1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:03,520 The OnePlus 13 marked a return to form for the company 2 00:00:03,520 --> 00:00:07,280 and let's see if they can continue that hot streak with the OnePlus 15. 3 00:00:07,280 --> 00:00:12,120 I am the owner of a OnePlus 13R, which is their more budget oriented version of the device 4 00:00:12,120 --> 00:00:15,520 and I'm very excited to see what they've done on the 15. 5 00:00:15,520 --> 00:00:20,160 Nothing interesting in there, except for a USB-A to USB-C adapter. 6 00:00:20,160 --> 00:00:23,440 What? Maybe this is something to do with the charger. I don't know, we'll set that aside for now. 7 00:00:23,440 --> 00:00:28,360 Before we get to the phone, we'll look at the rest of the box. One of the most exciting parts of the OnePlus 15 8 00:00:28,360 --> 00:00:32,040 is that it is the debut of Snapdragon's latest high-end 9 00:00:32,040 --> 00:00:35,720 chip, the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5. 10 00:00:35,720 --> 00:00:40,800 The names just keep getting longer, ladies and gentlemen. Inside we have a, whoa my gosh, 11 00:00:40,800 --> 00:00:47,520 you get their Super VUK fast charger, their proprietary still USB-A charging brick. 12 00:00:47,520 --> 00:00:51,960 It charges 120 watts on 240 volt and 80 watts on 120 volt. 13 00:00:51,960 --> 00:00:55,480 And that's good that it's gonna be nice and fast because it's a big battery. 14 00:00:55,480 --> 00:01:00,480 The dual cell battery in this thing is 7,300 milliamp hours, 15 00:01:01,440 --> 00:01:05,240 which is freaking large. It is USB-A, which is kind of annoying 16 00:01:05,240 --> 00:01:08,440 because you won't be able to use this with as many devices as you'd hoped. 17 00:01:08,440 --> 00:01:12,240 And I guess that means that this thing is not 18 00:01:12,240 --> 00:01:16,680 for the charging because you would want this to be a male USB. 19 00:01:16,680 --> 00:01:20,380 But that's all extra goodies. Let's take a look at the phone itself. 20 00:01:22,080 --> 00:01:25,760 Oh wow. The first thing I'm noticing is this interesting texture 21 00:01:25,760 --> 00:01:29,280 on the side. Usually it's just like an aluminum or titanium, 22 00:01:29,280 --> 00:01:32,440 but on this version, the Sandstorm Colorway, 23 00:01:32,440 --> 00:01:36,080 OnePlus is using something called micro arc oxidation. 24 00:01:36,080 --> 00:01:39,880 And what that basically allows them to do is apply a coating to the aluminum 25 00:01:39,880 --> 00:01:46,240 that provides it with a lot of extra durability. They're claiming 3.4 times harder than aluminum 26 00:01:46,240 --> 00:01:49,800 and 1.3 times tougher than titanium. 27 00:01:49,800 --> 00:01:55,720 Hardness refers to like it's scratch resistance and toughness refers to its ability to bend without snapping. 28 00:01:55,720 --> 00:01:59,120 It's even more iPhone-esque than it used to be. 29 00:01:59,120 --> 00:02:05,480 I think maybe that's just the rounder curves compared to the more square corners of the OnePlus 13R 30 00:02:05,480 --> 00:02:10,980 and also the OnePlus 13. And we're also getting that hint of that vertical oval glass 31 00:02:10,980 --> 00:02:15,920 that is on the very pronounced camera bump, though I don't think it's substantially more pronounced 32 00:02:15,920 --> 00:02:19,120 than it was on phones past. 33 00:02:19,120 --> 00:02:23,320 And you even get the Apple-inspired, kind of pill-shaped island there. 34 00:02:23,320 --> 00:02:27,480 All three of these sensors are 50 megapixels. You have a 116 degree ultra-wide 35 00:02:27,480 --> 00:02:30,600 and a 3.5 times optical zoom telephoto. 36 00:02:30,600 --> 00:02:38,160 And on the front, we get a 32 megapixel camera with a RGBW sensor that OnePlus claims gets 60% more light 37 00:02:38,160 --> 00:02:43,680 in your low-light selfies. It's hard to see, but there is this almost paper-like texture 38 00:02:43,680 --> 00:02:48,000 to the coloring of it that is just really nice. 39 00:02:48,000 --> 00:02:53,280 No. No. Look how they've massacred my boy. 40 00:02:53,280 --> 00:02:56,800 They got rid of the slider again. It's a button now. 41 00:02:56,800 --> 00:03:00,280 No! As disappointing as that is, you don't have to worry 42 00:03:00,280 --> 00:03:05,240 that it's gonna be a one-use button, like a Bixby sort of thing. This action button is meant to be programmed 43 00:03:05,240 --> 00:03:09,720 for a ton of different actions, just like, say, the action button on your iPhone. 44 00:03:09,720 --> 00:03:13,680 What those actions are, we'll get into a little bit later. Let's continue our way around the phone. 45 00:03:13,680 --> 00:03:17,760 At the bottom, we have our dual SIM tray, USB-C port and speaker. 46 00:03:17,760 --> 00:03:22,260 Looks basically identical to last gen. 47 00:03:22,260 --> 00:03:26,120 And at the top, you can see our microphone, as well as it looks like another port for a speaker. 48 00:03:26,120 --> 00:03:31,160 And on this side, you have your volume rocker and your power button. 49 00:03:31,160 --> 00:03:34,240 One downside of these brighter colorways, especially when they wrap around the edges, 50 00:03:34,240 --> 00:03:37,580 that you really see the edge of this phone. 51 00:03:37,580 --> 00:03:41,560 Compared to the edge of the bezels on this thing. If it's anything like my previous OnePluses, 52 00:03:41,560 --> 00:03:47,020 it's a plastic screen protector that is included on the front. It's actually a quite nice screen protector. 53 00:03:47,020 --> 00:03:50,160 And I always appreciate when they give you something like that for free. 54 00:03:50,160 --> 00:03:53,480 Let's turn the phone on, but not before I turn you on to our sponsor. 55 00:03:53,480 --> 00:03:58,000 Look at that, it's liquid glass. It's transparent, that means that it's copying Apple. 56 00:03:58,000 --> 00:04:02,280 The OnePlus 15 is running OxygenOS 16 based on Android 16, 57 00:04:02,280 --> 00:04:05,760 which I think is actually a very good Android skin. 58 00:04:05,760 --> 00:04:09,560 And it offers a lot of improved features. I think it really handles multitasking better 59 00:04:09,560 --> 00:04:14,080 than almost any other operating system at the moment. And it has stuff like this useful side dock 60 00:04:14,080 --> 00:04:17,800 that I use all the time. I am interested to see what this button's gonna do though. 61 00:04:17,800 --> 00:04:21,000 So let's press that. It's a little blatant, don't you think? 62 00:04:21,000 --> 00:04:25,920 Look at this, the animations are just cool. You want to be recognized as music. I don't want to change your settings though. 63 00:04:25,920 --> 00:04:31,120 Just like on iOS, you get a lot of different options, but they're pushing this thing called Mind Space, 64 00:04:31,120 --> 00:04:36,600 which is basically going to be like an AI assistant that's going to be based on your notes and screenshots. 65 00:04:36,600 --> 00:04:41,700 And now they're integrating it with Gemini so you can get better insights 66 00:04:41,700 --> 00:04:46,620 and give all of your data to Google, if that's like your thing. It's a very similar concept to the essential space 67 00:04:46,620 --> 00:04:50,380 on nothing phones. And the idea that OnePlus has is, I'd I quote, 68 00:04:50,380 --> 00:04:54,380 a unified and searchable repository for your digital memories, 69 00:04:54,380 --> 00:04:58,700 which honestly, if you can take a bunch of screenshots and then have them in here and then be like, 70 00:04:58,700 --> 00:05:02,820 oh, I need my BlueJays tickets or whatever. And then it'll just pull up those tickets 71 00:05:02,820 --> 00:05:06,500 out of your screenshots. That would be pretty cool. It remains to be seen. 72 00:05:06,500 --> 00:05:10,460 I think OnePlus has a kind of a bad track record with special features. 73 00:05:10,460 --> 00:05:14,140 Like they do have a dynamic island like feature, 74 00:05:14,140 --> 00:05:20,000 but very few things use it. As far as I can tell, only Spotify and Uber use that, 75 00:05:20,000 --> 00:05:24,100 though I don't know if Apple has a better track record with the dynamic island support. 76 00:05:24,100 --> 00:05:28,060 So like who knows, maybe Mind Space could be really awesome. 77 00:05:28,060 --> 00:05:33,220 Maybe it'll be just another thing on your phone. The plus key is assignable to several other tasks. 78 00:05:33,220 --> 00:05:37,380 Like you can make it be your alert slider again, but with a press and hold, 79 00:05:37,380 --> 00:05:41,060 or you can make it a camera button or flashlight button, whatever your heart desires, 80 00:05:41,060 --> 00:05:45,380 as long as it's one of these eight options. There might be apps that will allow you to implement it 81 00:05:45,380 --> 00:05:49,380 into more complex automations, but right now you have a solid selection of tasks 82 00:05:49,380 --> 00:05:52,820 that you would probably want on a hotkey like this. 83 00:05:52,820 --> 00:05:56,880 Let's keep it at Mind Space for now. And that is pretty bright. 84 00:05:56,880 --> 00:06:02,280 It's blowing out the camera for sure, right? Hell yeah. OnePlus claims 1,800 nits for its high brightness mode, 85 00:06:02,280 --> 00:06:08,140 but according to our lab's testing, it reaches 1,951 nits in a 1% window. 86 00:06:08,140 --> 00:06:13,460 By fiddling around with the settings, we were actually able to get it as high as 2,859 nits. 87 00:06:13,460 --> 00:06:18,420 It's not the brightest screen on the market, but in my opinion, it's about bright enough 88 00:06:18,420 --> 00:06:21,980 as you'll ever need for almost any setting. And I think that the brightness arms race 89 00:06:21,980 --> 00:06:27,100 is kind of coming to an end on phones. But as somebody who was chronically on my phone before bed, 90 00:06:27,100 --> 00:06:31,420 what I think is a pretty cool feature is that this reportedly gets to 0.5 nits, 91 00:06:31,420 --> 00:06:35,540 which is really low brightness. But what isn't low on this 92 00:06:35,540 --> 00:06:39,420 is the 165 Hertz refresh rate display, 93 00:06:39,420 --> 00:06:44,980 which it will only be some of the time. In day-to-day usage, this will just be a 120 Hertz display. 94 00:06:44,980 --> 00:06:48,500 LTPO, so the refresh rate can't go down to one Hertz if there's a static image on there 95 00:06:48,500 --> 00:06:52,540 to help with battery life. But if you want access to the 165 Hertz display, 96 00:06:52,540 --> 00:06:56,300 you do need to be in game mode. So it's really just kind of a gaming thing. 97 00:06:56,300 --> 00:07:01,300 And if mobile gaming is your thing, you'll be happy to know that they have a super high sample rate digitizer 98 00:07:01,300 --> 00:07:04,600 for super responsive touches, sweeps, 99 00:07:04,600 --> 00:07:07,680 and whatever you do in the game. You'll whirdle like never before. 100 00:07:07,680 --> 00:07:12,640 And with the new Snapdragon chip, this thing is pretty damn fast. 101 00:07:12,640 --> 00:07:16,080 Across our suite of benchmarks, the OnePlus 15 performed better than the OnePlus 13 102 00:07:16,080 --> 00:07:21,080 by 19 to 22% and better than the S25 Edge by 14 to 19%. 103 00:07:22,080 --> 00:07:28,280 That's a pretty impressive generational uplift, assuming that this isn't just sucking back even more juice 104 00:07:28,280 --> 00:07:32,400 than the last Snapdragon Elite chip did. Because if your phone is sucking back 20 watts, 105 00:07:32,400 --> 00:07:37,040 it's just gonna overheat and throttle. Qualcomm claims that they made substantial efficiency gains 106 00:07:37,040 --> 00:07:40,940 on this generation of chip, but let's see what it looks like in our stress test benchmark. 107 00:07:40,940 --> 00:07:45,400 And in that stress test, on average, the OnePlus 15 outperforms the OnePlus 13 by 10%, 108 00:07:45,400 --> 00:07:48,600 but destroys the S25 Edge by 56%. 109 00:07:48,600 --> 00:07:51,720 You can tell that cooling is very important 110 00:07:51,720 --> 00:07:55,760 for keeping these high power chips running smoothly. But it's not quite the same uplift 111 00:07:55,760 --> 00:08:00,160 that we saw on our shorter benchmarks. While the thermals might not be 100% solved, 112 00:08:00,160 --> 00:08:03,080 efficiency gains should translate into improved battery life. 113 00:08:03,240 --> 00:08:10,480 And boy, howdy, do we have improved battery life. The OnePlus 15 gets 29 hours in our battery test. 114 00:08:10,480 --> 00:08:16,800 Compare that to the 20 hours of our OnePlus 13. That's like a 50% increase in screen on time. 115 00:08:16,800 --> 00:08:20,120 We actually ran the whole battery test again, just in case there was a fluke. 116 00:08:20,120 --> 00:08:25,040 But no, this thing is a battery life champ. And that big battery will charge super fast 117 00:08:25,040 --> 00:08:29,840 with their included SuperVook charger. Our charging test doesn't use proprietary chargers. 118 00:08:29,840 --> 00:08:33,000 We stick to a standard 45 watt USB-C charger 119 00:08:33,000 --> 00:08:37,640 and to get this phone from zero to 100, it took about one hour and 20 minutes, 120 00:08:37,640 --> 00:08:41,280 which is about 20 minutes better than the Galaxy S25 Edge. 121 00:08:41,280 --> 00:08:44,720 So, cool. It does support Qi charging, 122 00:08:44,720 --> 00:08:47,800 but it doesn't include magnets, so no MagSafe. 123 00:08:47,800 --> 00:08:51,180 But you're probably just gonna use the included charger. Oh, and one more cool feature 124 00:08:51,180 --> 00:08:56,400 that OnePlus tossed in there is bypass charging. So if you're playing a game and you're plugged into the wall, 125 00:08:56,400 --> 00:09:01,600 you don't have to worry about heating up the battery by charging the battery. You can just power the phone directly from the wall. 126 00:09:01,800 --> 00:09:04,840 The phone is powered by a USB-C charger. 127 00:09:04,840 --> 00:09:07,880 The battery is powered by a USB-C charger. 128 00:09:07,880 --> 00:09:12,280 They don't get that loud, but they do sound quite good. One thing I do appreciate is that they've added a vent 129 00:09:12,280 --> 00:09:15,800 at the top for better stereo sound. So it's not like a big bottom speaker 130 00:09:15,800 --> 00:09:20,400 plus a tinny earpiece speaker. You get a little bit better performance from the top, 131 00:09:20,400 --> 00:09:23,760 which is gonna be great if you're somebody who likes watching movies. Cameras. 132 00:09:23,760 --> 00:09:27,820 The camera experience on OxygenOS is very reminiscent of iOS 133 00:09:27,820 --> 00:09:32,100 and is not deviated substantially from previous camera modes. 134 00:09:32,100 --> 00:09:36,660 And let's see about that low light performance. 135 00:09:36,660 --> 00:09:40,820 Honestly, pretty impressed. They did make you look pretty pale, Belle. 136 00:09:40,820 --> 00:09:44,680 Overall detail in the darker parts of the scenes are pretty good and the studio lights 137 00:09:44,680 --> 00:09:49,140 didn't absolutely destroy all the detail in the corner. 138 00:09:49,140 --> 00:09:52,820 The color might need some work, 139 00:09:52,820 --> 00:09:55,060 but the quality on the telephoto 140 00:09:56,060 --> 00:10:00,260 is quite good for this low light shot. 141 00:10:00,260 --> 00:10:04,260 It did do the longer exposure. Does this have optical image stabilization? 142 00:10:04,260 --> 00:10:05,180 I sure hope so. 143 00:10:07,820 --> 00:10:11,260 Taking the video right now, the phone struggles with matching the image 144 00:10:11,260 --> 00:10:15,540 between the lenses, at least in the viewfinder. 145 00:10:15,540 --> 00:10:18,600 That's something that Apple's gotten really good at. So it's a lot less jarring when you zoom 146 00:10:18,600 --> 00:10:22,740 all the way in on something and then zoom all the way out. A pretty stable video. 147 00:10:22,740 --> 00:10:25,860 I was shaking the camera that whole time. What we're doing right now is not enough 148 00:10:25,860 --> 00:10:30,220 to give a full conclusion on the cameras for this, especially for those who are worried 149 00:10:30,220 --> 00:10:33,620 about the lack of the Hasselblad partnership that ended. 150 00:10:33,620 --> 00:10:37,080 I'm pretty impressed by it in this room, but obviously your mileage may vary. 151 00:10:37,080 --> 00:10:41,260 I'm not really a videographer, but OnePlus has included a bunch of cool new features 152 00:10:41,260 --> 00:10:46,300 for creators, which includes log video recording in OnePlus's proprietary color space. 153 00:10:46,300 --> 00:10:49,460 OnePlus has also added what they claim is an industry first, 154 00:10:49,460 --> 00:10:53,380 and that is live LUT previews. So if you're recording in RAW, 155 00:10:53,380 --> 00:10:58,860 instead of monitoring a washed out gray image, it'll apply a LUT that will make your footage look 156 00:10:58,860 --> 00:11:02,300 more like how it should after editing. And that's gonna be cool if you're somebody 157 00:11:02,300 --> 00:11:07,020 who's maybe a travel vlogger, because this also has an underwater mode, 158 00:11:07,020 --> 00:11:11,020 which allows you to use the camera app with just the buttons on the phone. 159 00:11:11,020 --> 00:11:15,540 And you might be thinking, oh well, it must be IP rated to be underwater. 160 00:11:15,540 --> 00:11:22,020 And oh boy, is it ever IP rated. It's IP66, IP68, IP69, and IP69K, 161 00:11:22,020 --> 00:11:26,460 which means it can be submerged and blasted with water up to 80 degrees Celsius. 162 00:11:26,460 --> 00:11:30,540 Who's doing that to their phone? I don't know, but it is really nice to see the focus on durability. 163 00:11:30,540 --> 00:11:35,140 And OnePlus claims you can even use this in minus 20, and Labs actually confirmed that 164 00:11:35,140 --> 00:11:38,580 by tossing this in our environmental chamber, and it still works. 165 00:11:38,580 --> 00:11:42,820 So if you are a Canadian who forgets their phone in their car, you don't have to worry, 166 00:11:42,820 --> 00:11:45,820 unless it's lower than minus 20, which happens. 167 00:11:47,940 --> 00:11:51,500 It's like, I don't know, I'm not, that's not an impressive selfie. 168 00:11:51,540 --> 00:11:54,740 Being a flagship phone, there's an endless list of features. So we're gonna just speed run through 169 00:11:54,740 --> 00:11:59,260 some of the interesting ones. It's got Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6, UAV grade gyroscope. 170 00:11:59,260 --> 00:12:06,460 It's got the world's fastest smartphone RAM. We're talking LPDDR5X, running at 10,667 megabits per second 171 00:12:06,660 --> 00:12:11,740 in the 16 gig variant. It's got a dedicated Wi-Fi chip for a 50% faster Wi-Fi, 172 00:12:11,740 --> 00:12:14,940 360 cryo velocity cooling where it's trying to avoid 173 00:12:14,940 --> 00:12:19,580 sending too much heat to your display. It's got 4K, 120 FPS Dolby Vision HDR, 174 00:12:19,580 --> 00:12:24,100 real-time tone mapping and a bunch of AI stuff if you're really into that. 175 00:12:24,100 --> 00:12:29,820 Combine that with the performance, the battery life, the screen, you have a solid package in this phone. 176 00:12:29,820 --> 00:12:33,860 And speaking of the screen, it's actually fully flat, so it's easy to apply a screen protector 177 00:12:33,860 --> 00:12:37,020 and it's less fragile. The OnePlus 13, it was not completely flat, 178 00:12:37,020 --> 00:12:41,540 and it was super annoying, but now it's good, it's nice. 179 00:12:41,540 --> 00:12:45,220 Yeah, I think that if you are looking for a phone, 180 00:12:45,220 --> 00:12:49,540 this should be a real contender. However, the question remains, what does it cost? 181 00:12:49,540 --> 00:12:54,540 OnePlus has gone from flagship killer to flagship and it will be available for $899 182 00:12:54,540 --> 00:12:58,620 for the 12 256 gig version or $999 183 00:12:58,620 --> 00:13:02,060 for the 16 gig 512 version. So what do you think? 184 00:13:02,060 --> 00:13:05,300 Is that a fair price? Let us know in the comments below. And if you enjoyed this video, 185 00:13:05,300 --> 00:13:09,700 why don't you check out some of our other phone videos, maybe the Pixel 10 perhaps? 186 00:13:10,860 --> 00:13:11,700 Perhaps?