Is this the perfect premium flagship from OnePlus?
OnePlus flagship smartphones are one of the most popular as they can compete with smartphones from the likes of Samsung, Apple, etc., and come with some very good specifications especially the software experience continues to remain the best with the OxygenOS as it provides a bloatware-free experience. But things did change on the software side when the OxygenOS was merged with ColorOS last year.
However, this year OnePlus is doing some things differently compared to last year as it has launched the OnePlus 10 Pro first in China which runs on ColorOS, and later had a global launch in all regions of the world. The OnePlus 10 and the OnePlus 10R are kept for launch in the future and have not been launched alongside the OnePlus 10 Pro.
Last year, the OnePlus 9 series had a good start with the OnePlus 9 Pro (Review) being at the top end. The OnePlus 9 Pro is a very capable flagship smartphone out there in the market now as it packs some of the best specifications like a 120Hz AMOLED display, a great triple camera setup, and a powerful Snapdragon 888 chipset, good battery life with support for both wireless and wired charging.
However, the telephoto camera was just average and the smartphone suffered from overheating. With the launch of the OnePlus 10 Pro, the OnePlus has improved certain things a notch up but some minor things do feel like a downgrade also. So has the OnePlus 10 Pro enough potential to give other smartphones a run for its money considering its bloatware-free software experience and powerful specifications?
Let’s find out in the full review.
OnePlus 10 Pro Design:
In terms of design, the OnePlus 10 Pro sports a newer design that looks attractive and is eye-catching. Instead of the rectangular camera module which was found on previous OnePlus smartphones, here you are getting a squared camera module that houses the triple cameras and this camera module seems to have been inspired by Samsung.
The camera module merges from the back panel to the frame which is almost like the center cut on the Galaxy S22 (Review). This camera module has a ceramic coating and just like the OnePlus 9 Pro, these cameras are also tuned by Hasselblad. The camera module is not protruded but the main and the telephoto cameras are slightly raised compared to the LED flashlight and the ultrawide camera.
The OnePlus 10 Pro is available in two different colors – Emerald Forest and Volcanic Black. Both these colors do not have any shiny or flashy kinds of stuff but a simplistic look. Both have a matte finish that does not catch fingerprints and is easier to grip. The back of the smartphone is protected by Gorilla Glass 5 but this time there is no official IP rating that was present on last year’s OnePlus 9 Pro.
The OnePlus 10 Pro weighs around 201grams which is slightly heavier compared to the 197grams weight of the OnePlus 9 Pro. Around the sides, there is a metallic frame that houses the power button, and the OnePlus signature alert slider to manage volume profiles between Silent, Ring, and Vibrate. To the left, there are the volume buttons.
At the bottom, there is a USB Type-C port, a loudspeaker grille, a primary microphone, and a dual SIM card slot. There is no microSD card slot and neither a 3.5mm headphone jack. Like the OnePlus 9 Pro, the back has support for wireless charging and reverse wireless charging. Overall, the build and design look premium and definitely feels like a proper premium flagship smartphone.
OnePlus 10 Pro Display:
The OnePlus 10 Pro sports a larger 6.7-inch Quad HD+(3216×1440 pixels) AMOLED display which is curved to the sides OnePlus has made sure regarding the accidental touches and this is the similar display used on the OnePlus 9 Pro. The bezels are very minimum to the sides and this display is now protected by industry-leading Gorilla Glass Vivtus also used on the Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra (Review).
But it uses the newer LTPO 2.0 display where the display can switch from as low as 1Hz to all the way up to 120Hz depending on the application usage in the background and the change in refresh rate is very faster. Combined with the 120Hz refresh rate, you are getting a 360Hz touch sampling rate also for faster touch responses during gaming and multi-tasking.
Talking about the LTPO display, when you are watching a video of 24fps, the display will show 30Hz, or while looking at a static image in the gallery, the display will show 1Hz and when you are playing games like Call Of Duty Mobile, BGMI, etc, the display will show 120Hz. However, you can also switch to the standard 60Hz mode if you do not want a faster refresh rate.
The 10-bit AMOLED display has great viewing angles and color reproduction is good. The display on the OnePlus 10 Pro has three different color modes – Vivid, Natural, and Pro where Vivid covers the DCI-P3 gamut, Natural provides more realistic colors which are not as brighter as that of the Vivid but also covers the sRGB scale, and Pro contains another two options – Cinematic and Brilliant.
The display is very bright and now can go as high as 1300nits which is very good as under direct sunlight, the display is easily visible. The display also has support for Widevine L1 and HDR support, so you can stream HDR content on YouTube as well as other OTT platforms like Netflix, Prime, etc. As this is an AMOLED display, there is an optical in-display fingerprint scanner that works faster and is accurate.
Overall this is a great display for media consumption.
OnePlus 10 Pro Performance:
The OnePlus 10 Pro is powered by the latest and flagship Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset which is coupled with an Adreno GPU. This chipset is slightly more powerful than the Snapdragon 888 chipset on last year’s OnePlus 9 Pro. Since it is based on the 4nm process, we expect better efficiency than last year’s 5nm process Snapdragon 888 chipset.
In terms of daily activities, the smartphone handles everything with ease regarding all activities from playing games, rendering videos, and streaming social media. Switching between applications was faster also. All heavy games like BGMI, Call Of Duty Mobile, etc. ran at the highest settings without much stutters or frame drops.
In BGMI, we could achieve Ultra HD/HDR graphics with Extreme frame rates and Call Of Duty also ran on the highest graphics but after long hours of gaming like after 3-4 hours, there were some minor frame drops noticed and the back does tend to get warmer. Turning on the High-Performance Mode results in better gameplay but the back heats up very quickly.
OnePlus have provided a dedicated vapor cooling system that does dissipate heat faster but still like the Snapdragon 888, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 throttles a lot, and in CPU throttling tests, the sustained performance was around 65-70 percent which is decent but could have been better. In terms of benchmarks, the scores are not the best when compared to other smartphones having the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset.
We found that OnePlus has been limiting the performance of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset to conserve battery and avoid overheating. Also, the CPU clock speeds are being lowered simultaneously i.e. the high-end cores are not running at the highest clock speeds. In terms of network connectivity, you get good carrier aggregation and support for 11 bands of 5G.
The OnePlus 10 Pro is available in two variants – 8/12GB LPDDR5 RAM with 128/256GB UFS 3.1 storage. Overall, the performance and gaming are good but overheating does let the smartphone down due to the thermal throttling of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset.
OnePlus 10 Pro Software:
The OnePlus 10 Pro runs on the latest OxyegnOS 12.1 based on Android 12 out of the box. OxygenOS 12 shares most of its look and feel with ColorOS after the codebase of ColorOS and OxygenOS were merged together. This was made sure for faster software and security updates so the OxygenOS 12 has most of the elements of ColorOS if you look at the settings, camera, notifications, and quick toggles.
There are a lot of customizations available in terms of icon shape and size, look and feel, themes, wallpapers, different styles for the Always-On Display, and also different animations for the fingerprint scanners. Other features include Hyperboost Gaming Mode where you can block incoming calls and notifications, Zen Mode is present, and also Work Balance 2.0 is present.
The Dark Mode gets three different profiles – Enhanced, Medium, and Gentle. The OnePlus Shelf is present which can be accessed by swiping from the top right corner of the home screen and now has a lot of features present. The biggest standpoint of OxygenOS remains that there is no bloatware present and in terms of software updates, you are assured of another three years of AndroidOS updates and four years of security patches.
OnePlus 10 Pro Cameras:
The OnePlus 10 Pro sports a triple camera setup that consists of the main 48MP f/1.8 Sony IMX798 sensor with OIS, a 50MP f/2.2 Samsung JN1 sensor for the ultrawide camera, and an 8MP f/2.4 telephoto camera that can do 3x optical zoom and has OIS also. These cameras seem identical to that of the OnePlus 9 Pro except for the ultrawide camera where we have the 50MP Sony IMX766 sensor on the OnePlus 9 Pro.
The front camera on the OnePlus 10 Pro is a newer 32MP f/2.4 Sony IMX615 sensor which is a good upgrade over the 16MP f/2.5 Sony IMX471 sensor on the front camera of the OnePlus 9 Pro. Like last year, OnePlus’s partnership with Hasselblad is also found on the OnePlus 10 Pro cameras and there are some very interesting features present.
Hasselblad’s color science was not much impressive with the OnePlus 9 Pro but here we do some improvement. There is an orange color button and sounds are carried from the Hasselblad cameras e.g. while clicking the camera button. There is a new Pro mode which is much more improved than last year, RAW+ mode is present and you also get the XPAN mode of Hasselblad for those wider images.
The images from the main camera come out with good details that look sharper and the dynamic range is also good. However, there is some oversharpening present and colors look slightly oversaturated with the AI Scene Optimizer turned on. The images result in 12MP by default but if you choose to shoot at 48MP resolution, then images do crop in a bit to prevent noise and details look sharper.
At night, the images come out with good details and dynamic range. The noise is very low and the colors do look slightly oversaturated. There is not much oversharpening present and you do also get good exposure and highlights in shadows are very detailed. With the Night Mode turned on, the images do look slightly overprocessed but result in much better details with no noise and good dynamic range.
The images from the 50MP ultrawide camera come out with a good dynamic range but details do look slightly softer and also there is a larger amount of noise present. However, the field of view is now much larger at 150-degree, and switching to this setting results in a much larger aperture in images which does lead to distortion around the edges and details also look slightly softer compared to that of the OnePlus 9 Pro.
There is also a fisheye mode which results in the fisheye effect in images with a circular crop. The details look much softer and there is a lot of distortion though the colors look natural. Unlike the OnePlus 9 Pro where the ultrawide camera also doubles up as a macro camera, this ultrawide camera lacks autofocus and you cannot go closer to an object as some of the dedicated macro cameras can do.
The ultrawide camera does a decent job in terms of details that look slightly softer and the dynamic range is not so good. The noise is present to a larger extent and this camera struggles to keep up the pace during night when exposure is very bad and highlights in shadows are not so good. Turning on the Night Mode does improve the dynamic range, reduces noise, and also improves the exposure a bit.
This ultrawide camera simply cannot match the ultrawide camera on the OnePlus 9 Pro which is much better due to the superior 50MP Sony IMX766 sensor. The 8MP telephoto camera remains unchanged from the OnePlus 9 Pro and is capable of 3x optical zoom and 30x digital zoom. This camera, like the main camera, is also coupled with OIS.
The telephoto camera does a good job in terms of dynamic range and details also look sharper. There is some oversharpening taking place and the colors look natural like that of the main camera. There is very less noise present but if you go beyond 10x, the details look slightly softer and at 30x, the images look grainy with a lot of noise.
But still, 3.3x zoom images are excellent and it would have been better if OnePlus could have provided 5x or 10x optical zoom. During the night, the images come out with good details and dynamic range but colors do look washed out at times. However, the presence of OIS does help reduce noise to a larger margin and images come out with much better details with the dedicated Night Mode turned on.
In terms of portraits, the OnePlus 10 Pro uses only its main camera. It does a good job in terms of dynamic range and edge detection is also good. However, the background blur is not so good as the cutout from the background could have been better. You can adjust the background blur which is good.
The selfies from the 32MP f/2.5 camera come out with much better details that look sharper and good dynamic range compared to the 16MP front camera on the OnePlus 9 Pro. The skin tones look natural without any oversharpening and since it is a 32MP camera, you get a larger field of view. The portrait selfies come out with good edge detection and dynamic range.
The rear main camera can record 8K videos at 24fps which seems a slight downgrade from the 8K videos at 30fps support on the OnePlus 9 Pro. The videos come out with better dynamic range and colors also look saturated and since OIS is present, the noise is very less in the background. Switching to 4K videos at 60fps, the videos come out with excellent dynamic range and details look sharper.
The ultrawide camera can record 4K videos at 30fps which come out with good details and dynamic range. However, there is some noise present and the colors do look slightly oversaturated. The videos do have some distortion and for that, you do get an Ultra Steady Mode which results in stabilized videos with very less noise.
The telephoto camera can record 1080p videos at 30fps and the details come out sharper and the dynamic range is very good. Since OIS is present, the noise is very low and the colors do look natural. Similar goes for videos taken during the night from both the main and the telephoto camera with very less noise and details look sharper whereas, on the ultrawide camera, the videos come out with decent details and dynamic range.
The front camera videos are limited to 1080p at 30fps which is sort of disappointing as many other smartphones can record 4K videos at 30/60fps from the front camera. The details come out sharper and the dynamic range is also good. The colors look natural without much oversharpening. The portrait videos come out with good edge detection but do suffer from oversharpening.
OnePlus 10 Pro Battery Life:
The OnePlus 10 Pro sports a slightly larger 5000mAh battery which is a 500mAh capacity more than the battery on the OnePlus 9 Pro. With heavy usage that includes playing games like BGMI for 4-5 hours continuously, streaming social media for 6-7 hours, rendering videos, and web browsing, the smartphone could last only a single day and at night, quick charging for 15 minutes is required.
With normal usage, the smartphone can easily last for one and half days with some charge left. All these tests have been conducted with the display set to 120Hz. The standard screen-on time was around 4-5 hours which is decent considering the thermal throttling of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset. In terms of charging, the OnePlus has taken the game up as the OnePlus 10 Pro gets an 80W SuperVOOC charger bundled inside the box.
All regions of the world get the 80W fast charger except for North America which still gets the 65W fast charger that is also found on the OnePlus 9 Pro. With the 80W fast charger, the OnePlus 10 Pro can go from 0 to 100 percent within 35-40 minutes which does make much of a difference to the OnePlus 10 Pro in North America which charges from 0 to 100 percent within 45 minutes.
Like the OnePlus 9 Pro, here you also get support for 50W Warp wireless charging that takes around 47 minutes from 0 to 100 percent and since OnePlus has now been part of Oppo, it is termed as AirVOOC
charging. There is also support for 4.5W of reverse wireless charging where you can charge any other device if you put it on the back of the OnePlus 10 Pro.
OnePlus 10 Pro Audio Quality:
The OnePlus 10 Pro sports a dual stereo speaker setup that sounds adequately loud and clear without any distortion. The sound quality is very good and at the highest volume settings, the sound does not feel muffled. There is no 3.5mm headphone jack present which you would typically expect from OnePlus. You do also get Doly Atmos for enhanced sound output.
Verdict:
The OnePlus 10 Pro seems like a perfect flagship smartphone that packs in everything that a flagship needs. The build and design are premium, the display is great for media consumption, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset provides the flagship performance and gaming, battery life is good with faster charging, cameras are very good except the ultrawide camera, and the software experience remains excellent without any bloatware.
However, there are some areas where the OnePlus 10 Pro does feel short as the ultrawide camera is a downgrade from that of the OnePlus 9 Pro, there is no IP rating present, and Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset, though being powerful throttles a lot and overheating takes place. The battery life is also mediocre and cameras though being good simply cannot match other cameras present on other flagships.
The OnePlus 10 Pro brings good upgrades over the OnePlus 9 Pro in terms of a newer design, a slightly better display, better performance, more 5G bands, and bigger battery with faster charging. So if performance does not matter much, then the OnePlus 9 Pro is still a great buy as it still has a better ultrawide camera than the OnePlus 10 Pro and has IP rating which the OnePlus 10 Pro lacks.
Also it is cheaper and still packs all the things that the OnePlus 10 Pro offers, but if you want the latest and greatest flagship from OnePlus, then the OnePlus 10 Pro is a perfect smartphone to buy.