The OnePlus 10R is a phone that is very simple to overlook. In reality, it’s just a rebranded Oppo phone with a mediocre camera setup, an unsatisfying build quality, and a software experience that’s all over the place. Yet, on the bright side, the MediaTek chip maintains consistent performance. But, the true head-turner is the blazing-fast charging speeds it offers, which is perhaps the sole feature that helps it maintain its OnePlus identity.
The OnePlus 10R isn’t a bad phone, but it fails to leave a lasting impression. This is why I think it barely latches on to the OnePlus spirit, as OnePlus has, arguably, set a high standard in the past.
Considering the fact that it is effectively a rebranded phone as well as the fact that it is associated with the OnePlus name, should you spend your money on the OnePlus 10R? The only reasons I can think of why someone would purchase this phone are its lightning-quick charging speeds and its reliable, consistent performance at a price that is significantly lower than those of full-fledged flagships. If you think that is acceptable, then you should consider purchasing this phone.
When I pulled my SIM card out of this phone, I’m going to miss being able to completely recharge it in fewer than twenty-five minutes, and that’s something I know I’ll miss. Apart from that, however, I don’t find the OnePlus 10R to be that interesting. Continue reading to find out why I believe the OnePlus 10R falls short of expectations.
OnePlus 10R design
When you first take the OnePlus 10R out of its packaging, the device’s design will be the first thing that catches your eye. Due to the fact that it has a slightly different appearance to that of the Realme GT Neo 3, I would not say that it is an exact replica of that device. Having said that, both of them use the same reference design, and the similarities between the two are striking. The color stripe aesthetics of the Realme GT Neo 3 are more appealing to me than the dual-pane design of the OnePlus 10R, but ultimately, I think it boils down to a matter of personal preference. Whether you agree or disagree, there is no denying the fact that it does not resemble anything that OnePlus would produce in any way.
My understanding is that the OnePlus 10R is the first OnePlus phone other than their special edition phones to have any kind of design element at the back of the device other than the camera island and the company logo. This is the case with the OnePlus 10R. However, that is not the only aspect of this phone that is not typical of OnePlus. It is also the first phone in the flagship series from OnePlus to do away with the alert slider. When you factor in a plastic mid-frame and a back for an unsatisfactory in-hand feel, it is easily the most divergent thing from the other flagship offerings that OnePlus has to offer. The other phones in the Nord range, including this one, have the feel of being OnePlus products, but not this one.
The OnePlus 10R has the same dimensions as the OnePlus 10 Pro in terms of height, but it weighs a significant amount less at just 186 grams. A USB Type-C port is located at the bottom of the device, and it also has dual nano-SIM card slots and dual stereo speakers. Other standard features include these. Keep in mind that there is no jack for headphones, no IP rating to indicate that it is resistant to dust or water, and no slot for a microSD card to expand the amount of storage space.
OnePlus has given the 10R an appearance that is very different from anything else on the market. Personally, I am not a huge fan of the design, but I won’t dismiss it as a poor design choice just because I don’t like it that much.
OnePlus 10R display
This phone’s display is one of the features that particularly stands out to me about it. It is comparable to the vast majority of other flagship high-end products on the market today. The screen is a massive 6.7 inches and is an AMOLED display that supports a refresh rate of up to 120 Hz and high dynamic range (HDR). Be aware that it does not support a variable refresh rate, so you will only have the option to select either the fluid 120Hz refresh rate or the 60Hz option, which is easier on the battery. Neither of these options will support a variable refresh rate.
I used the ‘Vivid’ mode on the display because that is the mode I prefer to use on most smartphones, and I did not experience any problems using it in my day-to-day life. It also gets fairly bright outside, which means that visibility issues won’t even be an issue when you’re outside. This screen is excellent in almost every way, whether you’re using it to consume media or simply to navigate the social media apps you use on a regular basis. Regarding the consumption of media, I would like to bring your attention to the fact that the dual stereo speakers found on the OnePlus 10R produce a very satisfying sound. When I am in my room by myself, I don’t feel the need to pull out my TWS to consume media even though I have observed that the speakers that fire downward are more audible than the ones that is located on the earpiece. Although there isn’t much bass, the volume gets pretty loud and the sound is nicely separated in stereo.
Performance in General, the Lifespan of the Battery, and Charging
The OnePlus 10R is the first non-Nord OnePlus phone to have a MediaTek chipset because it is equipped with the MediaTek Dimensity 8100 Max 5G SoC. This makes it the first OnePlus phone overall. Those of you who are curious may want to know that the Dimensity 8100-Max has the same central processing unit (CPU) and graphics processing unit (GPU) clock speeds as the standard variant that is powering the Realme GT Neo 3. This indicates that it possesses four cores clocked at 2.85 GHz for the Cortex-A78 and four cores clocked at 2 GHz for the Cortex-A55. You get an Arm Mali-G610 MC6 graphics processing unit (GPU). You may be wondering, “So, what’s the difference?”
The “AI performance boost” is something that OnePlus claims the Dimensity 8100-MAX will have. According to reports, the MediaTek APU 580 included within the processor provides superior AI capabilities. It integrates seamlessly with the HyperBoost Gaming Engine to provide a more consistent gaming experience along with increased frame rates when playing games. When you consider that OnePlus markets its ‘R’ series phones for gaming, this makes complete and utter sense.
Although I don’t spend much time playing games on my phone, I made an effort to check out the newly released Apex Legends Mobile, Genshin Impact, and Call of Duty Mobile from Respawn Entertainment. All of these games were able to be played very smoothly on the OnePlus 10R, albeit with some of the settings turned down from their maximum potential.
In both the GeekBench 5 and the PC Mark benchmarks, the OnePlus 10R achieves higher scores than the Realme GT Neo 3. It is important to note that in order to obtain the best results possible when running these benchmarks, I adjusted the settings on my phone to prioritize performance (Settings > Battery > Advanced settings > High Performance Mode). The day-to-day performance has been very strong as a direct result of these results. Even when juggling a dozen apps at once, the OnePlus 10R remains cool and collected throughout the entire process. For those in the Snapdragon community who are curious, the general performance of the Dimensity 8100-MAX is very close to matching that of the Snapdragon 888, but it does not have the heating issues that the Snapdragon 888 does.
The fact that this particular phone doesn’t overheat even when being used to run benchmarking apps or video games is one of its most intriguing characteristics. Even when it was being pushed to its limits, the OnePlus 10R was able to maintain a touch that was surprisingly cool. And in contrast to the Realme GT Neo 3, the OnePlus 10R does not produce a significant amount of heat even while it is charging, which means that you can keep on using the phone even as the battery is being replenished.
At the moment, the OnePlus 10R is operating with Oxygen 12.1, which is based on Android 12 (build number: CPH2411 11 A.04). Even though this version of OxygenOS is an improvement over the first release of OxygenOS 12, it is still not a great operating system. The whole software experience still needs a lot of work in terms of reliability, but I am happy to report that the OnePlus 10R does not have much in the way of bloatware. But, there is still room for improvement. For example, the OnePlus 10R will not permit me to download and use a launcher developed by a third party. I attempted it with a number of different launchers, but none of them worked correctly.
I also don’t like how the OnePlus Shelf can now only be accessed by swiping down from the top right corner of the screen. Why is that? It isn’t a problem for me to use Shelf because it can be helpful in certain situations; however, I’m not sure if I want to swipe down from the top of the screen to access it rather than the notification center. Also, the OnePlus Shelf operates as its own independent app rather than merely being an overlay as the notification drawer does.
Because of this, it is relatively simple to inadvertently pull it down while doing something else, such as watching a video on YouTube, which will result in the video being paused. Even as I was utilizing the OnePlus Shelf’s widgets, I experienced several of them crashing on me. In our evaluation of the OnePlus 10 Pro, we discussed this issue in addition to some other problems, so make sure you read that review as well.
I am not partial to any one Android skin in particular since I believe that every single one of them is distinctive in its own way. But, OnePlus’ OxygenOS has to be the Android skin that I dislike the most at the moment. This is primarily due to the numerous stability issues as well as the small user experience problems that are afflicting the operating system.
Before we move on to the next part of this review, I’d like to spend a little bit of time discussing the battery life of the OnePlus 10R because, in my opinion, that’s the feature that sets this phone apart from others on the market. The most expensive model of the OnePlus 10R features a battery with a capacity of 4,500 mAh and is accompanied by a charger with a power output of 150 watts. I have used the OnePlus Endurance Edition in order to write this evaluation.
OnePlus refers to it as the “Endurance Edition.” During the course of my review, I gave the OnePlus 10R several charges, and each time it took between twenty-two and twenty-five minutes for the battery to reach its full capacity.
However, it is essential to point out that the standard charging test that we employ in order to generate the charging time graphs that we use ultimately results in OxygenOS terminating its operation after around 5 minutes of working in the background. Further, as we mentioned earlier, the OnePlus 10R did not heat up nearly as much as the Realme GT Neo 3 did when charging at 150W; however, a legitimate concern could be regarding the location where the heat that is generated is being dissipated.
Even though you only get an 80W charger with the other OnePlus 10R variants, even that is faster than a lot of the other high-end flagships on the market today. Notably, the OnePlus 10R models that come bundled with an 80-watt charger each have a 5,000mAh battery, making them slightly more powerful than the model that I currently own. The longevity of the battery itself was satisfactory overall. I was able to make it through an entire workday without being concerned about whether or not the phone needed to be charged.
Even on days when I had heavy usage, such as when I played a lot of games or took the phone out for a drive to test the cameras, it was able to keep up with me. It is quite useful that on days when you feel the need to charge your device in the middle of the day, you can easily top it off for five minutes and obtain enough juice to get you through the rest of the night. It is important to keep in mind that the charging brick that provides 150W is quite large in size. When deciding between the 80W and the 150W model, it makes more sense to purchase the 80W model so that you can enjoy longer battery life throughout the day rather than shave off a few minutes from each charge. This is due to the fact that the 80W model is also fairly quick.
OnePlus 10R cameras
As I alluded to earlier in this critique, the cameras on the OnePlus 10R are not particularly impressive. I’ve been using the OnePlus 10 Pro a lot lately to capture photos and this is definitely a downgrade over that. As for the optics, it comes with a triple camera setup at the back, which includes a main sensor with optical image stabilization (OIS) that measures 50 megapixels, an ultrawide sensor measuring 8 megapixels, and a macro sensor measuring 2 megapixels. Although it is not the most adaptable setup, that is not even my primary concern of mine. To put it another way, the three sensors that are included with the OnePlus 10R do not compete on the same level.
Even though the images are processed to make them appear warmer, the main sensor can still give you some good-looking shots even though it only has 50 megapixels. It is made abundantly clear when you examine the photographs taken with the OnePlus 10R alongside those taken with other devices such as the OnePlus 10 Pro or the Galaxy S22. However, this is not the case when it comes to the ultrawide shooter; while the primary sensor can take good pictures even in low-light conditions, the ultrawide shooter simply cannot. In my opinion, nighttime ultra-wide shots that were taken with a camera should not be used for anything. It does a fairly good job during the day, but in comparison to other available devices, it is clearly a step backward.
Because there isn’t much to say about the 2MP macro sensor either, I’ll let you take a look at some camera samples that I took while I was using the phone. I took these samples during the time that I had the phone. The 16-megapixel front-facing camera takes photos that are good enough for casual use. When it comes to video, the OnePlus 10R is capable of recording in 4K at 30 or 60 frames per second; however, the 4K footage is not stabilized; therefore, if you want to get any footage that is usable out of this phone, I would recommend switching to 1080p.
OnePlus 10R price and availability
It is now possible to purchase the OnePlus 10R in the country of India:
8GB + 128GB, 80W/5000mAh: ₹38,999 (~$500)
12GB + 256GB, 80W/5000mAh: ₹42,999 (~$552)
43,999 (about $565) for the 12 GB + 256 GB, 150W Endurance Edition/4500mAh model.
It is important to note that the Endurance Edition is only offered in the color option of Sierra Black, but the ordinary models can also be purchased in the colorway of Forest Green. This is an important distinction. At this point in time, it appears as though OnePlus has no intentions to offer the OnePlus 10R in any markets other than those in Asia.
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