OnePlus 11 5G review, OnePlus Buds Pro 2: gradual but noteworthy updates

OnePlus 11 5G – the successor to the OnePlus 10 Pro 5G which debuted last year – debuted in India on Tuesday. This handset might not have the word “Pro” in its name, but it’s powered by the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset and supports 100W fast charging. The company has also launched the OnePlus Buds Pro 2, which is supposed to offer big improvements over its predecessor. Meanwhile, the company also announced several other devices that will be available in the coming months, including the OnePlus 11R 5G, a new OnePlus Pad, the OnePlus TV 65 Q2 Pro, and the OnePlus Keyboard 81 Pro.

This week on Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast, host Siddharth Suvarna sits down with Editor-in-Chief Roydon Cerejo and Senior Reviewer Ali Pardiwala to discuss the OnePlus 11 5G and OnePlus Buds Pro 2 TWS headphones that launched on Tuesday. We also discuss the other new OnePlus devices that were announced at the Cloud 11 launch event which will arrive in the coming months.

The OnePlus 11 5G is the company’s most powerful smartphone to date and it didn’t have to make many changes from its predecessor, the OnePlus 10 Pro 5G. The company has also fixed some of our complaints that were present in the previous generation smartphone. You get a Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 SoC at a lower price than the iQoo 11 5G and the entry-level Samsung Galaxy S23. The company also launched another handset with a similar design, the OnePlus 11R, at the event.

Curiously, the OnePlus 11 5G doesn’t support wireless charging, a feature that was present on last year’s model. However, all cameras have been upgraded by the company. Macro mode is back and the ultra-wide camera is better, as we noted in our review. However, it only has an (unofficial) IP64 rating and the selfie camera is much worse than the OnePlus 10 Pro. If things like wireless charging and better waterproofing are important to you, should you still consider last year’s model instead?

OnePlus 11 5G review: which one to beat?

The OnePlus Buds Pro 2 launched two years after the company launched its first premium earphones and brings notable improvements such as a dual-driver setup and spatial sound with head tracking. These TWS headphones are great out-of-the-box headphones, unlike the older model which was updated with support for more codecs. At this time, Hi-Res Audio streaming is locked to phones that support the LHDC audio codec, which includes phones from Xiaomi, Oppo, or OnePlus.

We also saw the OnePlus Pad, the company’s first tablet, at the event. This device will arrive in April and appears to be aimed at productivity users with its more square aspect ratio (7:5). We didn’t have much time to use the device, but stay tuned to our website and YouTube channel for a review in the coming months. Some features will be exclusive to OnePlus phones, such as connecting your OnePlus phone to share its 5G connection, or copying and pasting between devices.

OnePlus Buds Pro 2 review: Improving on a good thing

OnePlus also launched a new smart TV, the OnePlus TV 65 Q2 Pro, which comes in a single 65-inch screen size. This TV costs around Rs. 1 lakh mark and does not feature a retractable soundbar like its predecessor. It has a 70W speaker setup and a QLED display panel. It will also support Dolby Atmos, HDR content, and we hope to have a review of this device in the coming months.

Another more affordable pair of TWS headphones was also announced by the company at the event – the OnePlus Buds Pro 2R. It doesn’t support spatial audio with head tracking like the OnePlus Buds Pro 2, nor do they support wireless charging. OnePlus’ new mechanical keyboard and wireless router were also announced, but we didn’t get hands-on time with them at the launch event.

Finally, OnePlus said it would show off a new concept OnePlus smartphone at Mobile World Congress (MWC 2023) and teased what appears to be a foldable phone that could arrive in Q3 2023, but we don’t have more. any details on these phones at this point.

You can listen to all of this in detail and more in our episode by hitting the play button on the embedded Spotify player above.

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