OnePlus Nord 3 5G review: Solid performer
OnePlus on Wednesday (July 5) unveiled the new generation mid-range phone-- Nord 3 5G- along with the Nord Core Edition 3 and Nord Buds 2r.
In India, OnePlus Nord 3 comes in two variants-- 8GB RAM + 128GB and 16GB RAM +256GB storage-- for Rs 33,999 and Rs 37,999, respectively.
It comes with several design changes and upgrades such as design language, improved camera, new generation MediaTek processor, and bigger battery capacity over the predecessor.
I have been using the Nord 3 5G for a little over a week and here are my thoughts.
Design, build quality, and display
The first distinguishable change we see in the latest Nord 3 over the predecessor is the design language. The latter, which was launched in 2021, featured a smooth curved body. Whereas the new generation model sports a flat-edge design with a solid frame around the corners and a flushed display.
On the back, Nord 3 features two big camera module islands, the top houses the main 50MP sensor, and below, it houses two camera sensors. There are two vertically aligned LEDs to offer flash support to get good pictures at night (more details below in the photography section). The rest of the body is a glass-covered body with just the company logo engraved in the middle.
When held in the hand, you can instantly feel the solid build quality of the Nord 3. It is very sturdy and also offers a good grip to hold onto the device.
Also, the device is well-protected against the daily wear-and-tear issues. On the front, the company has incorporated a Dragontail glass shield, and on top of it, the company prefits additional screen guard, which ensures full protection against scratches from small articles such as coins or keys in the pocket.
On the back, the device is guarded by Corning's Gorilla Glass 5. Add to that, OnePlus Nord 3 comes with an IP54 rating, meaning it can survive an accidental splash of water. Very few phones have such protection in this price segment.
OnePlus Nord 3 retains the trademark alert slider on top of the power button on the right side. It offers a handy shortcut to switch between ringing, silence, and vibrate modes.
On the left side, you will find the volume rocker and at the base, there is a mic, a SIM tray, a Type-C port, and a speaker, which by the way, does a fine delivering good stereo audio output.
It can really fill up the room with loud and clear music with less distortion when the volume is put to the max.
On top, there is a mic, and an IR(Infrared) blaster, which lets owners use OnePlus Nord 3 as remote control and a mic.
On the back, OnePlus Nord 3 misty green model features a glossy smooth texture. Unfortunately, it doesn't do well with repelling fingerprint smudges. On the bright side, the sweat stains and dust are not easily visible from afar. Only on close inspection, you will be able to see them.
My advice is to use the soft color-matching silicone cover that the company offers with the retail box. It not only protects the device from accidental falls but also keeps the phone clean.
OnePlus also offers Nord 3 in the temptest grey and is said to look too. And, it actually fares well in terms of repelling fingerprint smudges.
As far as the display is concerned, it sports a 6.74-inch Super Fluid AMOLED display. It comes with a pixel density of 450 ppi (pixels per inch) and supports a dynamic refresh rate 40Hz-120Hz to deliver a better viewing experience.
The bezels around the edge are uniform and thin too and the small camera at the top doesn't obstruct much when viewing any multimedia content. It has a screen-to-body ratio of 93.5 per cent.
The display quality is just top-notch. It is bright and the colours in the motion picture come off as vibrant and rich and make content viewing enjoyable. You can truly feel the delightful experience while watching nature documentaries. It supports HDR10+ format, HDR on Netflix, and Amazon Prime Video apps.
It supports a touch response rate of 1000Hz, which comes in handy in delivering a better gaming experience.
It also comes with in-display fingerprint sensor and works fine as long as the fingertip is dry and clean. It also supports password, pattern lock, and Face-based unlock features, but not on par with FaceID on iPhones particularly in pitch darkness.
Performance
OnePlus Nord 3 comes with MediaTek Dimensity 9000 octa-core processor, which can up to 3.05Ghz CPU speed. It also features Arm Mali G710 MC10 GPU and as mentioned above, comes in two configurations-- 8GB RAM LPDDR5X and 128GB UFS 3.1 storage and 16GB RAM LPDDR5X and 256GB UFS 3.1 storage.
Our review unit comes with 16GB RAM LPDDR5X and 256GB UFS 3.1 storage. During the entire review period, the phone worked smoothly and never showed any lag-ness as such.
Be it any day-to-day tasks or graphics-rich games such as Asphalt 9, the device blazes smoothly through like a cheetah on a hunting sprint mode. Unlike the latter, which can go only a few minutes, the OnePlus Nord 3 can run through long sessions of gaming and though, it does get a bit warm, but never went out of my comfort level.
Also, with the Ram Expansion feature, users can expand the RAM by up to an additional 12GB, provided there is enough free storage. I was able to expand 16GB to 28GB RAM. This will make the phone work more faster in terms of loading apps and switching between multiple apps with ease and no lag-ness.
The device runs Android 13-based OxygenOS 3.1. Unlike others, OnePlus installs only popular third-party social media and OTT apps, and the rest are core Google apps. Given the 256GB storage, they don't consume most. Most importantly, the user interface is simple and easy to understand for a first-time user, to navigate through the home screen and even settings too.
The device is guaranteed to get three years of Android OS support (up to 2026) and an additional year of security software (up to 2027).
With a 5,000mAh battery, the OnePlus Nord 3 can easily last more than a day with normal usage. Even if you are an extreme user, and consume a lot of multimedia content, it will serve you a full day. And, thanks to a super-fast 80W charger, users can fully charge the device from zero to 50 in under 20 minutes and reach 100 per cent capacity in around 40 minutes.
Besides NFC (Near Field Connectivity), Bluetooth 5.3, and Wi-Fi 6(802.11ax), OnePlus Nord 3 is compatible with the 5G service offered by both Airtel and Reliance Jio in India.
Photography
As noted earlier, OnePlus Nord 3 comes with three sensors-- main 50MP (with Sony's IMX890 with OIS: Optical Image Stabilisation) backed by an 8MP wide-angle sensor (with IMX355, 112-degree field of view) and a 2MP macro camera with dual LED flash support.
It takes brilliant photos in the sunlight and I have to note that, most phones in the segment perform really well in natural light. It's very hard to find any anomalies here in this aspect.
However, OnePlus Nord 3 does even better with night sight mode. The photos look lively. As you can see in the sample photo, the street lights and the scene of the traffic near MG Road Metro station (Bengaluru), are well captured.
With wide-angle mode, the device again excels here too. This Nandi Hills photo was captured from inside a moving car, and yet, the phone has managed to cover a wide area, and capture near-accurate colours of the landmark and surrounding vegetation.
As with the Portrait mode, the photo samples speak for themselves. The camera does a fine job delivering a natural blur effect in the background, while the subject, the flower is beautifully captured. However, I did take some minutes to get the perfect photo. The camera app will let you know how much distance you have to maintain between the subject and the phone to get that perfect snap.
It also supports video recording-- 4K at 60 fps(frames per second), full HD 1080p at 60fps ultra steady mode, full HD 1080p at 30fps HDR. Thanks to EIS(Electronic Image Stabilisation), the phone was able to deliver stable videos. Even with a shaky hand, the recorded videos came off good and steady.
On the front, it houses a 16MP camera. OnePlus Nord 3 does a fine job in this aspect. The selfies are of good quality and it ensures the skin tone is close to natural. Also, the portrait mode does great with edge detection; the hairs on the head are correctly captured and differentiated from the background with great accuracy.
Final thoughts
The latest OnePlus Nord 3 series is a solid performer. The build quality is great and I am more impressed with the AMOLED display, tailor-made for multi-media content consumption.
Also, performance-wise too, it excels with no pressing issues to complain about. It worked smoothly in all day-to-day tasks including gaming too. Battery life is good and with an 80W charger, the owner need not have to face any anxiety about the phone dying out. In less than 20 minutes, it can reach 50 per cent capacity.
As far as the camera hardware is concerned, it is decent. In bright sunlight conditions, it takes fantastic photos and with the Night Sight mode, OnePlus Nord 3 performs better compared to most of its peers in sub-Rs 40,000 price segment.
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