OnePlus 8 Pro gets Warp Charge 30 Wireless and 120 Hz display from $899

The OnePlus series are no longer as affordable as they once were, but that’s probably justified, at least to some. The OnePlus 8 and OnePlus 8 Pro offer some nice features that earlier OnePlus devices lacked, but at a price point that was never touched by any earlier OnePlus smartphone that came before it. Is it worth it? Well, you take a look and decide for yourself.

OnePlus 8 – like the OnePlus 7T, but better

The OnePlus 8 is this year’s base model, and thus comes with pretty standard “flagship” specifications as well. This includes the Snapdragon 865 and up to 256GB of UFS 3.0 storage, but you don’t get LPDDR5 RAM here. Only the OnePlus 8 Pro gets that. The OnePlus 8 gets LPDDR4x memory instead. Accompanying the chips is a 4300 mAh battery that supports the Warp Charge 30T Fast Charging standard, which is a nice upgrade from last year’s 3800 mAh unit.

Over on the back is a camera arrangement that’s reminiscent of last year’s model as well as most of 2019’s budget flagships. The 48MP Sony IMX586 takes the main stage, supported by a 16MP f/2.2 ultra-wide angle camera and a 2MP macro camera. Seriously, a 2MP macro camera? In a flagship at this price range?

The display is a curved 6.55″ FHD+ Fluid AMOLED panel running at up to 90 Hz, complete with a punch hole in the upper left corner to house the selfie camera. There’s support for HDR10+ and the DCI-P3 color gamut too. Here are the specifications of the OnePlus 8:

OnePlus 8 Specs

• Snapdragon 865, octa-core up to 2.84 GHz, 7nm
• Up to 12GB LPDDR4x RAM
• Up to 256GB UFS 3.0 storage
• 6.55″ FHD+ Fluid AMOLED, 90 Hz refresh rate
• 48MP Sony IMX586 f/1.75 + 8MP f/2.2 ultra-wide + 2MP macro camera
• 16MP f/2.45 selfie camera
• 4300 mAh battery, 30W Warp Charge 30T
• 8GB + 128GB: USD 699 (~RM3028)
  12GB + 256GB: USD 799 (~RM3462)

OnePlus 8 Pro – the true flagship?

While the OnePlus 8 seems like a pretty standard flagship, OnePlus definitely put a bit more love into the OnePlus 8 Pro. For starters, it has a larger and higher resolution display. You get a 6.78″ 2K+ Fluid AMOLED display, that also offers an impressive 120 Hz refresh rate. And to ensure that it has enough battery life so that you can actually enjoy all that, there’s a respectable 4510 mAh battery here, up from 4085 mAh in the OnePlus 7T Pro.

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But what sets the OnePlus 8 Pro apart from its predecessor is not just its screen and battery capacity, but also wireless charging. OnePlus’ CEO Pete Lau has famously went on record saying wireless charging is far inferior but I guess the 30W Warp Charge 30 Wireless isn’t inferior. That’s technically true, considering that the OnePlus 8 Pro charges at the same rate over a cable too, but it is definitely far from the best the industry has to offer. Both HUAWEI and OPPO have 40W wireless charging standards now, and OPPO is also currently offering 65W fast charging. So OnePlus is definitely offering an inferior charging experience on the OnePlus 8 Pro.

The camera ensemble on the OnePlus 8 Pro is superior compared to the OnePlus 8, as you might expect. While the main camera offers the same 48MP resolution, the sensors are pretty different. The OnePlus 8 Pro comes with a Sony IMX689 behind it’s main camera lens, a much larger sensor with big 1.12µm pixels, versus the Sony IMX586’s puny 0.8µm ones. Throw pixel binning into the equation and you are looking at 2.24µm vs 1.6µm pixels. The ultra-wide camera also sports a 48MP sensor, and it also pulls double duty by supporting macro shots too. Meanwhile the 3x telephoto camera touts an 8MP sensor, but whether OnePlus will still try to pull a fast one this generation remains to be seen. And lastly there’s a 5MP color filter lens that supposedly helps the camera throw on color filters. Never knew we needed hardware to do that.

OnePlus 8 Pro Specs

• Snapdragon 865, octa-core up to 2.84 GHz, 7nm
• Up to 12GB LPDDR5 RAM
• Up to 256GB UFS 3.0 storage
• 6.78″ 2K+ Fluid AMOLED, 120 Hz refresh rate
• 48MP Sony IMX689 f/1.78 + 48MP Sony IMX586 f/2.2 ultra-wide/macro + 8MP f/2.44 3x telephoto + 5MP color filter
• 16MP f/2.45 selfie camera
• 4510 mAh battery, 30W Warp Charge 30T, 30W Warp Charge Wireless
• 8GB + 128GB: USD 899 (~RM3895)
  12GB + 256GB: USD 999 (~RM4328)

And oh there’s the much-requested IP68 rating on the OnePlus 8 Pro. The OnePlus 8 doesn’t get an IP rating though.

So there you have it, the OnePlus 8 and OnePlus 8 Pro. Do you think they are worth their asking prices?

Pokdepinion: OnePlus is definitely targeting a more premium price range, but the OnePlus 8 is just horrible value for your money. The OnePlus 8 Pro does seem like a decent flagship though.