The term “CE” in OnePlus’ cheapest Nord lineup stands for Core Edition. The new OnePlus Nord CE 2 really nails the basics of a modern budget phone, offering a decent display and performance, along with impressive 65W charging speeds. But in doing so, the CE 2 misses out on some features that users in India expect from phones in this category. When brands like Realme, the sister brand of Xiaomi and OnePlus, can offer premium, well-rounded packages, doing the bare minimum isn’t enough even when controlling expectations with terms like Core Edition.
OnePlus Nord SE2
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The OnePlus Nord CE 2 has a lot to offer, but you can easily find it all – and a lot More — over many other phones in this price range.
- SOC: MediaTek Dimension 900
- an offer: 6.43 inches OLED, 2400 x 1080 pixels, 409 ppi, 20:9, 90 Hz, HDR10+, Gorilla Glass 5
- ram: 6/8GB LPDDR4X
- storage: 128GB UFS2.2, dedicated microSD card slot
- battery: 4500 mAh, 65W charging
- Ports: USB Type C, 3.5 mm audio jack
- Operating system: Android 11 with OxygenOS 11 operating system
- Front camera: 16 megapixel, f/2.4 lens aperture
- Rear cameras: 64 MP, f/1.79, EIS, 4K30 fps (main); 8 MP, 119°, f/2.2 (UW); 2 MP (macro)
- Contact: 5G (8 bands), Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth 5.2, NFC
- Others: In-screen fingerprint reader
- Dimensions: 160 x 73.2 x 7.8 mm
- colors: Gray and blue
- weight: 173 grams
- price: Starts at INR 23,999 (~US$310)
- The screen looks good
- Excellent battery life and charging speed
- It has a headphone jack and a dedicated microSD card slot
- Performance is good enough
- The camera is not up to the mark
- There is no alert slider
- Still on Android 11
- The screen could have been brighter
- The mono speaker is easily muted
Design, hardware and what’s in the box
Leave: OnePlus Nord 2, RLight: Realme 9 Pro+.
While OnePlus’ flagships still retain their distinct visual identity, budget phones like the Nord CE 2 are a clear sign of how closely OnePlus ties in with its BBK siblings. The Nord CE 2 is a direct rebranded version of the recently announced Oppo Reno 7 and shares many design elements with the Realme 9 Pro+ (pictured above). Because of this shared inheritance, you will lose the distinct alert slider.
I’m not a fan of how the camera bump melts into the back of the phone on the Nord CE 2. It’s meant to feel premium, like what we saw on the more premium Oppo Find Additionally, the port holes and speaker grilles at the bottom have sharp edges that frequently rub your fingers and force you to use a case — something I complained about on the Nord 2 as well.
Among the shortcomings, the Haptic Engine has a weak, unsatisfying sound, and the single down-firing speaker isn’t great. The speaker is loud and clear, but it gets a bit sharp at high volume levels and can be easily muted while gaming or watching videos. The absence of a stereo pair is a real bummer for the Nord CE 2 since we’ve seen much cheaper phones offering this feature.
On the bright side, the CE 2 offers you a high-quality 1080p HDR OLED display that refreshes at a 90Hz rate. The strong colors and deep blacks are as good as any other display on a OnePlus phone, although I would have liked to see a higher brightness for better viewing under direct sunlight. The brightness sensor could also use some fine-tuning, as it seems to always be fine-tuning the level when the ambient light changes, which can be quite annoying.
The Nord CE 2’s retail box contains a base case, a 65W SuperVOOC charger, a USB-A to USB-C cable, and some documentation and branded stickers.
Software, performance and battery life
It’s 2022, and OnePlus is still struggling to commit to Android 12. The Nord CE 2 comes with Android 11 and Oppo’s OxygenOS 11. It’s unfortunate that OnePlus took this long to figure out its Android 12 stance, and the two-year Android update promise doesn’t inspire much confidence either.
Despite this sore point, OxygenOS remains the cleanest device among its main rivals like Realme UI and MIUI, with little to no bloatware. The 11 in the Nord looks very similar to what we saw in the more premium 9RT – right down to the glitches. The software drops frames here and there, and transitions feel jerky at times. These are occasional hiccups, and you are unlikely to encounter them frequently during your daily use.
The new Nord runs on the previous generation Dimensity 900, while the competition has already moved to the newer Dimensity 920, with improved CPU and GPU cores. You probably won’t notice much difference in everyday things like email and messaging apps or while streaming videos. While gaming too, the phone shows no obvious sign of difficulty – there is no frame drop, even at high frame rates and graphics quality. But during such intense tasks, the CPU and GPU run almost at full speed — they’re on the edge of acceptable performance, which could be a problem if you decide to keep the phone for a few years. For some casual gaming and CPU-intensive tasks, the Nord CE 2 should be fine, but don’t expect too much from it.
Despite all that, I have to give these modern 6nm chips credit for being incredibly power efficient. The Nord CE 2 gets a modest 4,500 mAh battery, but there was never a day when the phone made me feel any concern about the battery. My regular use doesn’t include gaming at all; It’s all work apps and some social media, however, and I routinely ended up with around 40% charge remaining at the end of the day – after clocking 6 hours of screen time. Like most OnePlus phones, a 65W charger (now called SuperVOOC) is included in the box, and the phone takes about half an hour to fill the battery.
camera
The camera arrangement here hasn’t changed since the first CE, so you still get the primary 64MP OmniVision sensor. Like most midranges, the CE 2 can produce some good images in daylight; They look natural and have a fair amount of detail, and the HDR technology also does a good job of retaining detail in bright and dark areas. However, the color science is not consistent across images – you’ll find that colors don’t pop, especially at night. The camera also starts to lose fine details indoors, resulting in very soft images. This also applies to full-resolution 64MP shots.
There’s an AI scene optimization tool that automatically switches to Night mode and adjusts white balance based on lighting, but that’s about it. There aren’t a lot of camera features to play with, like on the Realme 9 Pro+.
The front camera is OnePlus’ favorite IMX471, but it somehow performs a little worse here. White balance here is something you can’t rely on, and the same goes for the HDR capabilities. Your portraits will look acceptable with natural skin tones, but when you zoom in, you’ll notice that none of the fine details are preserved.
Should you buy it?
Maybe not. The Nord CE 2 is not the most powerful phone from OnePlus recently, nor is it the best in its price category. Given how crowded this price segment is, OnePlus should have seen this coming. Without premium features like the alert slider, and given how integrated OnePlus is now with BBK’s other brands, the CE 2 doesn’t offer anything special. There is no longer an incentive to get a OnePlus phone instead of a Realme or Oppo.
For the same price, you can get the Realme 9 Pro+, which is as good or better than the Nord CE 2 in most ways, and you’ll also get Android 12. If a OnePlus phone is what you want, I would suggest spending more money on the Nord 2, which is more Capacity in general. It contains an alert slider. You also can’t go wrong with the Galaxy A52s or Xiaomi 11i 5G, both of which have better features for less money.
Buy it if…
- Battery life is priority.
- You’re fine with a mediocre camera.
Don’t buy it if…
- Don’t mind spending more on a better phone.
- You care about extra features like stereo speakers.
