OnePlus 10R Review – Not a “Flagship Killer” Anymore

The OnePlus 10R is the latest mid-range flagship smartphone from OnePlus, and it is only available in India. In China, the 10R is branded as the OnePlus Ace, and it’s simply the Realme GT Neo 3 with a few tweaks.

By offering a Mediatek chipset and capable camera hardware, the Oneplus 10R manages to break new ground in the budget flagship sector. It is also coupled with a high refresh rate panel and enough RAM for everyday tasks.

Of course, the most eye-catching feature is the lightning-fast charging speed. But, is it all worth the asking price? Let’s find out.

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The OnePlus 10R 8GB RAM + 128GB storage variant with 80W SuperVOOC charging is available in India for Rs. 38,999. The variant with 12 GB of RAM + 256 GB of storage, and 80W of SuperVOOC charging has a price tag of Rs. 42,999.

The OnePlus 10R 5G Endurance Edition is priced at Rs. 43,999 for a single variant with 12GB RAM and 256GB of storage with 150W of fast charging.

In terms of colour options, the variants that support 80W charging will be available in both Forest Green and Sierra Black, whereas the variant that supports 150W charging will only be available in Sierra Black.

You can purchase the smartphone through the official OnePlus website as well as Exclusive Stores, Amazon, Croma stores, and Reliance Digital Stores.

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The all-new so-called flagship killer from OnePlus comes with the following items inside the box:

• SIM Tray Ejector
• 80W Charging Adapter
• Phone Case
• USB Cable

Before we talk in detail about the OnePlus 10R, let’s see what the on-paper specs look like:

• Display: 6.7 inches AMOLED
• Chipset: MediaTek Dimensity 8100 Max
• RAM & ROM: 8GB RAM 128GB Storage, 12GB RAM 256GB Storage
• Software: Android v12
• Rear camera: 50MP + 8MP + 2MP
• Selfie camera: 16 MP
• Battery: 5000 mAh
• Weight: 186 grams
• Dimensions: 163.3 x 75.5 x 8.2 mm

The OnePlus 10R is visually different in various ways. With the 10R, OnePlus has chosen a striking visual design that attracts attention. The OnePlus 10R sports a boxy, squared-off look.

All of the sides are flat, and their clean, simple look makes them stand out. You can choose between two colours: Sierra Black and Forest Green. We have the former with us for the review.

Even though the phone is made of plastic on the back and sides, the overall build and finish quality are quite good. The 10R comes with a matte finish on the back which isn’t just velvety but also keeps fingerprint smudges at bay. Corning Gorilla Glass 5 protects the front with flat edges and a punch-hole camera in the top centre.

The back of the device features a protruding camera unit that houses three separate lenses. The striped pattern on the camera bump extends all the way to the phone’s bottom. The phone weighs just 186 grams, yet it feels big and hefty in my hands.

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For a phone in this price range, the build quality is adequate, and as previously said, the phone has a nice tactile feel despite being mainly built of plastic. However, we don’t see any kind of IP rating on the phone which is a little disappointing to see at this price.

In addition to the usual, there is no 3.5mm audio jack, and even more surprisingly, no alert slider. The power button is located on the right side of the phone, while the volume buttons are located on the left.

OnePlus 10R features a triple camera setup on the back. It includes a 50MP Sony IMX766 primary camera, an 8MP ultrawide angle lens and a 2MP macro lens. Selfies are taken care of by a 16MP camera on the front. The camera app is the same one seen on most Realme phones.

Images captured by the primary camera during the daytime have a good resolution and level of detail. However, the sensor fails to deliver good photographs in low light or at night, losing fine details and introducing noise to the images.

On the other side, the night mode does its job well. This is because the low-light photographs appear overly brightened.

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The ultra-wide camera takes somewhat passable shots. Due to its low-resolution sensor, the images appear washed out at times, and the quality is noticeably reduced.

The macro lens, on the other hand, is far from ideal. The photos appear hazy and distorted. Photos taken in low light have an unnatural look to them.

In well-lit conditions, the 16 MP front camera produces decent selfies. The photographs are a bit soft, and as the light level drops, so does the quality of the images.

As for video recording, the rear cameras can record videos in 4K at 30fps and in 1080p at 30/60fps, whereas the front cameras can only go upto 1080p at 30fps. The main sensor features OIS, but it only tends to work in 1080p mode.

On the whole, the camera setup on the OnePlus 10R is mediocre. Even though the older OnePlus 9RT wasn’t amazing in this field, it was still better than this.

The real draw is, of course, the lightning-fast charging speeds. There are two variants of the OnePlus 10R, one that prioritises charging speed and the other that prioritises battery life. The standard variant has a 5,000mAh battery and 80W charging speeds. The other increases the power to 150W at the cost of a smaller 4,500mAh battery.

It can easily give a full day battery backup and even survive the next day on light use. Now, if you’re a heavy user, you’ll need to charge it twice a day.

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The phone also comes with a number of additional features that can be used to extend the life of the battery. These features include a “Smart battery health algorithm” and “battery healing technology,” both of which protect the electrodes from harm caused by the regular process of charging the phone.

The 150W fast charger can fully charge the device from 0 to 100 per cent in under 20 minutes. OnePlus claims that it can go from 1 to 30 per cent in 3 minutes. On the other hand, the standard 80W charger will take around 30 minutes to fully charge the battery.

Another feature of the phone worth mentioning is the display. The OnePlus 10R packs a 6.7-inch FHD+ AMOLED display with a resolution of 1080 x 2412 pixels. The display has a dynamic refresh rate of 120 Hz and a 10-bit colour panel. Having a refresh rate of 120 Hz gives gamers another reason to appreciate this phone.

When the High refresh rate option is selected, the display can switch between 120Hz, 90Hz, and 60Hz. The refresh rate changes according to user activity, the content being displayed, and the applications that have been whitelisted.

Furthermore, the display is sufficiently bright at 950 nits and is protected with Corning Gorilla Glass 5. The phone was easily readable and unusable in bright sunlight, no issues here.

HDR10+ content viewing and gaming on a smartphone is a wonderful experience.

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You can change the colour mode by accessing the display settings. You can choose between Natural, Vivid, or Pro mode.

OnePlus has also enabled Widevine L1 support, which means that you can now watch FHD+ videos on OTT platforms. You will also find an in-display fingerprint scanner which we will discuss later in the review. As far as the display goes, the OnePlus 10R has done a good job here.

The OnePlus 10R delivers a great performance as expected. It has a MediaTek Dimensity 8100 MAX chipset, which is an exclusive version of the OnePlus of the Dimensity 8100 processor. When it comes to memory, you have the option of selecting between 128GB or 256GB of UFS 3.1 storage, with either 8GB or 12GB of LPDDR5 RAM.

During my testing and usage, the Dimensity 8100 Max did a good job and delivered a great performance which was comparable to Snapdragon 888. The phone was pretty smooth and had a quick response time.

There isn’t much to complain about in terms of performance on the OnePlus 10R, and that’s a good thing for potential buyers. The phone has no trouble handling high-end games and intensive multitasking.

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Most of the game developers have optimised their games for Qualcomm chipsets and hence the game optimization on this phone falls behind compared to Qualcomm flagships, at least for now. You will have to wait for a couple of months for the graphic demanding games to be optimised for MediaTek Dimensity 8100.

We tried to play some games including BGMI, Asphalt 9 and COD: Mobile. All the games ran well in high graphics as expected. However, BGMI can only go up to HD + High settings which is disappointing to see at this price. Hopefully, this will be fixed soon with an update.

But the highlight here is not the performance but the cooling system. The 10R features the company’s largest vapour chamber to date, as well as graphene and graphite thermal pads. The end result is amazing, as the phone maintains a healthy body temperature throughout heavy gaming.

Coming to the software, Oneplus 10R runs on Oxygen OS 12.1 which is based on Android 12. OxygenOS 12.1 is mostly just ColorOS 12 with a few small changes. Once upon a time, OxygenOS was known for its uncluttered and uniform appearance; however, all of that changed the moment the OS was combined with ColorOS.

It was nice to see that there is no bloatware on the device. You will also receive a number of helpful features that are already baked into OxygenOS. These features include a private vault, a dedicated dark mode, and a variety of gestures.

One of the cool features of OxygenOS 11 was the ability to tweak the navigation buttons by simply assigning different shortcuts to them when they are held down or double-tapped.

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Another helpful feature was something known as the Hidden Space screen. This feature allowed users to hide icons from the app drawer.

The company has stated that 10R will only get two major OS updates and three years of security updates which fall behind its competitors like Apple, Samsung, and even Xiaomi’s flagships.

Although it sports a dual-stereo setup, there is no Dolby Atmos support on this phone. The downward-firing speaker is notably louder than the top speaker.

As a result, when sounds become louder or move to higher frequencies, they sound rusty and congested. OnePlus has chosen Dirac audio instead of Dolby Atmos, which isn’t the finest, but it’s still good enough.

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The OnePlus 10R comes with 5G connectivity and supports 9 5G bands. These include n1, n3, n5, n8, n40, n41, n77, n78, and n28A. Other connectivity options include Wi-Fi 802.11, Bluetooth 5.3, GPS and NFC.

The phone offers quick and accurate biometrics. You can unlock the phone using the in-display fingerprint scanner or the face unlock. Note that the OnePLus has used an optical sensor which won’t work if your hands are wet.