OnePlus launches five new products, including Buds 4 and smaller Watch 3 for the US
OnePlus has launched five new products today, including the midrange Nord 5 phone and a smaller version of its Watch 3 wearable. The 43mm version of the Watch 3 and the new Buds 4 earbuds are the only new products launching in the US, with the others going on sale in Europe and India.
The Watch 3 43mm is exactly what it sounds like: a more compact version of the existing OnePlus wearable, which only launched in a single 47mm option. That was my colleague Victoria Song’s “big design gripe” with the original Watch 3, so a fix is certainly welcome. The new version is not only much smaller, but also drops the angular elements around the rotating crown and button for a simpler, circular design that’s less distinctive, but which I certainly prefer.
The compact design comes at a cost to battery though. OnePlus says the new Watch 3 is 7 percent thinner and 28 percent lighter than the original, but it has just 50 percent of the battery life. That’s still 60 hours on typical settings, but a far cry from the 120-hour battery life that was a key selling point first time round. That’s despite using a much less bright display, with 1,000 nits of peak brightness, down from 2,200 in the 47mm model.
As before, it runs on Wear OS and is powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon W5 Gen 1 chipset, with a second low-power chip to help with battery life. There are some new features too, with reproductive cycle tracking, and an updated version of its “Wellness” score that claims to use the watch’s barometer to measure your fatigue levels and show you a corresponding emoji as a result. The Watch 3 43mm is available from the OnePlus website from today for $299.99 — $100 less than the larger model — and will arrive on Amazon and Best Buy in August. In Europe it’ll set you back €299 / £269.
The other US release is the Buds 4, a new pair of affordable earbuds. Available in green or gray, these support both Hi-Res and spatial audio, powered by dual 11mm and 6mm drivers in each bud. I’m a fan of the slightly concave touch controls, which make it easier to feel where you’re meant to swipe and tap. They cost $129.99 in the US, and €119 / £119 in Europe.
The Nord 5 is the star of the other launches, though it won’t come to the US. This midrange phone launches in Europe for €449 / £399, powered by the Snapdragon 8S Gen 3. There’s a clear gaming focus, with a 144Hz OLED display, but also an unexpectedly capable 50-megapixel selfie camera. This one’s for the kids, I guess.
It’s a big phone, with a 6.83-inch display, but it’s relatively slim and light, so doesn’t feel too bulky from my time testing the phone so far. It also follows the Asia-only OnePlus 13S (known as the 13T in China) in dropping the company’s classic Alert Slider in favor of a new button, the Plus Key. This is fully customizable, but by default triggers (you guessed it!) AI stuff. I’m reviewing the Nord 5 right now, so we’ll have a full verdict on the phone soon.
It’s joined by the Nord CE 5, a €349 / £299 handset that looks similar but makes compromises across the board. It’s a hair smaller, with a 6.77-inch screen, and drops to a slower MediaTek Dimensity 8350 Apex chipset. The screen has a lower resolution, refresh rate, and peak brightness, and the camera specs are less impressive too, though at least it includes the same 5,200mAh battery and 80W charging speed as the Nord 5, and a similar promise of four years of OS updates. I’d pay a little more for the Nord 5 if you can afford to.
Finally, the Pad Lite is a cheaper take on the OnePlus tablet line-up. I’m disappointed to see it uses the ugly circular camera design of the older Pads (since changed on the recent Pad 3), but otherwise there’s a lot to like for the price. It has an 11-inch, 2K display (though only at 90Hz), and a decently sized 9,340mah battery. It’s just €229 / £199, but an extra €30 / £30 will net you more RAM, double the storage, and LTE support, which sounds like a bargain.