But there are also rivals, like the Realme 9 Pro+ 5G (Review), which offers similar hardware for even less. So how does the Nord 2T 5G compete in its segment? Is it a perfect mid-range smartphone? I used this phone for a few weeks and here I am telling what I think about it.
OnePlus Nord 2T 5G price in India
OnePlus Nord 2T 5G starts at Rs 28,999 for its 8GB RAM and 128GB storage variant and goes up to Rs 33,999 with 12GB RAM and 256GB storage. The phone comes in Greenish Jade Fog and Gray Shadow finish. I got its 12 GB Gray Shadow variant for review.
Design of OnePlus Nord 2T 5G
The OnePlus Nord 2T 5G doesn’t see any major design changes, especially since it’s the ‘T’ version of the phone, which is expected to come with only minor hardware changes. However, some details within the design have been changed, which are more visible only at the rear. Two circular cutouts are now visible on the camera module. One has the main camera and the other is given for the ultra-video and monochrome camera. The design of the phone looks clean, but the module protrudes slightly from the body of the phone. This causes the phone to wobble when placed on a flat surface.
The rear panel is made of anti-glare glass and has a smooth matte finish, which looks quite premium. It also does an excellent job of preventing fingerprints. The middle frame of the phone is made of polycarbonate and has a chrome-like finish, which is very prone to fingerprints. But because of this, the manual grip of the device becomes good. The phone is heavy and gives a premium feel in the hand. I’m glad that this time the alert slider has remained on OnePlus, which was removed from the pricier OnePlus 10R 5G phone.
The screen has slightly curved edges and is not completely flat. It gives a good gripping experience. You have been given a hole punch for the selfie camera. The fingerprint scanner is also displayed on the screen, which is reliable. The screen is protected by Corning Gorilla Glass 5, on which fingerprints easily fall, but which can also be cleaned quickly. I did not like the thick bezel of its screen. It looks a bit thick looking at the other three sides.
OnePlus Nord 2T 5G Specifications and Software
MediaTek Dimensity 1300 processor has been included in OnePlus Nord 2T 5G. The Dimensity 1200-AI SoC was provided in the previous model. This is the only major update with this model. The phone features LPDDR4X RAM and UFS 3.1 storage. It has a dual SIM tray in which two 5G Nano SIMs can be installed. For communication it has support for Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth 5.2, NFC. The phone has support for 4,500 mAh battery and 80W fast charging. Note that 65W fast charging was provided on Nord 2. There is no IP rating on the phone, while this feature has now become common on the middle ranges.
The phone runs on OxygenOS 12.1 based on Android 12. The software is the same as OnePlus, but this time I noticed a strange bug in it: no live wallpapers are provided, only stable wallpapers are available. For support, the company promises two major Android updates and three years of security updates, which is good for a mid-range device.
Continuing its tradition, OnePlus has presented a smartphone with a minimum of bloatware. Among the third-party apps, I only found Netflix on it. I do not receive unwanted notifications. The rest of the software is customizable. The theme engine automatically selects the wallpaper colors and applies them to the widgets and keyboard. But the same color is not applied to the system accent color, it has to be applied manually from the Personalization menu.
OnePlus Nord 2T 5G performance
OnePlus Nord 2T 5G performs well in the benchmark test as a mid-range device. The phone scored 6,15,487 points on AnTuTu. On Geekbench, it scored 672 and 2614 points in single and multi-core tests, respectively. These scores were lower than the iQoo Neo 6 in the same price range, which scored 7,29,331 on AnTuTu and 983 and 3,074 points on Geekbench’s single-core and multi-core tests, respectively.
The gaming performance of the phone is good and the phone does not get too hot while gaming. I’ve tried playing Call of Duty: Mobile and Asphalt 9: Legends on it. Both games ran smoothly with default settings. There was no performance drop even when the graphics settings were maxed out. The display’s 180Hz refresh rate was adequate even when playing fast-paced titles.
The phone has a 6.43-inch AMOLED panel with a 90Hz refresh rate. The company says that it is HDR10+ certified. The display produces saturated colors at the default Vivid color setting. Colors look true in Natural mode. The screen gets a decent amount of brightness outdoors, but its ambient light sensor dims the brightness a bit when I’m indoors and I had to turn the brightness up on the bar once I’m inside.
Its HDR10+ certification didn’t seem to be of much use. The screen’s HDR rating was not detected in apps like Netflix. Color banding was felt when watching HDR content on YouTube. SD content looked sharp and blacks were quite deep. Sound from the stereo speakers was decent, but at higher volumes the sound crackled a bit.
The battery life of the OnePlus Nord 2T 5G is good. The phone comfortably managed two days in normal use, which also included a few games. With heavy use, the phone lasted a day and a half with 2 hours of gaming and half an hour of camera use. The phone ran for 22 hours and 55 minutes in the HD video loop test, which is pretty impressive. The phone went from 0 to 55 percent in 15 minutes and was fully charged in 30 minutes with the included charger.
OnePlus Nord 2T 5G cameras
Three rear cameras have been given in OnePlus Nord 2T 5G. It has a 50-megapixel Sony IMX766 primary sensor with OIS support. Alongside this is an 8-megapixel ultra-wide camera and a 2-megapixel monochrome camera. A 32-megapixel camera is available on the phone for selfie. The camera interface is similar to recent OnePlus phones. Some options are hidden in the slide-out mini menu on the ellipsis button. This is similar to what is found on the recently released Oppo and Realme devices.
Photos taken in daylight were sharp and clear, with good dynamic range, but details in the dark area were somewhat less. The colors looked accurate, but it depended on the color profile he had set as to how the colors looked. He seemed oversaturated when set to Vivid. Its 2X digital zoom is quite surprising, which took very sharp photos with enough light. The ultra-wide camera takes photos with fewer details. There was a purple cast to the edges of the photo in the brightest places.
The main camera can’t replace a dedicated macro camera, but I managed to take good close-ups of flowers with the main camera from a distance, which looked pretty sharp. Sharpness was a bit high in selfies, but overall dynamic range was good. In selfies, edge detection was good in portrait shots, but dynamic range was limited and the background was overexposed.
In low-light conditions, the ultra-wide camera takes useful photos. The main camera also takes sharp photos with good detail and dynamic range. I had to use its dedicated night mode only in very low light. All I can say on this is that the phone’s low-light performance wasn’t always impressive. In night mode, it captured images with better dynamic range and less noise but the sharpness was a bit high. I have seen better low-light camera performance on the Realme 9 Pro+ 5G.
The phone shoots 1080p video at 30fps which had a slight softness to it but the stabilization was amazing. Less detail was found in 60 fps 1080p video. The best results were achieved at 30 fps while shooting 4K video. At the same time, the best results were obtained in 4K while shooting video in low light. 1080p images looked soft in low light and shook while moving.
our verdict
OnePlus Nord 2T 5G offers everything a user can expect from a mid-range phone at a price of Rs 28,999. Neither go up nor down from it. The phone works within its limits, be it the processor (perfect mid-range), the camera (no macro function), or the screen (limited to 90 Hz). But whatever he does, he does it well. At this price, it presents itself as an all-rounder. However, its 12GB RAM variant (Rs 33,999) looks more useful as smartphones like Nothing Phone 1 offer more features like wireless charging and IP53 rating at this price.
If you’re looking for other options than the Nord 2T 5G, there are brands like iQoo and Realme that offer better value for money smartphones. iQoo Neo 6 packs a powerful Snapdragon 870 SoC, a 120Hz AMOLED display, and a 4700mAh battery. It comes for Rs 29,999. The Realme 9 Pro+ 5G has the Dimensity 920 SoC, the same main camera, a macro camera, and the same 90Hz AMOLED panel, but it starts at Rs 24,999 for the 6GB variant.