OnePlus broke its “flagship” mold with the launch of the Nord, now the company is ready to dive even further into the mid-range and even skim the upper end of the entry-level market. In other words, Nord is now a series of phones.
OnePlus Nord N10 5G
The OnePlus N10 5G stays close to the original formula with a mid-range Snapdragon, 90Hz display, and a 64MP main camera. However, the N10 aims for a lower price range, so affordability considerations led to some changes.
The new model has a 6.49 ”screen with a resolution of 1080p +. There is a major change from the original Nord: the panel is now an IPS LCD, a first on a OnePlus since the OnePlus 2 in 2015. The screen is protected by Gorilla Glass 3. Naturally, this moves the fingerprint reader on the back.
OnePlus Nord N10 5G in Midnight Ice
The Nord N10’s rear camera is actually a bit better equipped than the original, as it features a 64MP sensor inside the main camera while maintaining the 119 ° ultra-wide camera with 8 MP sensor and dedicated macro modules. and depth. The main camera can record 4K video at 30 fps and 1080p at 60 fps (reaching 120 fps in slow motion mode).
A couple of things changed with the selfie camera. Good news: it’s just a drilled hole. Bad news: the main 32MP camera is down to 16MP and the ultra-wide lens is gone (obviously).
The battery outperformed the price-cutting measures quite well. With a capacity of 4,300 mAh, it is a fraction larger than the Nord battery and charges just as fast with Warp Charge 30T (no wireless connection on either model). Also, this one has a 3.5mm headphone jack, something we haven’t seen on a 1+ in a while.
The N10 is powered by the Snapdragon 690 chipset, which is similar to the S765G chip, albeit with several key differences. Simply put, it uses two new large Kryo 560 CPU cores (up from 475) and a slightly degraded GPU, Adreno 619L. The X51 modem only supports the sub-6 flavor of 5G, but the original Nord didn’t have mmWave connectivity, so it’s a wash.
Before you judge the decisions OnePlus made, let us tell you the price: a OnePlus Nord N10 5G will cost € 350 / £ 330. And that’s with 6GB of RAM and 128GB of storage (UFS 2.1). In comparison, an original Nord with 8/128 GB memory costs £ 380.
However, here is the catch. Both new Nords have expandable memory, which could tip the balance if you have high storage requirements.
Also, unlike the original Nord, these two will be released in the US, although the exact details will be revealed at a later date.
OnePlus Nord N100
The OnePlus Nord N100 (not 5G here) is the entry-level offering, its price starts at € 200 / £ 180 for a phone with 4GB of RAM and 64GB of storage (UFS 2.1). But again, the storage can be easily expanded with a cheap microSD card.
This phone is based on the Snapdragon 460 chipset, a cheap 11nm chip with cores derived from Cortex-A73 and an Adreno 610.
The N100 has a 6.52 ”IPS LCD screen with 720 x 1,600 px resolution (and standard refresh rate). The screen is again protected by Gorilla Glass 3. Like the N10, it has stereo speakers and a rear-mounted fingerprint reader.
OnePlus Nord N100 in Midnight Frost
OnePlus decided to focus on longer battery life for this model, its power cell has a capacity of 5,000 mAh, at the expense of charging speed, which goes up to just 18W (given the additional capacity, Warp would have been fine). On the plus side, a 3.5mm jack is also present on this model.
This phone is equipped with a 13MP main camera, so photography is quite basic. It is technically a triple camera, although 67% is a dedicated macro lens and a depth sensor (both 2 MP). Video recording is limited to 1080p / 30fps for the front and rear cameras. The front camera has an 8 MP sensor.
Both the Nord N100 and N10 will launch with OxygenOS 10.5. It’s still based on Android 10, but it features the latest proprietary enhancements from OnePlus. The phones will arrive in Europe early next month and will soon be on the other side of the pond.
