Test report on the OnePlus Pad: a successful debut

Almost ten years after its first phone, OnePlus is now introducing a tablet for the first time. Can the OnePlus Pad keep up with the established names for 499 euros? We found out.

We’ve always learned not to rely on looks, but we have to admit that with this OnePlus Pad (€499 inc VAT) this is immediately apparent; this is a beautiful device. The aluminum case in Halo Green has an industrial, cool touch and a polished look at the same time. That’s how it feels, and that’s perhaps the only point of design criticism we can think of. The OnePlus Pad might be a bit too slippery to hold perfectly. With 552 grams dry on the hook, however, it is not a heavy load in the truest sense of the word.

Inside the aluminum body is an 11.6-inch glass screen that blends seamlessly with the rounded corners of the awesome design. The OnePlus Pad is the first tablet with a 7:5 screen ratio. This gives you a squarer screen, which the manufacturer says gives the impression that you’re looking at a 12-inch screen. We mainly saw a nice and clear screen (more on that in a moment). Thanks to the rounded design, the screen-to-body ratio is a respectable 88 percent.

The OnePlus Pad is equipped with a USB-C port (also for charging) and has two buttons on top for controlling the volume. Unfortunately, there is no longer a connection for headphones with a cable on this device. True, unfortunately we are sometimes old-fashioned.

Finally, we would like to mention that the camera lens has been given a prominent place in the design on the back. It protrudes slightly and is surrounded by a ring made of the same Halo Green aluminum. That added a bit of industrial touch for us, although we do question the extent to which a camera should be a prominent element in a tablet.

screen time

As promised, a word about the screen. We have absolutely no complaints in this area. With a resolution of 2000 x 2800 (296 PPI) and a refresh rate of 144 Hz, the OnePlus Pad easily leaves some of the bigger names behind.

Although the same names are starting to switch to OLED technology for their screens, OnePlus still opts for LCD. There is of course a reason this pill won’t cost your body a rib. Fans of OLED will probably immediately think that the OnePlus Pad’s colors won’t be as bright and vivid and that black will be more like 50 shades of gray. Well that’s a lot better than you think.

The LCD screen is easy to see even in brighter light. The brightness has been set at 500 nits and that’s noticeable. Even outside in a rarely sunny garden, we were able to watch our videos in a pleasant way.

However, a quick tap on the screen to activate the tablet is not possible. Without pressing the button on the side, your screen remains black. We’re creatures of habit, and one of those habits is waking up a touchscreen device with a quick double-click on the screen. It took a few adjustments before that didn’t work.

battery

At least we didn’t need an extension cord for the visits in the garden. The battery life of the OnePlus Pad is impressive, as is the charging speed. When fully charged, the tablet is advertised as “standby for a month”, but we didn’t test it, it would be a shame to use such a beautiful device and then not do anything with it.

We watched videos on YouTube, browsed the internet, took notes, checked emails – we tried everything and yet we saw that the battery percentage only gradually dropped. The battery (9,510 mAh) is fully charged in about an hour via a charging cable from OnePlus, so you don’t have to worry if your tablet is about to run out of power.

Practical

The OnePlus always has two speakers, bottom and top. they turn Omni-carrying sound fieldTechnology specially developed for OnePlus. There’s no bad word about that, we’ve had an excellent sound experience. They’re not very loud, but what we heard was clear. Ultimately, you’re not going to use a tablet to organize a rave.

You get 128 GB of storage space. Since no micro SD card is available, an expansion is unfortunately not possible. The OnePlus has 8 GB of RAM and runs on a MediaTek CPU: the Dimensity 9000. The built-in GPU is a Mali G710 MC10.

use

Internally, everything is driven by OxygenOS 13.1, whose OnePlus shell turns this tablet into a device that lets you navigate smoothly between stock and uninstalled apps. Thanks to the 144 Hz screen, all animations seem very smooth, which contributes to a feeling of speed.

You will immediately find the necessary apps from Google such as Maps or YouTube. All the applications we use are also surprisingly well adapted to the screen size, which isn’t always the case with Android tablets.

An annoying little bug in the service is the error when closing tabs. Nine times out of ten the “Close All” option didn’t work and we had to wipe out the windows. This sounds trivial, but gets annoying after a while.

For this price you get an easy-to-use tablet that serves the average multitasker and can easily place itself alongside the direct competition in terms of operation. We see this confirmed in the benchmark results. The MediaTek processor outperforms the Qualcomm 778G in the Samsung Galaxy Tab Active, the Kompanio 1300T in the Lenovo Tab P11 Pro, or even the Snapdragon 680 in the (significantly cheaper) Oppo Pad Air.

This is reflected in daily use. When surfing, for example, the value is significantly higher than that of the more expensive Samsung Galaxy Tab Active 4 Pro 5G or the slightly cheaper Lenovo Tab P11 Pro Gen 2.

In fact, the performance of the MediaTek chip remains generally commendable. Despite its competitive price, the OnePlus Pad is increasingly the more powerful choice for browsing, photo and video editing, and data manipulation.

camera

The front camera has eight megapixels, shoots 1080p images at 30 fps and does not support video zoom. The rear camera has thirteen megapixels, but supports video zoom, which allows you to take pictures in 4K at 30 frames per second.

Undoubtedly, not many people use a tablet for photography, but it’s always an option. The OnePlus Pad’s front camera is more than capable of taking average home, garden, and kitchen photos. The snaps are of decent quality and actually meet our expectations. You won’t win any awards with it, but your followers on Instagram and family on Facebook will no doubt like the results.

It’s always a bit of a shock when we activate a device’s rear camera, but in this case it’s more a result of our own looks than the lens. You can easily use the OnePlus Pad for casual selfies and most importantly video calls.

Both cameras are more than decent for a tablet in this price range.

Accesories

A number of accessories are also available for the OnePlus Pad. Of these, the OnePlus magnetic keyboard is definitely a, well, plus. Visually, it fits the device perfectly. Featuring a cover in the same Halo Green used on the black keyboard. The whole thing also gives you an extra feeling of solidity. This can also be due to the fact that the tablet is a lot heavier.

Admittedly, the size of the screen takes a bit of getting used to compared to the keyboard. This feels a bit impractical at first, but once we started typing that feeling was completely gone and it went very smoothly. The touchpad, on the other hand, seemed a bit slower than if we were just using the touchscreen.

In this respect, the round cursor is not very practical. We tend to use the keyboard a lot when it’s plugged in and then it’s difficult, for example not being able to log in; You must always enter your code using the touchscreen. It’s really just a few little things. In general, the magnetic keyboard is definitely worth the purchase price of 149 euros, especially for those who have a lot of paperwork (e-mails, texts).

Verdict

There were a few – small – caveats here and there, but in the end it was a positive experience. The OnePlus Pad (499 euros incl. VAT) is a very nice device and certainly more than a few nice faces. You will definitely get your money’s worth. Sometimes even more than the more expensive models from the competition, especially when it comes to image quality. For a first attempt, this is certainly more than successful.

The device is covered by OnePlus’ “limited warranty”, i.e. 2 years. For the update policy, OnePlus promises three years of operating system updates and four years of security updates, starting with the May 18, 2023 release date.