OnePlus was pretty busy this year. The company launches two flagships a year, on four smartphones in the same period. The OnePlus 7T basically replaces the OnePlus 7, and as such, launching the more expensive OnePlus 7 Pro brings most of the features, but at a much lower price. Spending money to buy OnePlus 7 is reason enough to make people angry, but how fast the industry is moving nowadays. How good is the OnePlus 7T? We put the phone through our ringer in a test process to see how the phone is held –

Performance

All OnePlus smartphones launched in the last few years have set a benchmark in speed. OnePlus 7T is no different. Combined with the best hardware possible on OnePlus devices and fast, seamless, minimal software usage, the OnePlus 7T is easily one of the fastest smartphones I’ve ever used. It takes less than 30 seconds to boot, instant to unlock, and seconds to launch any app installed on the phone. This was made possible primarily by the Snapdragon 855+ SoC, which powers the smartphone with 8GB of RAM and up to 256GB of UFS 3.0 storage. Quite as expected, the benchmark results are one of the highest we’ve seen. These charts will take that point further home –

On AnTuTu, only the Realme X2 Pro is better than the OnePlus 7T. Even the iPhone 11 has achieved scores that are not as impressive as the OnePlus 7T. On the Geekbench 5 CPU, the OnePlus 7T scores higher than most Android smartphones but lower than the new iPhone, while in the 3DMark slingshot, the OnePlus 7T scores the highest of all smartphones. These results may not give you a complete picture, but they are a good indicator of how well the OnePlus 7T performs.

But, if you don’t want to go through the benchmark numbers, that’s fine. How about gaming? We played multiple rounds of PUBG Mobile, Asphalt 9 and Call of Duty: Mobile and recorded statistics using GameBench. The OnePlus 7T runs all the games we tested at the highest frame rate with almost 100 percent stability. PUBG Mobile and Call of Duty: Mobile runs at 60 FPS with 100 percent stability while Asphalt 9 runs at 30 FPS with about 85 percent stability. These numbers are impressive, and show that you don’t need a gaming phone to get the best mobile gaming experience. OnePlus 7T will work fine.

Needless to say, apps other than games run just as smoothly on the OnePlus 7T. Shooting 4K video from the camera, editing the same video, browsing social media and everything like that is handled without any hindrance. I can easily copy text from WhatsApp, switch to Facebook and post text with a photo, all in one minute. There is no waiting time to get things done. It’s that fast. Expanding the experience is the 90Hz refresh rate that comes with the OnePlus 7T. While higher refresh rates don’t apply to many apps and games, it does change the way you experience your UI.

Software

The OnePlus 7T is one of the few smartphones that comes with Android 10, out of the box. In addition to the Pixel phones, the OnePlus 7T is one of the first to come with the latest update. OxygenOS is probably the most optimized custom skin on an Android smartphone so far. It is the primary source of productivity, providing you with everything you need at your fingertips. Gesture works consistently well, and fortunately, OnePlus has adjusted aggressive RAM management that now allows apps to stay open longer in the background, and nevertheless, always keeps about 2GB of RAM free.

Battery life

The OnePlus 7T comes with a 3800mAh battery that tops up using a Warp Charge 30T charger that delivers 30W of power to the battery. Despite not having a 4000mAh unit, the battery life is enough to last you a day, even in heavy use. I used the phone as a daily driver for a month and used to record footage at events, take photos and write articles, browse social media as well as play lots of calls of duty: mobile. After all, the phone easily survived until I plugged it back in.

In our test, the OnePlus 7T lasted 753 minutes in the PCMark Work 2.0 battery test. The battery is reduced by 4% after 15 minutes of PUBG mobile and 5% after 30 minutes of streaming Big Bang Theory on Netflix. These are impressive numbers, boosted primarily by measuring OnePlus’ own capabilities with the power-saving features of Android 10.

The camera

The OnePlus 7T comes with a triple camera setup on the back. This is a bigger upgrade than the OnePlus 7 which only had a 48MP primary camera and a depth sensor for the company. This time, each of the three lenses is designed for different uses, ensuring superior versatility in shooting. It has a 48MP Sony IMX586 sensor, a 12MP telephoto lens with 2x optical zoom, and a 16MP wide-angle camera with a 120-degree wide field of view. There is also a macro mode that can get very close to the subject using ultra-wide lenses. Here’s how the camera performs –

Daylight

As we mentioned earlier, the image quality from the 48MP primary lens is almost the same as that of the OnePlus 7. The details, the dynamic range, even the colors are very similar. Only, the OnePlus 7T’s HDR algorithm has been slightly improved to get some more details from the shadows.

A little light

Low light is where we see the most improvement. The nightscape algorithm has been further improved to capture more light, sharpness and detailing so much that it is now possible to read text from a great distance. However, if you zoom in, the details will quickly become as dirty as a painting.

Portraits and selfies

The OnePlus 7T relies on telephoto lenses to capture depth data and works fairly well when capturing portraits from both front and rear cameras. The OnePlus 7T comes out with better details than the OnePlus 7.

Design and display

While the OnePlus is no longer the only OEM-made quality flagship, the company is still credited with creating the best look. The OnePlus 7T has faced stiff competition from the Realme X2 Pro, Redmi K20 Pro and the like, but in all of them the OnePlus 7T looks premium and manages to stand out from the crowd. It is also comfortable to keep, especially for its slim profile. The 7T relies on a round camera module that protrudes slightly from the body and sways the same frosted glass finish that comes with the OnePlus 7 Pro. Both sides are reinforced with Gorilla Glass 5 and a sturdy aluminum frame holds them together. But what is missing is the demand for water resistance and wireless charging. While the former is crucial to using the phone for a long time, the latter is still a novelty and frankly, coming from the Galaxy Note 10+ I don’t really miss it very much.

The OnePlus 7T’s 6.55-inch display is another company decision. After debuting the 90Hz refresh rate on the OnePlus 7 Pro, the company quickly rolled it out to the OnePlus 7T. In fact, up front, all OnePlus devices will come with a 90Hz refresh rate, at least. The higher refresh rate, as we mentioned earlier, is not as effective when gaming or watching a movie, but it greatly enhances the phone usage experience, making it feel much faster. In addition, there is HDR10 + support that extends to all major streaming platforms. And the display is bright enough to give an impressive movie viewing experience.

We clocked an impressive 736 lux with maximum brightness and 7 lux minimum brightness. The latter is still at the top and is clear when using the phone in bed.

The last row

OnePlus 7T is one of the best smartphones owned in 2019 The phone is basically a great showcase of what is good in the smartphone industry The latest processor, fastest storage, a bright and fast display and a premium design. Save for cameras that still need some improvement, it’s a flagship as good as any. After all, OnePlus manages to deliver all of this at an affordable price, much closer to the OnePlus 7. If you are looking for a phone that will not disappoint you, then this is a must have.