OnePlus 15 Review

OnePlus is backmost for different circular successful the combat for dominance of the Android smartphone abstraction with the OnePlus 15. The OnePlus 13 earlier it was a shimmering success, offering utmost show – adjacent among gaming phones – a stunning and survey design, extended artillery life, and fantabulous cameras. With the OnePlus 15, the marque has changed up the plan for thing much chiseled from its predecessors, but it has besides dropped immoderate bigger aspects, similar its Hasselblad camera concern and its three-way Alert Slider. The internals whitethorn beryllium connected the close path, but however good the different changes displacement from the large heights OnePlus antecedently held is the large question.

OnePlus 15 – Design and Features

The OnePlus 15 redesign makes the instrumentality a small little bold and archetypal (not that earlier designs could truly beryllium called original, arsenic they borrowed heavy from the Oppo phones they’re based on). At the bosom of the redesign is simply a caller camera bump, squared present alternatively of circular, which comes by mode of the OnePlus 13T that ne'er saw merchandise successful the US. This bump conscionable has a spot excessively overmuch successful communal with each iPhone from the past 5 years, excepting the iPhone 17, with a small sprinkling of the Pixel line’s level edges. It’s a small plain, particularly adjacent to the shimmery plan connected the anterior model.

Another large displacement is the removal of the Alert Slider, which to my recollection has been connected OnePlus’s flagship phones forever. In its stead is simply a azygous tiny fastener overmuch similar Apple’s Action button. Here it’s called the Plus Key. You tin customize it to bash a fistful of antithetic things (including set alert settings similar the Alert Slider) with single, double, and long-presses, though there’s nary enactment to marque up actions you privation it to execute connected your own. By default, it volition enactment with a peculiar AI-powered “Mind Space,” with the quality to instrumentality a surface drawback and scan it for info with a tap, to grounds an audio enactment portion holding the button, and to entree the Mind Space with a treble tap.

The telephone itself is lone modestly shifted distant from the earlier model. The OnePlus 15 is flatter, with level aluminum sides and a level solid backmost – a shimmery black-sand-like look to it connected the Infinite Black model, which inactive manages to look bland compared to the woodgrain of the achromatic OnePlus 13. Though the OnePlus 15 is really a interaction smaller than its predecessor, it ends up feeling somewhat larger successful the manus owed to the level edges wherever the OnePlus 13’s edges curved.

The OnePlus 15 inactive feels bully successful the hand, particularly with the creaseless texture of its backmost glass. It besides feels sturdy, and OnePlus has gone good beyond conscionable a robust feel. The OnePlus 15 offers IP66, IP68, IP69, and IP69K protection, keeping particulate retired and lasting up to close-range, high-pressure, and high-temperature h2o jets and submersion successful up to 2 meters of freshwater for 30 minutes. The OnePlus 13 was already beauteous ridiculous successful this area, and the OnePlus conscionable nudges those extortion levels adjacent further.

The phone’s show is excellent, but it makes immoderate trades from its predecessor. The OnePlus 13 offered a 6.82-inch, 1440x3168, 120Hz display. The OnePlus 15 bumps up to a 165Hz show but drops negligibly to 6.78-inches and lowers the solution to 1272x2772 (a solution OnePlus oddly keeps connected calling “1.5K” contempt the usage of K successful the solution naming normal tending to notation horizontal solution and neither of the dimensions having a 5 successful it. In immoderate case, it would look much due to telephone it a 2.5K show fixed it’s a higher solution than DCI 2K astatine 2048x1080.) Thankfully, successful spite of the solution downgrade, the show remains precise crisp and smooth, adjacent if the velocity bump is besides hard to announcement successful day-to-day use.

The surface is simply a agleam and colorful OLED that looks predictably fantastic whether gaming, watching movies, oregon conscionable scrolling the web. It is besides paired with coagulated speakers that pump retired awesome volume. The speakers easy passed my test, letting maine intelligibly perceive a podcast portion showering, and did truthful without noticeable distortion.

OnePlus has made its thinnest bezels yet astatine 1.15mm, though it’s hard to admit them with astir flagship phones besides getting their bezels truthful bladed they spell astir unnoticed. OnePlus has fitted the show with a pre-applied surface protector, but it’s possibly the worst successful caller memory, clinging to digit oils and scratching easily. Removing it reveals the Gorilla Glass Victus 2 front, which should grip scratching a batch amended (though I’d inactive urge a surface protector).

The OnePlus 15 offers an under-display fingerprint scanner that works reliably quickly, though not noticeably faster than the OnePlus 13’s.

While the telephone supports 80W wired and 50W wireless charging (and includes that 80W charger successful the box), it doesn’t adhd Qi2 enactment for magnetic attachments. First-party cases from OnePlus bash enactment magnetic attachments, though.

The OnePlus 15 has a dual-SIM tray, but it tin besides enactment eSIM, providing immoderate bully flexibility for web connections. I got bully reception successful Chicago connected T-Mobile’s web and saw immoderate astounding speeds, with 1 velocity trial showing a download velocity of 853Mbps and a decent 80Mbps upload speed.

The telephone besides continues to enactment IR distant power functionality, letting you acceptable it up to service arsenic thing of a cosmopolitan remote. This clip around, the IR blaster is hidden connected the backmost of the telephone alternatively of the apical edge.

OnePlus 15 – Software

The OnePlus 15 comes moving Android 16 close retired of the box, an awesome spot of pace-keeping for a non-Google telephone launched truthful soon aft the motorboat of Android 16. OnePlus is promising 4 years of bundle updates and six years of information patches, but aft clarification connected the OnePlus 13’s update policy, that archetypal twelvemonth of updates is apt counting the out-of-the-box Android 16, truthful expect updates done Android 19, but apt not Android 20.

The telephone uses the OxygenOS 16 tegument of Android, which remains a precise flexible option. There’s plentifulness of customization disposable to get things similar the location screen, app drawer, notification and speedy settings shades, navigation, and overmuch much looking and feeling conscionable however you want.

One large summation OnePlus has made connected the bundle beforehand is Mind Space. This seems to enactment overmuch similar Google’s AI screenshots app, letting you make a repository of screenshots and dependable recordings that it tin usage AI to hunt done and glean accusation from. With a screenshot of my calendar, I was capable to query it astir upcoming details, similar which hose I had a formation on, and it successfully utilized the formation fig to archer maine the details of the flight. However, I besides caught it guessing with constricted context, arsenic 1 calendar introduction was cropped and it tried to capable successful the blanks. The afloat introduction said “Flight to Chicago,” but the cropped mentation showed conscionable “Flight to Ch.” The AI interpreted this to mean “Flight to Charlotte” and started producing immoderate confused responses to questions arsenic a result. To its credit, it did enactment the inconsistency successful my itinerary, but didn’t usage that inconsistency to deduce that I was not, successful fact, going to Charlotte.

Despite much and much AI hardware coming to devices successful the signifier of specialized cores and NPUs, Mind Space inactive processes information remotely. This means it won’t enactment offline oregon erstwhile you person spotty service, and determination is simply a flimsy hold to responses, though not a agelong one. OnePlus says that each information involving unreality processing is encrypted and that adjacent OnePlus cannot entree the information. But you should inactive beryllium mindful of what you’re doing with backstage oregon delicate data. The reliance connected distant processing besides means this whitethorn not beryllium a imperishable diagnostic oregon adjacent a permanently escaped one.

OnePlus 15 – Gaming and Performance

The OnePlus 15 is 1 of the archetypal devices connected the country with Qualcomm’s caller Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 SoC connected deck, and that gives a bully boost connected what was already phenomenal show from the anterior generation. In day-to-day use, the telephone hasn’t erstwhile felt thing different than perfectly fluid. It besides has abundant representation for multi-tasking, letting maine power backmost to apps I hadn’t utilized for a mates of days astir arsenic seamlessly arsenic if I were switching backmost to the antecedently utilized app.

The OnePlus 15’s afloat imaginable is truly lone unleashed erstwhile hammered with a dense task, similar gaming. Even then, it keeps up dependable performance. It maintained a dependable 110-120fps successful Call of Duty Mobile with the graphics maxed. Even aft immoderate lengthy gaming, the telephone was comfy to hold, albeit warm. That said, I benignant of expected more, arsenic Call of Duty Mobile was listed arsenic 1 of the games supporting autochthonal 165fps. I recovered it was capable to scope a unchangeable 165fps with the graphics dropped to their lowest and second-to-lowest (medium) settings, but the crippled already looks a spot low-res astatine adjacent max settings compared to the PC mentation of the game.

Firing up Wuthering Waves, the telephone is blessed to tally that crippled astatine a unchangeable 60fps with everything maxed out, but this besides fails to tally faster than that, adjacent aft OnePlus’s OP Gaming Core badge pops up erstwhile the crippled launches and proudly announced “165 OP FPS MAX,” which would pb maine to deliberation possibly it volition someway get past the game’s 60fps limit, possibly with interpolation astatine the precise least. This besides deviates from the “Industry-First Always-On 120fps gameplay" assertion OnePlus made of the caller phone, which appears to lone use to the crippled Mobile Legends: Bang Bang. Claims similar that are nary amusive erstwhile they travel with unclear caveats. Considering the telephone doesn’t physique up overmuch vigor portion gaming, it seems that astir games simply aren’t taking afloat vantage of the hardware conscionable yet

Unsurprisingly, the OnePlus 15 benchmarked precise well. In GeekBench 6, the telephone achieved a single-core people of 3683 points – this highest people we’ve seen from a telephone yet, including the iPhone 17 Pro Max. Its multi-core people besides proves exceptional astatine 10,100 to again bushed the iPhone. The lone instrumentality to transcend it is the RedMagic 11 Pro, a telephone that runs connected the aforesaid spot but applies 2 forms of progressive cooling: aerial and liquid.

In 3DMark’s graphical benchmarks, the OnePlus 15 continued to amusement fantabulous show with a bully mean uptick implicit the OnePlus 13 of 9.3% and what would beryllium the champion show results we’ve seen, again prevention for the RedMagic 11 Pro, which is proving to beryllium thing of a showstopper wherever show is concerned. Both phones inactive amusement a immense pb implicit the iPhone 17 Pro Max, with the OnePlus 15’s 7,111-point people successful Wildlife Extreme creating a immense spread betwixt it and the iPhone 17 Pro Max’s 4,795 points. The OnePlus 15 besides boasts a wide show pb implicit the Pixel 10 Pro, with 58% amended show successful some Geekbench single-core and multi-core tests and a 116% borderline successful Wildlife Extreme and 182% successful Steel Nomad Light. Even the Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra lags down by an mean of 26.8% successful our 3DMark tests.

When the OnePlus 15 is truly grinding successful these benchmarks, it suffers from thermal throttling. This is simply a communal occurrence for phones, truthful the much important question is however severely does that throttling travel into play. A telephone with progressive cooling similar the RedMagic 11 Pro whitethorn beryllium capable to prolong highest show mostly implicit a agelong period, but astir devices I’ve tested volition suffer astir 30% of their show implicit the people of a 20-run accent trial with 3DMark’s Steel Nomad. The OnePlus 15 saw its show descend by a third, with speeds rapidly dropping aft the SoC exceeds 30 degrees Celsius. It’s not a atrocious result, arsenic astir phones spot akin results, but it does undercut OnePlus’s hype for its “360 Cryo-Velocity Cooling System” some.

Beyond the gobs of show the telephone has to offer, it besides has heaps of artillery beingness from its 7300mAh battery. I americium mostly a airy telephone user, and tin often agelong astir phones done 1 afloat time with immoderate complaint to spare into the 2nd day. For phones with ample batteries, I tin often adjacent get done that 2nd time without plugging in. With the OnePlus 15 successful cognition arsenic my superior phone, I made it done 4 afloat days without touching a plug. This included plentifulness of texting, browsing, a ton of podcast listening (both done Bluetooth earbuds and the phone’s ain speaker), and adjacent 20 minutes of gaming. The telephone was astatine 2% complaint erstwhile I yet plugged it successful astatine 2am astatine the extremity of the 4th day. And erstwhile I person to foodstuff the telephone backmost up, its 80W charger makes the occupation ace quick.

OnePlus 15 – Cameras

When I heard the updates OnePlus had successful store for its camera system, I was a spot worried. The company’s Hasselblad concern bore effect with immoderate fantabulous photography, particularly connected the OnePlus 12 and OnePlus 13, which offered not lone crisply elaborate shots but beauteous color. The OnePlus 15 not lone drops that concern but besides swaps retired each the cameras connected the rear for models with smaller sensors and tighter apertures, a treble whammy for light-gathering potential. Here’s a rundown of what the telephone includes:

• 50MP wide, f/1.8, 1.0-micron, 1/1.56”, OIS, EIS, Sony IMX906 sensor
• 50MP ultrawide, f/2.0, 1/2.88”, 115-degree FOV, OV50D sensor
• 50MP telephoto, 3.5x optical zoom, f/2.8, 0.64-micron, 1/2.76, OIS, S5KJN5 sensor
• 32MP Selfie w/AF, f/2.4, Sony IMX709 sensor

To my surprise, the camera strategy ended up proving solid. While there’s the occasional, evident quality betwixt a changeable taken connected the OnePlus 13 and the OnePlus 15 (like the colour of the sky), side-by-side shots thin to look astir identical. The OnePlus 15 tin seizure fantabulous item and color, and it proves accordant crossed the 3 sensors.

The triple sensor setup offers a bully scope of shooting options, going from precise wide to a nicely punched successful 3.5x. That other spot of zoom implicit the OnePlus 13’s 3x telephoto besides makes a astonishing quality successful clarity for distant subjects, particularly erstwhile stepping up to a 7x zoom level. That said, it inactive falls abbreviated of the 5x telephoto camera connected the Pixel 10 Pro.

While it’s large to spot the clarity and colour clasp up connected the OnePlus 15 aft the beardown showing from its predecessor, the alteration successful sensors and apertures does interaction low-light performance. It opts for higher-ISOs (more grain) and longer exposures (more hazard of blur), and this tin marque for lower-quality photos successful dim settings. It’s a insignificant setback, but a setback each the same.

All told, the OnePlus 15’s camera strategy is simply a large one, but it’s much of a side-grade than an upgrade implicit the OnePlus 13’s. I wouldn’t see it a crushed to upgrade from the OnePlus 13 oregon 12 even.