As 2014 comes to a close, all of the players on the mobile scene have played their hands.   HTC has the M8, LG brings the G3, Motorola brought both the Moto X & the Nexus 6, Apple with a pair of iPhone 6 devices, and Samsung with their Galaxy Note 4.  There was a new player in town desired form the heads over at Oppo called the OnePlus One.  

The OnePlus One was announced in April, have been out since June, and it still just as hard to get ahold of one.  All of that is about to change as they'll begin taking pre-orders next week.  It will definitely beat relying on their invite-only system.  We finally got on hands on the OnePlus One here at TSGB. After spending months with it, we are ready to give you our full review of the device. Let’s dive in and take a look at OnePlus’ first Smartphone offering.

oneplus box

oneplus one review

Design

From the moment you pick up the One you can feel the quality. I am not the first, and probably won’t be the last to tell you how wonderful the sandstone back feels. It is truly like nothing I have ever felt before on a phone. The hardware keys have a nice click to them, and the capacitive buttons (should you choose to use them) are responsive and have a nice vibration to them. The only potential negative is a personal issue that some people might have due to the physical size of the phone. The One is TALL. It features large bezels on both the top and bottom of the phone, and feels every bit of how massive a 5.5” screen phone can be.

one plus chris

Display

The screen on the One is a great display. In a world with the LG G3 and its QHD display the One and it’s IPS display can still hold it’s own. The colors are bright and vibrant, but not over saturated. I also didn’t have any issues with the phone outside either. I was able to see outside just fine even on the brightest of days. I’ve seen other reviews where the reviewer has complained about the screen outdoors, but I had no problems at all with the screen set to auto. I usually manual adjust my screen and keep the brightness between 15-30% most of the time indoors.  Job well done, OnePlus team.

Performance/Battery Life

Under the hood, the One features a Snapdragon 801 quad core processor, 3GB of RAM, a 5.5” IPS display, 5MP front facing camera, 13MP rear shooter and a 3100 mAh battery. The phone flies through any and everything I’ve thrown at it. No game or app or combination of the 2 could slow this phone down. The speakers on the One are something worth noting as well. They are the best speakers I’ve heard on a phone outside of the HTC One series of phones. Despite being bottom firing speakers, they are really quite nice.

The One Plus One offers the best battery life i’ve seen on a phone bar none. I am extremely taxing on my batteries. Since entering the post-iPhone world, I haven’t had a phone that gave me all day battery life no matter how big the battery was. I have used just about every flagship to come out since the original iPhone and still nothing could keep me away from the charger before 5:00p.m.. The One is the first phone that I can make it all day with. When I go to plug in my phone at night, usually around midnight, I still have between 20-40% left. I don’t know what Cyanogen and the team at OnePlus did to achieve this, but let me be the first to sing their praises.

OnePlus One camera 

Camera

The camera on the One is surprisingly good. Usually with a budget phone, that skimp somewhere, and the camera is what usually is the first thing to take a hit. But OnePlus (and Cyanogen) actually deliver a quality experience. The hardware of the same is solid. It features a 13MP camera capable of shooting 4K video and 120FPS slow motion. The shutter is quick, the focus is accurate, which is paramount when your phone is your primary camera. There are TONS of settings, from different filters to shooting moods. The 5MP front-facing camera is great too. Cyanogen and OnePlus have thrown everything but the kitchen sink into this camera.

oneplus software

Software

Software is an interesting category for the OnePlus One. The One is running Cyanogen Mod out of the box, without having to root and ROM the phone like you normally would have to do in order to Cyanogen on your phone. For all intents and purposes, this is a pretty stock build of Android when you get it. It looks and runs a lot like stock Android, minus the a few software tweaks. The icons are different and the lockscreen is unique to the One, but other than that, this is stock Android at it’s finest. What makes the One special though is you have to freedom to really made the device your own.

oneplus software 2

One of the best features that comes on the One is the Theme Showcase. You have the option to change just about every aesthetic of the phone. You don’t like the icons, change them. You don’t like the boot animation, change it. You don’t like the system colors, change them. You don’t like the sounds effects you have, you can change those too. And, you’re not tied to one theme at a time. You want the sound effects from one, the icons from another and the boot animation from another, you can have them all together. When it comes to customization, there’s no better phone on the market. There are a few other system tweaks that benefit the One as well, such as the audio EQ that gives you more control for music playback. There are also gestures you can do with the screen off that can turn your screen on or access the camera or torch (flashlight).

 

oneplus review grade

 The OnePlus One: affordable, beautiful, & powerful.

TG 2 Cents

The One is one of the best phones out on the market today. It can go toe to toe with any of the flagships currently out, or will be coming out, this year. But none of that is what makes the OnePlus One special. What really makes the phone special is the price. For $300 you can purchase this phone. There’s no other phone that has the specs that this phone has at its price-point.

With all that said, there is one REALLY big problem with the One. As good as the phone is, and as cheap as the phone is, you will be hard pressed to actually get your hands on one. OnePlus is running an invite system where customers have to take a number in order invited to purchase a One. The phone was released back in may and they still haven’t caught up with the demand of this phone. I was lucky enough to be given an active invite, my phone wasn’t made until after I placed my order. They really need to do something about how they are getting their devices into the hands of their customers.

To Buy Or Not To Buy

In a world of QHD screens and 41MP cameras, the OnePlus One holds it's own. The One is a top tier phone at mid-range price. With top of the line specs, a beautiful screen, and quality camera, it is incredibly hard to not recommend the OnePlus One. With rumors swirling of the removal of the invite system and open availability coming as soon as next month, the only achilles heel that the One had might soon be a thing of the past. 

OnePlus One

Categories: Review