricing of every variant of the OnePlus Nord.
- OnePlus Nord (6GB RAM + 64GB storage): INR 24,999
- OnePlus Nord (8GB RAM + 128GB storage): INR 27,999
- OnePlus Nord (12GB RAM + 256GB storage): INR 29,999
The variant with 6GB RAM and 64GB storage will only be available in India through Amazon, and it will go on sale in September 2020.
OnePlus Buds Features, Price
The OnePlus Buds is the company’s first truly wireless earbuds, and it features Bluetooth 5.0 with SBC and AAC audio codecs. They use 13.5mm drivers, and feature Dolby Atmos and Dirac Audio tuning. The earbuds have capacitive touch sensors, and double-taps gestures can be customized.
The company claims that the earbuds last up to 7 hours on a single charge and the case extends them up to 30 hours. The case has a USB Type-C port and a 10-minute charge offers up to 10 hours battery life. They are available in three colors: Grey, Nord Blue, and White.
The OnePlus Buds are priced at INR 4,990 in India, $79 in the US, and €89 in Europe.
Our Take
The OnePlus Nord is a solid smartphone if someone wants a OnePlus device. However, there are a few good alternatives in the form of the Realme X2 Pro, Realme X3, and the Galaxy A71. The phone could’ve had 4K 60fps video recording in the rear-facing camera setup, stereo speakers, and a headphone jack.
The OnePlus Buds, too, could’ve been much better. At a similar price, rival firms are offering in-ear-canal design for better noise isolation and aptX codec for higher resolution audio. Some rival earphones are even offering wireless charging, something that’s missing from the OnePlus Buds.
