OnePlus 9 Pro
The OnePlus 9 Pro is a no-holds-barred premium device and is one of the best phones you can buy right now. The OnePlus 9 Pro ships with Android 11 and OxygenOS 11. It will receive two years of OS updates (Android 13) and three years of security patches (2024).
Design & Features
OnePlus continues to source high-end OLEDs from Samsung Display for its flagship. The OnePlus 9 Pro bestows a large, super-sharp 6.7-inch front panel with 525 pixels per inch, and it supports a 120 Hz refresh rate for smoother motion and interaction with the phone. OnePlus 9 Pro are several display features that can adjust the screen or the media content that is being played. Motion Graphics Smoothing increases the smoothness of video content (in supported apps) by interpolating additional frames, converting video up to 60 frames per second (or 120 FPS when enabling it in the OnePlus Laboratory). Comfort tone is functionally identical to Apple’s True Tone. It adapts the white balance of the display to better match that of your viewing environment, which can help improve the consistency of the appearance of white. The adjustment range for the color temperature of white varies from 5000 K to 7400 K, and from my usage, the feature tends to shy away from tinting too warmly relative to the environment when compared to True Tone. Hyper Touch is a setting exclusive to the OnePlus 9 Pro that increases the touch polling frequency up from 240 Hz to 360 Hz. Enabling this feature should improve touch latency. Vibrant Color Effect Pro increases the contrast and saturation of video content, intending to upscale the content from standard dynamic range to high dynamic range.
Ultra-high Video Resolution is an AI upscaling feature that increases the sharpness of video content in supported apps. So far, there appear to only be three apps that are supported: WeChat, Instagram, and Snapchat. Vision Comfort is OnePlus’ version of Night Light, which reduces the emission of blue light by making the screen warmer. However, this feature is slightly different since it can also lower the saturation of the display to make it more comfortable to look at in low light. OnePlus collaborated with Pixelworks, a company that specializes in video and image processing, for some of these features. Inside the OnePlus 9 Pro is Pixelworks’ X5 Pro visual processor which handles the HDR upscaling (Vibrant Color Effect Pro) and the motion processing (Motion Graphics Smoothing).
Display
Despite positioning a 6.7-inch display front and center, notably the same diagonal as the iPhone 12 Pro Max’s display, the OnePlus 9 Pro is more grip friendly by going taller instead of wider to accommodate that extra large screen. Display is actually sharper at 3,216 x 1,440 resolution while supporting the same HDR10+ capabilities alongside a 1,300-nit peak brightness that’s plenty for daytime viewing. OnePlus has used a 10-bit AMOLED panel here with support for an adaptive refresh rate from 1Hz for lower power usage up to 120Hz for extra smooth scrolling and animations. Despite all its packing in, the OnePlus 9 Pro actually manages to trim its weight, coming in at 197 grams.
Perfomance
OnePlus 9 Pro features the latest Octa-core Snapdragon 888 chipset with Adreno 660 GPU, which helps it keep running its high resolution display at that high refresh rate, along with that, you get 8GB or 12GB of LPDDR5 RAM. There’s no storage expansion via micro SD possible. Out-of-the-box, the OnePlus 9 Pro runs on Oxygen OS 11 atop Android 11. Signature features such as always-on display, themes, Zen mode, Pro Gaming mode (nee Fnatic mode).
Camera
The 9 Pro has a quad-cam setup: a 48-megapixelmain camera, 50-megapixel ultrawide camera, 8-megapixel telephoto camera and a 2-megapixel monochrome camera. The main camera is a 48MP f/1.8 unit, using the new 1/1.43-inch Sony IMX789 sensor with incredible dynamic range, focus roll-off, and true-to-life colours. OnePlus 9 Pro opts for what is probably the best wide-angle camera on the market. Using a large 1/1.56-inch 50MP Sony IMX766 sensor with a freeform lens. With OnePlus 9 Pro, you can shoot up to 8K 30 or 4K 120 video.
Battery
The OnePlus 9 Pro retains the same 4500mAh battery as the OnePlus 8T, and it uses the 65W fast charging standard as well. The phone has a dual-cell system with two 2250mAh batteries, and the 65W charge is directed into two 32.5W streams to simultaneously charge both cells. The phone has 12 sensors to manage heat and control voltages on the fly, and as a result, it can now charge from zero to 75% in just 20 minutes, and a full charge takes just 29 minutes the charging tech is now called Warp Charge 65T. The wireless charger takes just 43 minutes to fully charge the battery on the 9 Pro.
