Since the company started, OnePlus Moto was always to come up with a smartphone that would be a Flagship Killer. In their first two attempts, the devices lack the premium quality that most flagship smartphone lovers wanted. OnePlus came up with their own unique design with Sandstone backings, but since then the company has learned that its not sandstone that is going to with the hearts of everyone. OnePlus 3 is the 4 the smartphone from OnePlus after their last budget offering the OnePlus X. Let’s find out if the latest smartphone from OnePlus is truly a Flagship Killer, with our OnePlus 3 Review.
Design
OnePlus has changed their deign this time and it’s more premium and well built than the previous phone. There is no longer a removal backing and the phone is made out of a unibody metal design. Due to the design change, the phone has become slimmer and a bit larger than-than the predecessor. The overall design is quite minimal and yet premium, you will find all the things at their right place along with a camera hump at the back with just the OnePlus logo.
The Phone weighs at just 158 grams with a thickness of 7.35mm. It’s available in 2 colors and what I have with me is the Graphite one while the soft gold will be launched later. One the front there is a 5.5 inch 1080p AMOLED display with Gorilla Glass 4. The Phone is powered by a Snapdragon 820 processor along with 6 GB of RAM. The phone also comes with NFC and 64 GB of internal storage.
The Primary camera is 16 MP one with OIS and f 2.0 Aperture while the front camera is 8 MP one. OnePlus 3 also boasts a battery capacity of 3000 mAh and comes which DASH Charging.OnePlus 3 has the best tactile buttons that I have ever used on any smartphone yet, on the right side you have the power lock and unlock button and on the left, you have your volume rockers and the alert slider similar to the OnePlus 2 and OnePlus X.
The Phone is usable with one hand but I found myself using it in both the hands most of the time due to the larger design. The metal design on the phone does make it look good and the edges are sharp enough to provide you a grip but the metal on the back is slippery and at that is why OnePlus has made so many cases for the phone this time. You can but any one of the cases to add grip and a bit of protection the device and yes there is even a sandstone case available for the phone.
While some may argue that the design is similar to HTC phones with the metal back or the iPhone , I personally feel that it’s similar but yet a lot different.
Display
The display on the front is a 1080p AMOLED panel with a corning Gorilla Glass 4. Though it’s a 1080p panel it enough pixel density for day to day use. You won’t notice any pixel and it’s sharp enough to play games and general media consumption. The only point where the display lacks is in terms of outdoor brightness where OnePlus could have to improve the display a little.
But less brightness means more overall battery life and being an AMOLED panel the phone saves a lot of battery in terms of display.
The overall contrast of the display is great with good color reproduction and deep blacks. OnePlus also added a feature called ambient display where you can wave your hand in front of the display to wake it up and see you notification and time. They’re also a night mode which you can turn on and it will adjust the color temperature of the display to a much more yellow tone to make it suitable for night use.
Performance
The One Place where OnePlus, where the OnePlus 3 shines the most, is the performance. It’s a lot more that what you need and the phone didn’t have even a single slowdown or stutter during my day to day use. If you want to see a detailed benchmark of the device then you can see in our OnePlus 3 benchmark video. You can have multiple apps and games open on the phone at the same time and still use it without any issue.
The alert slide on the phone has also changed adding a better texture and tactic feedback. I found myself using it on a daily basis to quickly set the phone in different modes. You can slide it set the phone to either priority notification or full silent modes which are helpful in some situations.
The massive 6GB of RAM keeps the apps in the memory and is a bit overkill if you ask me. Yes, there had been some memory leak issue with the OnePlus 3 but the company has responded that there is an update coming soon to fix all the issues.
You can run all the latest games on the OnePlus 3 at their full settings and still won’t notice any lags making the OnePlus 3 One of the best performing smartphones.Speaking of the Hardware there are few things that have changed from the OnePlus 2, the phone now comes with NFC so you can use it for Android Pay or NFC pairing. The Back is nonremovable which means the Sim card tray is on the side of the phone which can support 2 sim cards.
The Speaker on the bottom is loud and provides decent output but nothing too fancy over here, however, the audio output from the headphone jack is another story. It’s much better than most of the smartphone and provides a little bit louder sound output that other.
The Battery life on the OnePlus 3 is standard with the screen on time ranging from 3 and a half hrs to 4 on my regular use. You can expect it to last a day on a regular use but if you are doing heavy gaming all day then expect yourself to carry the charger all times.Speaking of the charger the phone comes with Dash charging which allows the ONEPLUS 3 to charge to 60% in just 30 min of charging. This is done through the included dash charger which provides the phone with 5V and 4 Amp of current.
OnePlus has also made a CAR dash charger that you can plug into the standard socket in your CAR and have your OnePlus 3 charged during your daily commute.
Camera
The CAMERA on the ONEPLUS 3 is a 16 MP one with OIS. It can shoot 4K videos and comes with a manual mode. The default camera app is easy to use and comes with a lot of features including the ability to set different exposure and focus points. The overall camera performance is good but the photos lack details and there is visible noise in some of the shots. The saturation levels in the photos comes out great some time while other it lacks saturation. For the most part, you can leave the camera in the default HDR Automatic mode and get good pictures.
Features
OnePlus 3 is powered by Android Marshmallow out of the with Oxygen OS. Its is similar to stock android and feels light to use. There is no bloatware installed on the phone but Oneplus did add some unique features that can useful for the most part.On swiping to the right you have the shelf where you can add use full information such as widgets and frequent contacts. There is a quick memo option that has been added to the shelf which can be very useful to take quick notes and reminders.
Over at the quick settings, you have the ability to rearrange the settings icon according to your needs with just a press button. This is one of that feature that should be available in all smartphone nowadays.One of the most interesting features I thought was the Dark mode. This allows the phone to run most of the UI dark deep black modes resulting in saving the battery since the display is AMOLED.
Conclusion
So the OnePlus 3 is the Flagship smartphone the has got everything almost right. It has a great metal design that most of the users will find very interesting and premium. The software running on this phone is polished and has many features and no bloatware. The performance is top notch and it ranks highest in any benchmark we thought of it. Although the battery is just 3000 mAH the phone comes with Dash charging too quickly charge the device in a few minutes.
THE ONEPLUS 3 IS TRULY THE BEST SMARTPHONE FROM ONEPLUS YET AT THE PRICE POINT OF 27,999, YOU CAN’T BUY ANYTHING BETTER.
