Last month, OnePlus officially announced the OnePlus 2, the company’s second smartphone and successor to last year’s highly-sought after OnePlus One. It sports a 5.5-inch Full HD display, Snapdragon 810 octa-core CPU, Dual-LTE capabilities, and Oxygen OS based on Android 5.1.1 Lollipop. OnePlus confidently calls it the 2016 Flagship Killer. We put that claim to the test in our review.
Design and Construction
The OnePlus 2’s design is something we would consider as a mix of discreet and sophisticated. Discreet because it’s not as flamboyant as other smartphones like the Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge+, OPPO N3, Apple iPhone 6 or the LG G4, which I will explain in a bit.
Up front is the 5.5-inch display with a huge slab of Gorilla Glass 4 for protection. Right above it are the earpiece, 5 megapixel camera, light sensor, and notification light. Found below is the fingerprint sensor which also doubles as the capacitive home button, flanked by two other illuminated capacitive buttons for Recent apps and Back.
If you noticed, the OnePlus 2 doesn’t have any logos printed on its face. The navigation buttons only appear when in use and disappear when not. When the screen is off, it just looks like big slab of black glass. Like what was said earlier, it’s discreet, stealthy, and doesn’t beg for attention.
Now for the sophisticated part. The OnePlus 2 sports a dark grey metal chassis which, according to its maker, is crafted from an alloy of aluminum and magnesium with some stainless steel accents. It has a matte finish and accented with very thin bevels like the ones found on the iPhone 5 but much thinner.
Situated on the right side of the frame are the metallic buttons for the volume and power / lock. One the left is the dedicated alert slider for quick switching between three notification profiles.
Right up top are the headset jack and microphone, while down at the bottom is the USB Type-C port, flanked by two sets of holes for the loud speaker and microphone.
Turn the OnePlus 2 on its back and you will see the removable backplate, the 13 megapixel camera, dual-LED flash, Laser AF, and the OnePlus logo. Situated underneath the backplate is the dual-nano SIM card slot.
Speaking of the backplate, our review unit comes with a Sandstone Black StyleSwap cover which has a texture similar to a nail file but not as abrasive. If that’s not your think you may replace it with Bamboo, Black Apricot, Rosewood, Kevlar.
At 9.9mm thick and 175g in weight, the OnePlus 2 is 1mm thicker and 13g heavier than its predecessor. It’s a bit chunky and hefty but feels solid in the hands. To sum it up, the OnePlus 2 is one of the most well-crafted smartphones we’ve reviewed.
Display and Multimedia
The OnePlus 2 is equipped with a 5.5-inch In-Cell IPS display with Full HD resolution or 401ppi, and a contrast ratio of 1500:1. The result is great screen quality that is bright with very good viewing angles. The colors, although not as punchy compared to Super AMOLED, are rich and accurate.
Sound-wise, the OnePlus 2’s loudspeaker didn’t perform as we expected it to be. The mids and trebles are crisp and clear but the bass is weak. Loudness is also very underwhelming.
To compensate, OnePlus included an Audio Tuner powered by Waves MaxxAudio which enhances the overall sound quality and lets you select and adjust audio presets. Audio was greatly improved when using the Audio Tuner as the bass and loudness are now at an acceptable level. We still suggest using a good pair of headphones or external speaker to better appreciate this feature.
OS, UI, and Apps
Running the software department for the OnePlus 2 is Oxygen OS version 2.0 which is based on Android 5.1.1 Lollipop. Everything is pretty much vanilla but with some added features:
* The Shelf: an extra homescreen panel situated at the left which curates frequent contacts and apps used.
* Ability to switch between on-screen and physical navigation buttons
* Gesture support: Double tap to wake, draw to open camera, flashlight, and control music playback
* Save up to five fingerprints
* Switch between light and dark mode and change color accents
* Change notification LED color
* App Permissions
* Waves MaxxAudio
Although the UI is almost stock, the unit we received for review came with a lot of preinstalled Chinese bloatwares that you cannot remove: the old stock Android browser (instead of Chrome), UC browser, Baidu browser, DU Battery Saver, DU Speed Booster, Magic Photo, DC Share, and WeQR. Overall, it just looks messy.
To solve this problem, we downloaded a stock ROM on version 2.0.1 and flashed it on the OnePlus 2. Now it’s all squeaky clean as we got rid of all those bloat, we have proper Google apps by default, and we’re enjoying the benefits of the updated firmware.
Our unit is the 64GB variant which is good in today’s standards. However, the system apps take a huge chunk at 10GB, leaving us with 54GB of usable storage. There’s no microSD card slot but there’s support for USB OTG.
Camera
The OnePlus 2 boasts a 13 megapixel camera with 1.3µm pixels, f/2.0 aperture, six-element lens, dual-LED flash and OIS. It also boasts a Laser AF which promises faster auto-focus times. True enough, the camera was able to lock on a subject at no more than 1 second in our estimate. To test the difference in performance, we covered the Laser AF and had it focus on the same subject. We noticed that it took longer at around 2 seconds. When it comes to low-light conditions, the OnePlus 2 suffers a lot in quality and is sluggish most of the time.
The camera uses Android’s stock camera app with some added features:
* Clear image – the camera takes multiple photos then stitches them together to produce a single super high-resolution image.
* HDR, Beauty, Panorama, Built-in timer, Time-lapse
* 4K, 1080p, 720p video recording
* Slow motion – 720p at 120fps
The 5 megapixel front camera on the other hand will suffice for selfies and video calls. It doesn’t offer a lot of extras aside from the Beauty feature and wide-angle view.
Image quality is good although sometimes colors appear less saturated when shooting outdoors – blues and greens are not as punchy as we want them to be. Shooting speed is also relatively slow as it takes about about 1 second in between shots and there’s no burst mode. We also noticed that the top part gets warm when shooting stills and videos reaching up to 42.2C from the usual 33-35C.
Take a look at the samples below:
4K video recording sample:
Slow-motion video recording sample:
To sum this part, the OnePlus 2 is equipped with a good camera with fast AF and a few notable features, however, it doesn’t offer anything that will blow the competition away when it comes to quality. Not to mention the heating issue.
Performance and Benchmarks
Powering the OnePlus 2 is a 64-bit Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 octa-core processor clocked at 1.8GHz, 4GB RAM (64GB model), and Adreno 430 GPU. As expected of a smartphone with this kind of configuration, it was able to handle almost everything we throw at it including graphic intensive games. Oxygen OS 2.0.1 also feels stable as all the features work well and so far we haven’t noticed any bugs worth mentioning.
The main concern now is how OnePlus 2 manages the temperature during heavy tasks. We played Mortal Kombat X for an hour and the temperature topped at a toasty 43.5C which is uncomfortable on the hands.
As for benchmarks, the OnePlus 2 produced some of the highest scores we’ve seen in a smartphone.
* AnTuTu – 52,686
* Quadrant Standard – 31,198
* Vellamo – 3,059 (Chrome), 2,401 (Multicore), 2,335 (Metal)
* 3DMark Sling Shot ES 3.1 – 914
Connectivity and Call Quality
Aside from the usual WiFi, Bluetooth, and GPS connectivity, the OnePlus 2 gets an upgrade with support for dual-nano SIM. Call quality and LTE connectivity is good as long as you’re in an area with healthy coverage. The only downgrade we see in this department is the removal of NFC which its predecessor has.
Battery Life
OnePlus equipped the OnePlus 2 with a beefier non-removable 3,300mAh battery compared to the 3,100mAh found on the One. With normal use consisting of constant WiFi connectivity, heavy social media browsing, light calls and texts, and an hour of gaming, we were able to get a good 14 to 15 hours of battery life. We ran PCMark’s battery test and the result is 9 hours and 45 minutes which is also good.
Conclusion
The OnePlus 2 is a beast of a smartphone that features a good build and design and powerful hardware. The Snapdragon 810 CPU, 4GB RAM, beefier battery, dual-SIM connectivity, Fingerprint scanner, USB Type-C, and Laser-guided autofocus, are great improvements from the OnePlus One. It’s a solid flagship device but I doubt it will dominate 2016 flagships. There’s the uncomfortable warming when using the camera and playing games, and Oxygen OS could still use more features and stability.
One of the reasons why the OnePlus smartphones are so popular is because the company is offering high-end devices at a not so expensive price. At $389 (~Php18,200) for the top-of-the-line model it’s a bargain, but that is if you live in countries where OnePlus officially ships. For us here in the Philippines, we have to rely on imported units with no warranty and bumped up prices. Despite the disadvantages it’s still one of the best phones to have, that is if you get your hands on one.
OnePlus 2 specs:
5.5-inch In-Cell full HD Display @ 1920×1080 pixels, 401ppi
1.8GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 v2.1 64-bit octa-core processor
4GB LPDDR4 RAM
64GB internal storage
13MP rear camera w/ OIS, 1.3 micron pixels, Laser AF, dual-tone flash
Slow-mo video at 120fps, 4K video recording
5MP front camera
Dual-SIM, Dual-LTE (nano-SIM)
4G LTE, 3G HSPA+
WiFi 802.11 a/c
Bluetooth 4.1
GPS, A-GPS
FM Radio
Fingerprint sensor (up to 5 unique fingerprints)
USB Type-C
Alert Slider (hardware switch for notifications settings)
3,300mAh Li-Po non-removable battery
OxygenOS 2.0.1 (Android 5.1.1 Lollipop)
151.8 x 74.9 x 9.85mm (dimensions)
175 grams (weight)
What we liked about it:
* Good design and build
* Great display
* Great performance
* Good battery life
* Fast autofocus
* USB Type-C
* Cheaper compared to other flagship smartphones
What we didn’t like:
* Gets really warm when using the camera and playing games
* Not officially available in the Philippines
* Review unit’s ROM came with lots of bloatware (had to flash a stock ROM)
* Camera app is slow with few features, poor low-light performance
The OnePlus 2 was provided by Widget City and is selling for Php20,990. See listing here.
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