-----------------------------Review--------------------------
- Here's the new OnePlus 7T. It's a lot like one of our favorite phones of the year, the OnePlus 7 Pro, but it's a little bit smaller and it costs less. It's a follow-on from the OnePlus 7 that was available in other markets, but not here in the US. So you can think of it more as a successor to the OnePlus 6T from last year. You'll be able to buy the 7T starting on October 18th, from either OnePlus or T-Mobile for 599 bucks, which is about 70 to 100
dollars less than the 7 Pro. Now don't let that lower price lead you into thinking that the 7T is a worse phone than 7 Pro, because in realty, between the two, it's the one that I actually prefer. (smooth synthesizer music) It still has the best parts of the 7 Pro. That super-smooth 90 hertz screen, fast and responsive performance, but it doesn't have the other things that make the 7 Pro challenging to use, like a giant size and curved edges. It also has a couple of new tricks that the 7 Pro doesn't even offer. So let's talk about specs, because when you review a OnePlus phone, you have to talk about specs.
Snapdragon 855+ processor, which is technically faster than the standard 855 in the 7 Pro, but I doubt you'd really notice much difference between them. Either way, performance
available here in the US has 8 gigs of RAM and 128 gigs of storage. Other markets like India and China are also going to get a 256 gig option. The screen has a 20 by nine aspect ratio which makes it a bit tall, but it's noticeably narrower than the 7 Pro and even last year's 6T. That, plus the flat surface, there's no waterfall curves here, make it more comfortable to hold. But you shouldn't go thinking that this is a suddenly new,
small phone from OnePlus. This is still a big phone, it's just a little smaller than the 7 Pro. The display doesn't have a
completely uninterrupted screen. There is a small water drop notch at the top for the front camera, because the 7T doesn't have the fancy pop-up motorized front camera that the 7 Pro has. Now OnePlus says this notch
is specifically 31.6% smaller than the notch on the 6T and the 7. And to be honest with you, I really haven't found it to be any problem in use over the past week or so. Now the screen supports both HDR10 and HDR10+ and it's 27% brighter in direct sunlight, thanks to a new boosted outdoor mode, which lets it get to up to a peak of 1,000 nits. There's really not a whole lot to complain about with this screen. It's bright, it's colorful, it has that fast refresh rate that's awesome. Now it's technically a lower resolution than the 1440p panel on the 7 Pro, but I really can't see a difference in sharpness between them. Now if we stop staring at the screen for a second, which, I admit, it's hard to do, we could flip the 7T over and check out its camera system. Now just like the 7 Pro and a lot of other phones out this year,
One new thing that the 7T has is a super macro mode that lets you get focused really close on an object. It can be challenging to use because it's hard to hold still and get a sharp shot at these close distances, but with a little practice, it can be a ton of fun and you won't be able to get this on the 7 Pro, even through a software update, because OnePlus tells me that to get this to work, it requires some special hardware that the 7 Pro just doesn't have. Another thing that the 7 Pro doesn't have is Warp Charge 30 plus, which is the latest version of OnePlus's proprietary fast-charging system.
The company says it's up to 23% faster than the Warp Charge 30 that's on the Pro, and it should charge the 7T's battery from zero to 100 in just 60 minutes. In my test, I was able to go from 22 to 87% in just 30 minutes, which is really impressive. But just know that, in order to get those speeds, you're going to have to use the included brick and cable that came in the box with the 7T.
The 7T is launching with Android 10 and OnePlus's OxygenOS 10, making it one of the first phones to launch with Google's latest software. Now you can choose between Android 10's new gesture interface, or the standard three buttons. But if you were a fan of OnePlus's old gestures, I'm sorry to report, those are no longer available. One new thing in OxygenOS that I particularly like is the chromatic reading mode, which desaturates the screen to make it easier to read, but it doesn't turn it fully monochrome like before. Now I like using this when I'm using Pocket or the Kindle app and doing a lot of reading, but if you prefer the older, full-style monochrome version, you can choose that if you want to. So, what's not to love with the 7T? Well, for starters, I'm only seeing average battery life with it, which is about four to five hours of screen time. Even though this thing has a big 3800 milliamp hour battery. I don't think this is a huge problem and I think most people will be able to get through a full day with the 7T, but if you saw that stat and were hoping for a multi-day monster, this ain't it. It's clear that the 90 hertz screen does take a hit on battery life, but I think it's totally worth the trade. The 7T also has the familiar OnePlus complaints. It doesn't support wireless charging, which might not matter to you, but matters to me. It doesn't have a rated official IP rating for water and dust resistance, and you can't expand the storage with a micro SD card. It also tends to aggressively shut down apps when I'm not using them, which is something the company says it'll be addressing in future software updates, but it just hasn't yet. I mostly notice this when I'm using Android messages on my computer and I can't send or receive new messages until I wake up the 7T on my desk. But I can forgive and forget a lot of those things when I consider the fact that I'm getting this screen and this performance for 600 bucks. We're expecting Google to put a similar 90 hertz display in the upcoming Pixel 4, but I guarantee that won't be available for anywhere near the price of the 7T. In fact, when I compare the 7T to any other phone right now, even the 7 Pro, I'm not sure anything else can touch this combination of display, performance and price.
-------------------Price & More Info -------------------
The main version of the OnePlus 7T will be the one with 8GB of RAM and 128GB of internal storage. This is the variant that will be available in most parts of the world, while some will get access to a model with 8GB of RAM and 256GB of internal storage.
The OnePlus 7T price for the 128GB model will be $599 here in the US. This is a slight increase over the OnePlus 6T, which launched at $549 last year. The OnePlus 7, which launched earlier this year (but not in the US) retails for €559 (~$612).
In India, the base model OnePlus 7T will be available for Rs 37,999 (~$535) while the price for the 256GB model will be Rs. 39,999 (~$564). Once again, the 7T hits India earlier than the US
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