OnePlus 10T Review: this charger comes with a phone!

The T series for OnePlus is a weird phenomenon in the tech world. It’s the second big release for OnePlus for the year, and for the OnePlus 10T, it follows the flagship OnePlus 10 Pro model, which launched in April.

While the new OnePlus 10T has a very similar look and a top-tier processor, one look at the price tells you that it is clearly not a flagship phone, so some compromises must have been made.

After living with the phone for a while, we found one such compromise to be the camera. The 10T does not get the zoom camera of the flagship 10 Pro, replaced instead with a mostly useless 2MP macro shooter, and then a few other features like wireless charging have also been removed.

We mentioned the T series is a bit weird and that is because while being cheaper than the flagship model, the 10T also has a couple of features that are actually better than the flagship model: 150W charging speeds, for once, which is just as insane as it sounds, and then the newer version of the top-tier Snapdragon processor, which heats up less and is perfect for gamers. So can this phone be a good fit for you, and should you buy one when it launches in September? Let’s take a closer look and find out!

Get OnePlus 10T at 37% off on Amazon

Amazon directly sells you the OnePlus 10T 8/128GB configuration at an incredible price. Right now, the model in Moonstone Black is 37% cheaper.

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Before we dive in, though, let’s quickly go over the OnePlus 10T prices:

• 8/128GB — $650
• 16/256GB — $750

This is very competitive and we believe the 10T will be the cheapest phone with the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 processor in the United States when it launches in September. And having a version with 16GB of RAM (!) and double the storage for merely $100 more also sounds like a great deal.

You get the OnePlus 10T in a bright red box that is much bigger than what most other phones come in these days. The reason for its larger size is that you actually get a charger included, unlike those other phones, so for this reason we are more than happy to have a slightly larger box in our drawer.

The charger is a special one, a bit larger than your typical charging brick, and packed with technology that allows it to deliver 150 watts of power (125W if you are in the US, but more on that later). It has a single USB-C port, and you need to pair it with the Type C to Type C cable that also comes in the box. It's a thicker cable than your average USB-C cable, so that it can handle the higher load and it comes in the signature for OnePlus red color.

The charger is the big star of the unboxing, and this time around, OnePlus does not include a case for the phone inside the box, which is a bit of a disappointment. The phone does come with a pre-applied plastic screen protector though. Inside the box, you will also find the usual user manuals, a couple of OnePlus stickers, a SIM tool and other technical literature.

Below, you'd find a summary of the most important specs, but don't forget that we have an in-depth dive at the OnePlus 10T specs here. 

The thing that we would pay attention to in this specs table are the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 chip which is getting glowing reviews and is the fastest processor in use on an Android phone at the moment. Additionally, the 150W fast charging, but again, more on that later.

OnePlus 10T Design

Big phone, premium materials, but loses signature OnePlus elements like the Alert Slider

The OnePlus 10T is first and foremost a big phone with a 6.7-inch screen and a weight of more than 200 grams (7+ ounces).

It’s actually even wider, thicker and heavier than the OnePlus 10 Pro, but so slightly that you might not even notice unless you actually look at the dimensions:

• OnePlus 10T — 163 x 75.4 x 8.75mm, 203g
• OnePlus 10 Pro — 163 x 73.9 x 8.55 mm, 200g

There’s been a lot of uproar about one particular, signature OnePlus design feature that is missing on the 10T: the alert slider, aka the mute switch. It’s been a staple of OnePlus phones for years, but it seems that this time around OnePlus has decided to remove it citing the need to include more antennas for better reception, but we would have loved to have the Alert Slider to easily mute the device or put it into silent or vibrate mode, so it will be missed.

For all else, this is your typical modern day smartphone: aluminum frame, glass on the back and the front, USB-C and loudspeaker on the bottom. Oh, and no 3.5mm headphone jack too, unfortunately.

OnePlus tells us the 10T has IP54 water and dust resistance rating, which is also not quite on par with flagships toting IP68 ratings these days. The difference is that an IP54 rating signifies only dust limited ingress vs total dust protection, and protection from water sprays vs long term immersion on flagships. In other words, you would be just fine leaving the phone in the rain for a while, but you’d better not drop it in water.

OnePlus 10T Display

The OnePlus 10T comes with a 6.7-inch screen, the same size as the flagship 10 Pro model, and this is a big reason why both these phones feel extra large.

The only major difference is the slightly lower resolution: you have 1440p on the flagship 10 Pro model, while here on the 10T you get 1080p resolution. We wouldn't really sweat over this difference, unless you really have the habit of examining every individual pixel from up close.

For all else, color calibration is great and the screen gets plenty bright so you can see it outdoors under direct sunlight, no complaints here.

The 10T also supports adaptive refresh rate, meaning that the phone can automatically decide to run from 120Hz that looks buttery smooth while scrolling, and down to 90Hz or 60Hz when the higher refresh rate is not needed.

Display Measurements:

We use professional equipment to measure all sorts of display metrics which you can see above, and to see how well exactly phone makers calibrate the screens on their phones.

In terms of biometrics, the OnePlus 10T uses an in-display optical fingerprint scanner that is super fast and accurate. It’s strange how some big companies like Google struggle to implement an in-screen fingerprint reader that is at least halfway decent, while others like OnePlus have been using fast and accurate fingerprint scanners for years, and this is once again a zippy and reliable fingerprint scanner on the 10T.

You can also register your face for the image-based face unlock feature, just keep in mind that while face unlock might be even faster than the fingerprint scanning, it is still based on a 2D image rather than a safe 3D scan, so it is easier to spoof the camera and less secure compared to the fingerprint unlock.

Also read: 

OnePlus 10T Performance & Benchmarks

Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 powered, great for gamers

Equipped with the latest Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 chip, the OnePlust 10T has screaming fast performance. We’ve already mentioned that this is one of the cheapest, if not the cheapest, phone with this processor, which seems to be one of the best-made Qualcomm chips in recent years.

You have to know, however, that the phone defaults to a balanced performance mode that goes the extra mile to ensure the chip will not overheat and one consequence of that is you don't always get the maximum performance in this mode. You also have a “High performance mode”, which unleashes the chip, but OnePlus warns may decrease your battery life (enable it from Settings > Battery > Advanced settings). We noticed that in the regular mode, some benchmarks yielded results more akin to the non-plus version of the same Snapdragon chip, while enabling the high performance mode delivers that extra punch that you expect to see from this processor. Gamers might also consider running this phone in high performance mode all the time, especially if you are the kind of person who plays Genshin Impact or Diablo Immortal.

On the other hand, in daily use, we found the performance perfectly smooth and zippy, even in the default mode. The base model of the phone ships with 8GB of RAM, but we had the souped up 16GB version, which is another insane feature and allows you to keep literally dozens of apps open in the background.

You also have 128GB UFS 3.1 storage in the base model, the fastest type currently available on Android, or a 256GB in the pricier version. Keep in mind that storage is not expandable (there is no microSD card slot).

The OxygenOS skin on top of Android 12 is a mostly clean affair with a few signature OnePlus touches like the Shelf, which is essentially a one-stop shop for all sorts of widgets and shortcuts. The one thing that we love most about this skin is how well optimized it feels, every swipe is buttery smooth, there are no hiccups, it all just flows together very nicely and instills confidence that this phone will remain fast for years to come.

OnePlus promised three major Android updates and four years of security updates. This used to be the standard for most Android phones, but this year, Samsung announced that it is expanding support to 4 years of major updates / 5 years of security updates, and Apple traditionally supports its iPhone for 5 or even 6 years, so OnePlus could definitely up its game in this regard.

OnePlus 10T Battery

4,800mAh battery inside

Despite its slightly bigger size and weight, the 10T actually has a 4% smaller battery (4,800mAh) than the flagship 10 Pro model (5,000mAh).

Battery life is very good and the phone lasted us more than a day on a single charge, but it’s not quite iPhone 13 Pro Max kind of good, as that phone would last a full 2 days or even more on one charge.

You can find our independent battery test results below:

We perform all of our tests in equal conditions, with screens on all phones set to the same brightness level. All of our tests are carried out over a Wi-Fi connection, but each one measures something different. Our video test, for example, runs a YouTube playlist until the phones die, and is a great metric for those watching lots of videos. Our web browsing test simulates browsing the web and is a lighter test, while finally our 3D Gaming test works the GPU.

The OnePlus 10T scored in line with its predecessor on the video test, but we guess the more efficient processor helped it score much higher on the web browsing test. Interestingly, it scored lower on the gaming test, despite all the innovative cooling that OnePlus uses, but still that score is actually quite good.

Output from the two loudspeakers is decent, but not quite the best around. We missed a bit in terms of volume, and we wished to hear a bit more depth in the sound profile.

On the other hand, haptics are absolutely excellent. OnePlus phones recently have these really impressive vibration motors that give this "vibrating glass" kind of feel, a nice and tight vibration effect. It's delicate and gives just enough feedback for typing or notifications.

OnePlus 10T Competitors