We can no longer consider OnePlus to be a brand of cheap Chinese smartphones. Gradually, they have developed into a premium manufacturer of high-end smartphones, and this year their iron is on fire just OnePlus 9 Pro. We looked at him in detail and tested it.
The flagship for 2021 will of course impress with the most up-to-date hardware, including Snapdragon 888, beautiful 120Hz AMOLED display, 50 W wireless charging, premium glass processing, but especially cooperation with a global company Hasselblad, with which they tuned the quality of their cameras to the highest level.
However, there are also some beauty flaws with this smartphone. We noticed that Oxygen OS is not completely stable in the 900 price range € (according to the official price tag), the OnePlus 9 Pro could already have a more advanced periscopic camera, which even some cheaper Xiaomi smartphones already have. Therefore, the Chinese company was not very surprised by the photo hardware, and they are trying to compensate in another way, by software modification.
Where did we buy it?
We ordered the OnePlus 9 Pro from our partner Banggood, which sends it via reliable EU transport Priority Line. It is without duty and VAT. Below you will find the current best prices.
OnePlus 9 Pro global ROM
You do not pay any extra fees for Global Priority shipping.
We recommend choosing Global Priority transport, for which you will not pay extra. Customs fees and any VAT will be arranged for you directly by the seller. Shipping can only be selected in the cart, after entering the delivery address. Delivery with Global Priority usually takes about 15 days, but may take longer.
More coupons
You do not pay any extra fees for Global Priority shipping.
We recommend choosing Global Priority transport, for which you will not pay extra. Customs fees and any VAT will be arranged for you directly by the seller. Shipping can only be selected in the cart, after entering the delivery address. Delivery with Global Priority usually takes about 15 days, but may take longer.
We ordered it 12.5., was sent from the warehouse 17.5. and our home was delivered 31.5. Shipping is so fast even from a Chinese warehouse.
We are testing the global ROM version, which means that it is originally a Chinese version with a global system installed. It has full coverage of our telecommunication networks, the only disadvantage is the Chinese terminal on the charging adapters, but we solve it by reduction.
However, with the basic OnePlus 9 model, be careful in the global ROM version (originally the Chinese version). It lacks wireless charging and has slightly different dimensions and weight. However, the OnePlus 9 Pro is identical.
You can also order an original one 50 W wireless charger, which is also available to our partner Banggood.
OnePlus 50 W wireless charger
You do not pay any extra fees for Global Priority shipping.
We recommend choosing Global Priority transport, for which you will not pay extra. Customs fees and any VAT will be arranged for you directly by the seller. Shipping can only be selected in the cart, after entering the delivery address. Delivery with Global Priority usually takes about 15 days, but may take longer.
Rich red packaging, also with charger
OnePlus has omitted the trend of packaging without a charger, so you will find a powerful one under the smartphone in the box 65 W charging adapter with iconic red USB-C to USB-C cable. The OnePlus 9 Pro is also packaged with an applied film on the display. In the oblong red box there is also a manual, a needle for extraction SIM slot, several stickers, a nice gray silicone case and some other papers. In the global ROM version, most of the texts are in Chinese.
Beautiful design, glass design
Our tested device is in gray, which looks really beautiful with the glass material on the back. OnePlus has always been able to process its smartphones and, of course, the flagship cannot be an exception. However, the back is very prone to smudges from fingerprints as well as scratches. It's shiny and you'll see yourself in it like a mirror.
The upper left corner is dominated by a larger section of the camera, where there are 4 sensors, a dual LED flash, an autofocus sensor, a microphone and the logo of the manufacturer of quality photo sensors Hasselblad.
On the right side is the famous switch for OnePlus smartphones, with which the ringtone modes are initially changed, but the function of the switch can be changed in the settings. Just below it is the button to wake up the display. On the opposite side, there are only a pair of buttons for volume control. At the bottom you will see the cover of the slot for SIM card together with the USB-C connector and cutouts for the speaker. All sides are then lined with gray strips for the antennas.
The exact dimensions of the device are 163.2 mm x 73.6 mm x 8.7 mm and weight 197 grams. So it's not a completely heavy device, as it is really loaded with specifications and is comfortable to hold in one hand.
Beautiful AMOLED with smart technology
The entire front is dominated by a curved one 6,7 ″ Fluid AMOLED display, with an adaptive refresh rate from 1 Hz up to a maximum, ie 120 Hz. This technology is called LTPO and is tailor-made by OnePlus. The display has the same recovery technology as the type of content it displays. Whether it is a photograph or static text, the frequency is 1 Hz. When scrolling on social networks, the frequency can be up to 120 Hz.
The display resolution is 3216 x 1440 pixels and fineness 525 ppi, which means that everything will be beautifully and delicately displayed. The display supports sRGB colors, Display P3, 10-bit Color Depth and is fitted with a stronger Corning Gorilla Glass glass.
We must not forget the Hyper Touch function, which ensures the least possible delay when touching, which will be used especially by mobile game players. The brightness of the display is decent 1300 rivets and 8,192 levels of auto brightness are available. When using it, it reads well from the display even in very strong sun, which we tried.
Was the cooperation of several million with Hasselblad worthwhile?
The most significant aspect that OnePlus itself promotes is the cooperation with the well-known manufacturer of sensors Hasselblad. They helped the OnePlus 9 series to fine-tune the colors of the photos taken, but this is not a special sensor from them, which is a slight disappointment. But in recent years, OnePlus has lagged behind the best in the camera segment, and this is not a bad step to change. You can read the camera review from DxOMark professionals.
What pleased us is the use of the unique 48 MPx primary sensor Sony IMX789 combined with very high quality 50 MPx wide-angle sensor Sony IMX766, which can take up to 140° shots. In addition, the "wide-angle" is a Freeform Lens type, which means that it is without the effect of hiding at the edges, which causes a fish eye (it is only 1% compared to 10% or 20%).
In our camera test, we were really excited about the pair of primary sensor and wide-angle sensor, and the post-processing of the photos itself is excellent. Hasselblad helped them achieve the most vivid and true-to-life colors possible. You can view all test photos on Google Drive from the link below.
See all test photos and videos
Classic shots
For the camera, let's start by testing normal photography. In addition to the original 1x mode, you have an ultra-wide range (0,6x zoom) and a 3,3x optical zoom, which is with less loss of quality than digital. The maximum possible zoom is 30x. You can set the aspect ratio to / 4: 3/1: 1. You can also switch to a photo in high resolution, which uses a full 48 MPx and photos take up much more storage space, but the aspect ratio is fixed at 4: 3.
It is very difficult for the average user to compare the quality of photos of current flagships. In our opinion, the OnePlus 9 Pro is at the top level when it comes to the camera, and Hasselblad's post-processing color balancing helps make photos even more faithful to reality. How came photos from main 48 MPx sensor you can see below.
Night photos
Night photos are at a very decent level. Below you can see a comparison of the photo in normal mode and when using the night scene. Night mode achieves much better lighting with the capture of details and can also handle very dark parts of the photo. After post-processing, we were often surprised at how nicely OnePlus 9 Pro was able to handle it. The cooperation with Hasselblad certainly worked here. But what is immediately obvious, widescreen photos in night mode significantly lose detail and many parts of the photos are blurred, but no smartphone can do it perfectly.
Widescreen, zoomed images
You can see a comparison of the same wide-angle sensor, primary sensor, 3,3x optical zoom and 30x digital zoom below. Photos with a wide-angle sensor are at a much better level than the OnePlus 8T, thanks to the newer sensor used.
Image comparison - ultra wide - normal - optical zoom and maximum digital zoom
OnePlus 9 Pro also includes macro mode, which you will not find in the main menu at the bottom, but is hidden in the top bar as a flower icon. After clicking on this icon, the camera switches to macro mode (it can also be turned on by itself if the phone is close to an object) and you can take a detailed photo. You can see some macro shots below.
Years panoramic shots they are not bad at all. We managed to create such a beautiful panorama of Trenčín.
Portrait shots
Function portrait (depth) of the OnePlus 9 Pro will be appreciated. It often happened that smartphones could not adjust the photo enough to highlight the subject in the foreground, but with this flagship, the function is at a very good level. It can handle background blur even though the subject is not clearly separated from the background. We used a wide-angle sensor when creating portraits, because the classic one is at a 4: 3 ratio and uses too much zoom.
Photo in full 50 MPx resolution
There is also the option to turn on full resolution in the camera application options, because it is originally turned off. By activating it, the aspect ratio is only 4: 3, but the images have great quality even when viewed on large monitors. It can create really beautiful 50 MPx images.
High quality video, up to 8K resolution
Currently, video quality is one of the main parameters when choosing a smartphone. We dare to say that with OnePlus 9 Pro you will be able to create more professional content and in combination with gimbal, the result will be very good. Optical stabilization alone can produce a really great result with shaky shots.
The maximum video resolution is 8K at 30 frames per second. 4K can be rotated already at 120 frames per second, which is really fantastic. Video also supports HDR, but not at all resolutions. Mode is also available super stable (only available in 4K / 30 fps and 1080p / 30 fps), as in its predecessors, and here the stabilization is even more pronounced. A novelty is a portrait video that can blur the background.
Of course there is also widescreen video and we liked how OnePlus matched the transition between each sensor. It is very smooth and does not disturb the integrity of the video when zooming in or out to 0,6 times wider, or vice versa, the transition to the tele-sensor.
We also had to try the function time-lapse video which you will find in the accelerated mode in the top bar. This can be done in 4K resolution and the result looks something like this:
Decent endurance and 50 W wireless charging
The battery on this smartphone does not surprise with its high capacity, but its endurance is quite decent. With a capacity of 2x 2,250 mAh, ie a total of 4500 mAh, we got to the screen time about 5 - 6 hours. Of course, it depends on how you use it. We were able to get up to 10 hours from your smartphone, using social networks, occasional phone calls, Wi-Fi or data, and watching YouTube videos from time to time. So the endurance on this smartphone is at a good level.
The smartphone has 5G support and a more powerful processor, but especially the demanding AMOLED, and that really requires a lot of juice. The battery is divided into two parts for fast charging to achieve continuous performance up to 65 W, which Oneplus refers to as fast charging Warp Charge 65.
What kind of flagship would this be without wireless charging? Power 50 W for wireless charger it's really decent, and here the OnePlus 9 Pro compensates for not all of the battery. In terms of battery life, it's well-balanced, but if you use your smartphone really often every day, you'll often have it on the charger. However, this is not a big problem, because you will get the daily juice in about 15 minutes.
We just enjoy Oxygen OS 11
We have been testing OnePlus smartphones since seventh generation and their superstructure Oxygen OS we still enjoy it very much. Significant improvements have been made here over the last year, such as Always-on-AMOLED, which has been ironically missing for a long time. Otherwise, it still maintains its design purity and smoothness, although with this model a few things still need to be fine-tuned, because we recorded a few crashes and subsequent restarts of the launcher.
The biggest pluses of Oxygen OS 11, in our opinion, are a modern and clean design with a notification bar, rich system customization options (icon packs, colors of interactive elements, dynamicool backgrounds, creative screensavers, nice animations, ...), system stability / fluidity and excellent built-in applications.
Although we recorded a few restarts of the launcher at higher device temperatures and working with the camera application, everything is beautifully smooth and trouble-free during normal operation. In this case, it will probably be an unadjusted version of the latest Oxygen OS.
We discussed the adaptation of the system in detail in the review on OnePlus 8Tso you can read everything from this part of the superstructure there. Smartphones have the same version of the system, they are identical in this. We also write here about a handy application OnePlus Switchwith which you get files from your old smartphone to your new one very conveniently and wirelessly, including launcher settings.
Motion smoothing and ultra-high resolution
A novelty in the system and specifically in the OnePlus 9 series is motion smoothing function. This ensures that videos are displayed more smoothly, depending on which application you choose. We used it mainly for YouTube. It's an alternative to the MEMC function used by smart TVs, where postprocessing artificially increases the frame rate of the video, and that's what it looks like. much smoother.
This feature works automatically when the video is running in full screen, in landscape mode. We noticed a slight loss of video quality, but it's great that you can get a nicer and smoother result even from a normal 30 fps shot.
The function will also be interesting ultra-high resolution, but it only supports Instagram and WeChat applications. We also had Facebook, Youtube, Twitter or Messenger installed on our test device, but these are not supported.
The highest available power
Inside the OnePlus 9 Pro is located Snapdragon 888 from the American Qualcomm, followed by the Adreno 660 graphics chip. 8 GB and 12 GB of RAM are available for the Pro variant. Lwhich is quite sufficient. The storage memory has a capacity of 128 GB and 256 GB and is of the type UFS 3.1 2-LANE. Here, someone would certainly like to see the 512 GB option, but we personally like the 256 GB variants as the largest.
The smartphone performance segment has been a really boring part for at least the last year. Every manufacturer already has the best Snapdragon processors, large RAM memories or the fastest storages available, and the differences between flagships are really in small details that the average user will not even notice. Therefore, we did not focus primarily on this part, but of course we performed tests on Geekbench and 3DMark. You can see them below.
There is no lack of haptic vibrations or stereo
Of course, it has been a part of all flagships for about two years now haptic vibration motor. It provides a much wider range of vibrations and different levels will also give you different types of feedback, thanks to which you will immediately know what it is. You will use this feature especially in games.
Of course they are not missing stereo speakers with Dolby Atmos® sound and microphones with active noise cancellation. However, the quality of the top speaker is not as top-level as we could feel with the Xiaomi Mi 11. So it's just a classic secondary speaker used for calling, which is synchronized with the main bottom. However, it is not such a big negative, we have external speakers and headphones for proper sound quality.
As for other equipment, it goes without saying NFCwhich we actively use for contactless payments, Bluetooth 5.2 with aptX & aptX HD & LDAC & AAC codec support, GPS (L1+L5 Dual Band), GLONASS, Galileo (E1+E5a Dual Band), Beidou, A-GPS, WiFi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac/ax also support Wi-Fi Display.
Water resistance IP68
For those who don't know, the OnePlus 9 Pro also has water resistance. However, the current versions do not contain an official one IP68 certification, only those versions sold by T-Mobile. This is due to a saving from OnePlus, because obtaining official durability certification costs a lot of money, which would make the model itself more expensive. So you don't have to be afraid. if your OnePlus 9 Pro gets wet in water, it is waterproof.
Final rating
In conclusion, we can say that the OnePlus 9 Pro is a very successful smartphone, but we do not know if it is fully worthy of its official price in Slovakia. If we don't have a global seller here Banggood, the OnePlus 9 Pro would probably not be worthy of its price / performance ratio and the Xiaomi competitor would easily trump it.
What we value most about this flagship is fast charging, the presence of wireless charging, a camera that can deliver truly stunning results, a beautiful glass design, as always a practical Oxygen OS system with a minimalist user interface and, last but not least, water resistance.
What froze us during the test were occasional launcher restarts and chopping up the camera application, especially when working with 4K video. We hope the developers will fix this inconvenience with the next update.
Available with duty-free and VAT shipping
If we have convinced you based on our review, as we mentioned at the beginning of the review, you can get the OnePlus 9 Pro from our favorite partner Banggood. Transport is without VAT and customs duties. You will probably only have to pay fee 2 € Slovak Post for automated customs procedures.
OnePlus 9 Pro global ROM
You do not pay any extra fees for Global Priority shipping.
We recommend choosing Global Priority transport, for which you will not pay extra. Customs fees and any VAT will be arranged for you directly by the seller. Shipping can only be selected in the cart, after entering the delivery address. Delivery with Global Priority usually takes about 15 days, but may take longer.
More coupons
You do not pay any extra fees for Global Priority shipping.
We recommend choosing Global Priority transport, for which you will not pay extra. Customs fees and any VAT will be arranged for you directly by the seller. Shipping can only be selected in the cart, after entering the delivery address. Delivery with Global Priority usually takes about 15 days, but may take longer.
OnePlus 50 W wireless charger
You do not pay any extra fees for Global Priority shipping.
We recommend choosing Global Priority transport, for which you will not pay extra. Customs fees and any VAT will be arranged for you directly by the seller. Shipping can only be selected in the cart, after entering the delivery address. Delivery with Global Priority usually takes about 15 days, but may take longer.
