Mobile, OnePlus | Test: OnePlus Nord 2

You can’t get more money for money than this.

A little over a year ago, OnePlus released a new mobile phone that hit the market like a bombshell. The first model from the North It was a low-cost phone that could embarrass competitors’ flagship models in some ways. It was just a very cool phone.

This phone was so good that OnePlus itself couldn’t compete with it. the last two Cheap phones from OnePlus tried to use Nord’s success in the name, but both It was a huge disappointment.

But now they’ve finally come up with a complete successor, and once again OnePlus is showing that they really can when they want to.

Most important first: at the time of writing, the phone costs 4,500 NOK for 128 GB storage and 8 GB of RAM, and an additional 700 NOK for 256 GB and 12 GB RAM – exactly half the price of the flagship 9 Pro model. costs. In comparison, the cheapest iPhone 12 model costs 9000 kroner.

And what’s impressive about Nord 2 isn’t the specs themselves – but how little you really lose, while paying half the price.

Almost pioneering model

The phone has taken serious inspiration from the new top-of-the-line Oneplus 9 Pro model, but that’s where they’ve tried to cut costs in a way that isn’t particularly noticeable.

First, the phone has such a build quality that it’s almost hard to distinguish the models when you hold it in your hand. It is solid and densely built. It has all the physical buttons as the top model – including a three-stage silent mode switch.

Inside, it packs an impressive 4,500mAh battery, and it’s got what’s become OnePlus’s spin-off that puts competitors in the corner of shame: It charges at a full 65W. It’s almost horrible when you walk out the door, discover you have very little power, and only plug it in for a few minutes while you’re ready.

From almost empty to 40 percent this is done in 6-7 minutes. In practical terms, this means that this is a mobile phone that never runs out of power, as it is very fast to recharge.

The downside is that she thinks this is a good case that she’s found wireless charging to be an area that could cut back, so you don’t get it.

the screen

When it comes to making a phone at half the price, it’s inevitable to make some compromises on the screen. But no sense has been chosen: it is a 6.43 “OLED screen with a refresh rate of 90 Hz, with a resolution of 2400×1080 pixels.

To make the long story short, we’re not convinced that many will notice the difference between this and the more pixel-dense version found on the Pro 9 under normal circumstances. It’s fast, responsive and good at everything.

If we want to highlight a few weaknesses, they are not as bright as the best on the market – more specifically, they are limited to 600 lumens. This means that it is not shiny in direct sunlight. It also lacks automatic white balance, which means the screen can appear slightly blue indoors in yellow light.

dim camera

Where the OnePlus 9 Pro could boast Hasselblad optics, the Nord 2 model had to scrap this flaunting point, but it’s still a fairly user-friendly solution that they’ve gone for:

Wide angle: 50 MP Sony sensor, f1.88 w/OIS
Supervidvinkel: 8 megapiskel, smoothed 119.7, f2.25
Single Sensor: 2 MP, f.2.5
Front camera: 32 MP, f.2.45

OnePlus continues to insist on putting on a monochrome camera that is unusable for anything, and will most likely boast a triple camera solution. It can only be overlooked.

When it comes to the quality of the photos, they are generally better than expected. Big Brother photos are shot twice as well as photos with less noise in dark surroundings, but in contrast Nord 2 seems to retain more detail more often.

Under good lighting conditions, most things are good enough at the moment, and it’s more about detail when checking image quality. The Nord 2 can blow out a bit more detail in the bright areas than the 9 Pro, but the images also come out crisper. Postprocessing doesn’t seem to involve any particular blur action, something we like.

It is worth noting that the autofox function is fast and accurate, which makes it easy to take pictures of wild children.

At the ultra-wide angle, there’s a much more noticeable difference between the cameras, with Nord 2 struggling a bit for photos in the dark.

On the other hand, actually, there is a 32MP selfie camera which is quite impressive for the price..

If you’re a video fanatic, you should probably look elsewhere, because OnePlus dropped video formats on FullHD, but that’s good enough for most of us. The videos are completely usable view-based on social media quality, and include image stabilization so you don’t get dizzy from watching.

Brand new processor

Where OnePlus seems to have saved the most money is not going to Qualcomm for the chipset. Instead, a somewhat unknown processor from MediaTek called Dimensity 1200-AI is used, in our case with 12 GB of memory. This is an ARM-based processor like most others on the market with a total of eight cores, which are simply divided into three different groups.

We measured it at a Geebench score of 807/2538, which is about 30% faster than last year’s Nord model with a Qualcomm processor, but about 35% slower than the 9 Pro, which is one of the fastest mobiles on the market with a Snapdragon 888 processor.

And to make a long story short: That’s more than good enough for 99 percent of all users out there. The phone feels silky smooth and responsive in everything it does, and even in gaming it has the ability to turn around.

conclusion

Oneplus Nord 2 isn’t the best mobile phone on the market, but it never tried to pretend it was. But with smart cuts and alternative solutions, you have a very mobile phone for the money.

OLED display with a high refresh rate, the best charging solution on the market, more than enough good performance, good build quality, smart buttons – and camera quality that beats its weight class. What more could one want?

Well, the memory card reader was just fine, but beyond that, it seems that OnePlus has just lowered it enough, in just the right places, that this appears to be one of the safest mobile purchases for you who don’t have to have it to death. Better but who doesn’t want any rails.

We think this is the best mobile phone buy on the market.