OnePlus 9 Pro IN-DEPTH Review // One Month Later By Sam Beckman

This is the OnePlus 9 pro, and it's the latest high-end flagship phone from OnePlus that they are hoping will be compelling enough to compete amongst the big leagues in a world where phones like the galaxy, s21 ultra exist, or the Xiaomi mi 11 ultra or even phones like the iPhone 12 Pro max or the Oppo fine x3 pro OnePlus could feel the need to really add all these bells and whistles to help sway towards buying this phone. And yet what it really feels like is just a further refinement of their tried and true methods, and so it begs the question: are there enough reasons to make this phone worth getting, and so, as always, given that the phone was released just over a month ago, after a few software updates and after extended use with the phone, it's finally time to unpack my thoughts, let's dive in now in terms of design? The first question I want to ask is this: why do phone companies still persist with these glossy finishes? On the back like that is a genuine question. Four or five years ago sure matte finishes on the backs of our phones. Were pretty rare, but these days so many phones have frosted matte glass finishes even OnePlus. Does them really well and in fact the pine green version of this phone has a matte finish, and let me ask you this: one plus: have you ever seen a review of one of your phones where the reviewer has said they prefer a glossy finish on the back of the phone compared to a matte. Frosted finish I feel like the answer is: definitely not I don't know, maybe they're cheaper to manufacture, or the numbers suggest that most average consumers prefer buying the glossy variants.

But this is one that I can't really get my mind around and to everyone thinking about getting an OnePlus 9 pro who hasn't bought one. Yet I would highly recommend going with the pine green version simply because it is the only variant that has a matte frosted finish on the back the morning, mist variant that I have, which I'll admit visually, looks really nice. Well, because of that glossy finish. It's just about darn well near the slipperiest phone I've used in a long time. It's honestly slipped out of my pocket and onto the couch more times than I feel comfortable with, and so given how expensive this phone is.

I've actually started using it in a case from today's video sponsor rhino shield, so rhino shields, lineup of cases is not only highly protective, but they're also really customizable, which means you can protect your phone whilst having it look really slick. At the same time, they come in a huge variety of styles and finishes, and on top of their incredible in-house designs, they've actually also done a bunch of name collaborations as well, including with PewDiePie NASA League of Legends plus, a bunch more all of which will be available for the OnePlus 9 pro. You can even design your own case if you're looking to make your phone unique. Aside from that, the protection you get from using a rhino shield case is top tier pair it with one of their impact screen, protectors, and you're. Pretty much golden their cases are available for a huge collection of phones, and they come with a lifetime.

Warranty and rhino shield also offers free worldwide shipping for qualified orders. You can actually get 20 off their cases for the next 48 hours by using the discount code, Sam Beckman or, if you're, watching this video. After that time period, you can still get a handy 10 off so make sure that you check out all of their incredible cases and consider picking one up for your phone using the first link down in the description below. But aside from the finish on the back of the phone, everything else in terms of design feels fairly familiar compared to their previous flagships. I will say the display is ever so slightly less curved compared to last year's OnePlus 8 pro, which is something I have appreciated, and speaking of the display, the one on this phone does feel like a slight improvement over the already fantastic displays, we've seen from OnePlus in the past.

It gets quite nice and bright. It's really vivid and sharp, particularly if you set it to its max HD plus resolution, but then, more than anything it's the fluidity of the display that makes the experience of using this phone so good. Furthermore, it's still a 120 hertz panel, but now OnePlus calls it smart.120 hertz because it dynamically adjusts the frame rate to as low as one hertz, depending on what the phone is doing now. I'd actually say that this is possibly one of the things that has been improved even further since launch. Am I've not experienced any lags or moments where it's felt like the display has had to catch up with what I'm doing so really an close to a plus score for me, with this display only coming down one notch, given that other flagship displays can go even brighter just quickly touching on this fingerprint sensor, no pun intended when I first saw that it was positioned lower on the display compared to previous models from OnePlus? I'll admit that I was a bit perplexed, but it didn't take as long to adjust to as I thought it would.

But with that said, it doesn't seem quite as fast or reliable as the previous in-display sensors. I've used in phones like the OnePlus 8t or the OnePlus 8 pro, and that's even after registering my main finger twice, and so I do wonder if this is a result of having it lower on the display. Rather than there being something wrong with the tech itself, either way, I'd still like to know the reason why OnePlus decided to move it down. My hope and guess is that they'll probably move it back up for the next phones that they release. Now, as for haptics man, are they great on this phone? Such a quality, haptic motor is being used here, but, what's even better, I think, is how OnePlus has refined their implementation of the haptics throughout the software experience.

So things like feeling a bunch of little taps as you adjust the volume or brightness sliders, or even just the little taps. You feel when swiping up into the reasons menu or when you're typing, and the great thing is that they're subtle they're not over the top, like what I've experienced with past one plus phones, and it's this subtlety, along with the fantastic hardware that makes the haptics so pleasing. As for software and performance, I'm not going to spend too long talking about this, because I've raved about OnePlus software a lot in my past videos, but long story short thanks to all the really fluid animations and just the overall optimization on this phone. Put simply it's incredible. Everything positive I've had to say about OnePlus software and performance over the past year is true about this phone, but just dialed up even that little further, but one area that has left a little to be desired is battery life.

I've actually struggled almost every single day to get through to the end of the day, without feeling like I should top it up like. I have made it to the end of pretty much every day, but that's by the skin of my teeth on some days with the phone sitting at like one to two percent of battery life left when I'm going to bed, I thought perhaps dialing back the display resolution setting to full HD would help. But, to be honest, I didn't really notice a difference. One thing that might be causing an impact, though, is that OnePlus phones do have aggressive battery optimization so much so that they've become somewhat infamous for how a lot of the notifications on OnePlus phones just don't come in because of the battery optimization that's occurring now, because I'm someone who relies on a lot of notifications. I often find myself going into some apps settings and switching the battery optimization off that largely fixes the notification issue, but I'm guessing this is causing slightly more battery drain than usual.

That said, I've turned off battery optimization on past OnePlus phones. For the same reasons, the battery life on the OnePlus 9 pro is still far worse than what I've experienced with those phones, so whether this is something that can be addressed in another software update in the near future, maybe hopefully but right now. Battery life has definitely been disappointing for me. So then we have the cameras, the biggest change on paper. By far for this year's lineup of OnePlus phones, we have that fancy Hasselblad branding on the back, which indicates a partnership between the two companies, and the first thing I wanted to test was how it took portrait photos of people, because this is an area I believe OnePlus phones have always struggled with.

To put it simply for some portrait photos. I can definitely see some slight improvements. They don't look quite as fake as they once did, which could be attributed to the color and lighting tuning enhancements. That may be occurring thanks to the Hasselblad partnership, but then, in some scenarios I actually prefer the portrait photos taken with the OnePlus 8t, but in pretty much all scenarios, I still prefer the portrait images taken using the Guam mod on the OnePlus 8t. I even found a working mod for the OnePlus 9 pro, which even supports the three different lenses, but it looks as though the HDR plus mode isn't really working, so I wouldn't rely on it just yet for taking portrait images in extreme scenarios, but aside from portrait photos in all honesty, I've always been pretty well satisfied with the non-portrait images.

OnePlus phones have taken in good lighting conditions compared to previous OnePlus phones. Images taken with the nine pro are definitely consistently cooler in their color palette, and they're also a little flatter as well, which I kind of like, but really in regard to images taken using the main sensor. A lot of it will just come down to personal preference. The ultra-wide lens, on the other hand, is where I can see pretty significant improvements in regard to both processing, but also just clarity. Images taken with this lens are consistently sharper and cleaner, and yet they still look more natural and less over processed compared to photos taken using the ultrawide lens on the OnePlus 8t.

For example. I've also noticed some small improvements when it comes to video quality over past OnePlus phones, which I think is largely thanks to processing. Again. Videos are slightly cooler and flatter, but still really nice and crisp, and I think, there's also less noise in darker areas of videos as well. It's also really nice and somewhat surprising that we can now capture 4k 120 videos with the 9 pro, and we can also capture 4k 60 videos using the ultra-wide lens which past OnePlus phones couldn't do and whilst 8k is certainly not for everyone, it at least means this phone is competing with the big leagues in pretty much all features related to video capturing.

But is it the huge camera improvements? OnePlus was promising us when these phones first launched well, I think with the ultrawide. Yes, it's probably one of the best ultra-wide lenses on any smartphone right now, but as for the main sensor, not really I mean the photos are good, but they're, still not top of the pack, and I'll be eagerly awaiting a working google camera mod that has HDR plus working properly, and I'll, probably use that for photos. I take of people going forward, and so there it is that's my thoughts on the OnePlus 9 pro a month after its release without question. This is a really great phone, and it might even be the one I continue using for the vast majority of this year and whilst OnePlus are definitely moving in the right direction, with what they're doing with the cameras on their phones, as evidenced with the OnePlus 9 pro I'd, say that in terms of price, they are definitely moving in the wrong direction. If OnePlus can't find a way to keep a lid on these ever-increasing prices, well, their phone's just going to become impossible to recommend, particularly at launch, because no matter how good a phone might be and how impressive its feature set is.

I will always search far and wide for phones that offer incredible value for money and for each dollar over a thousand dollars that becomes an increasingly tougher and tougher job to do a big thank you to rhino shield for supporting the channel, don't forget to use the code Sam Beckman at checkout to get 20 off your order for the next 48 hours or 10 after that. But, aside from that, hopefully you enjoyed the video. Thank you all very much for watching, and I will catch you later. You.

Source : Sam Beckman