Ahead of its Summer Launch Event, OnePlus is offering a sneak peek at the four products it'll reveal on July 16. Much of the information in the preview pertains to the upcoming Nord 4, a smartphone that breaks new ground for the company in several areas.
First off, the device sports a unibody build made entirely out of aluminum. OnePlus President and COO Kinder Liu told DigitalTrends the metallic form enables “durability, beauty, permanence, and strength.” Part of its eye-catching appearance can be attributed to the company’s “Nordtones” color scheme. This is basically a two-tone paint job where the top portion is polished metal while the bottom has a matte coating.
There are three colors in total: Obsidian Midnight (aka black), Oasis Green, and Mercurial Silver sporting a ridged texture moving down the back.
OnePlus goes to reveal the Nord 4 will be the slimmest model in the line measuring 7.99mm thick. The company states that because of the aluminum unibody, it had to move some components around to maintain a lightweight smartphone. As a result, the camera lenses have been shifted to sit horizontally instead of vertically. This also let OnePlus install a smaller motherboard and give more space to the battery.
AI-boosted
Under the hood is a Snapdragon 7 Plus Gen 3 chipset, up to 16GB of LPDDR5X RAM, and a maximum storage space of 512GB. The hardware is supported by a wide array of AI features; chief among them is the Trinity Engine. This component allows the Nord 4 to finetune its performance with various tools. For example, CPU-Vita can provide the processor with a power boost when the situation calls for it or reduce power when the device is idle.
A lot of the AI features are reminiscent of the tools seen on other smartphones like the Pixel 8. You have AI Audio Summary to transcribe audio files, Note Summary to sum up emails, and Text Translate to translate other languages. There will be one interesting feature called AI Linkboost. It allows the Nord 4 to quickly reconnect to mobile networks once you leave an area with no service.
Other notable OnePlus Nord 4 features include a 6.74-inch 1.5K AMOLED display, a 50 MP Sony LYT-600 camera, and AquaTouch which lets you interact with the screen even when it's wet.
Accompanying hardware
OnePlus didn’t share a ton of information on the other three devices. Presumably the company wants to save those for the event but they did give some insight. The OnePlus Pad 2 houses a 12.1-inch touchscreen as well as its own set of AI tools like Eraser 2.0 for image editing and Scan Document.
The OnePlus Nord Buds 3 Pro is claimed to be a “significant leap from its predecessor” when it comes to how it handles low and high frequency sound. The 12.4mm drivers cover a frequency range of up to 4,000Hz, plus they can cancel up to 49 dB of noise. Regarding the OnePlus Watch 2R, very little is known about the wearable apart from it having a 100-hour battery life and dual-frequency GPS.
Fortunately, we won’t have to wait for long to learn more as OnePlus’ Summer Launch Event kicks off on July 16 at 6am PST / 9am EST / 2pm BST. Be sure to stay tuned for our coverage.
In the meantime, check out TechRadar's list of the best OnePlus phones for 2024.
