Nord CE review: Another winner from OnePlus
OnePlus has a reputation for coming up with well-packaged products and the latest Nord Core Edition packs a punch in the midrange segment.
A few months ago, the company launched the first Nord. Ever since, the CE edition that has been released now comes with welcome changes and looks promising.
The front has a 6.43-inch 90 Hz AMOLED display with a resolution of 2400x1080 and a pixel density of 410 ppi. The selfie camera lens is on the left. The left side of the bezel is the volume up/ down buttons and the SIM tray. The right side has the power button. The bottom has the 3.5mm audio socket, a mic, the USB Type-C port and a speaker. The top has a mic. The rear has the triple camera setup and an LED flash.
The front of the Nord CE is glass, while the frame and back are plastic. The plastic on the CE is a marked improvement over the first Nord and it is hard to tell if it is glass or plastic. It feels secure in the hand even without a case and is not a fingerprint magnet.
Another aspect where the Nord CE scores are the dimensions. It weighs 170 grams and is just 0.79 cm thick. It feels very compact to hold. For those with an average sized hand, the thumb reaches most parts of the screen.
One of the best things OnePlus has done with the Nord CE is bring back the 3.5mm audio jack. Many audio enthusiasts, including this author, like to listen to music with high-end or studio grade headphones and Bluetooth headphones often do not fit the bill. It might be argued that streaming music is not exactly hi-fi, but there will be users who load ‘flac’ or such uncompressed files on the phone.
The Nord CE gets the OxygenOS based on Android 11 and is powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 750G 5G SoC and an Adreno 619 GPU. This is the other major upgrade over the first Nord. RAM options are 6/ 8/ 12 GB LPDDR4X and storage options are 128/ 256 GB UFS 2.1.
The above-mentioned hardware is pretty solid in the midrange category and proved to be more than sufficient for routine daily tasks. It can do gaming duties as well without too much difficulty.
The main lens of the camera setup is a 64 MP shooter (f/1.79). The ultra-wide is 8 MP (f/2.25), while the mono lens is 2 MP (f2.4). The selfie camera is a 16 MP one (f/2.45) with a Sony IMX471 sensor. Obviously, the strength of the setup is the main 64 MP lens, which did really well and colours did not come out very saturated. The bokeh is particularly good.
The 4K video we streamed on the Nord CE played without a hitch and the colours looked natural. So, no complaints in that department.
The Nord CE comes with a 4500 mAh battery and with it comes a 30W warp charger. The phone gets charged from zero to 100 per cent in about an hour.
If it is a midrange phone one is looking for with 5G future-proofing, we recommend the Nord CE. Apart from performance, we liked its compact dimensions.
For the 6GB RAM+128GB storage base version, the Nord CE is priced at Rs 22,999, the 8GB+128GB is priced at Rs 24,999, while the top-end 12GB+256GB is Rs 27,999.
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