OnePlus 9-series round-up

UPDATE, 2021-03-18:

We initially wrote that it is unknown which UFS- and LPDDR version the 9-series will use. As OnePlus announced it on their Chinese forums, we have edited the article accordingly (UFS 3.1 & LPDDR5).

UPDATE 2, 2021-03-18:

As OnePlus made an announcement on their forums regarding wired and wireless charging, we have edited the article accordingly.

UPDATE 3, 2021-03-20:

A thread was posted by Pete Lau, showing the OnePlus 9 Pro Pine Green. We have edited the article accordingly.

Small side-note: in this article we will only talk about the OnePlus 9 and 9 Pro. We've previously written a round-up about the OnePlus 9 (non-Pro) earlier as well and this time we will also cover the 9 Pro. There will be another article about the OnePlus 9R, once there is more information available about the device. 91Mobiles however claims that OnePlus will announce the 9R and Watch in March as well. This round-up is based on reliable sources.

Just one week more and then OnePlus will announce the 9-series. OnePlus announced their 8T-smartphone on the 14th of October and as usual, they release new top-of-the-line smartphones twice a year. The company recently revealed in a video on YouTube that they will announce the OnePlus 9-series on the 23rd of March. This is surprising, as OnePlus used to announce their smartphones around May/July. This is probably because OnePlus wants to compete more closely with bigger brands like Samsung (who usually announce their devices in Q1 as well).

Specifications

According to a source, reporting to 91Mobiles, both the 9 and 9 Pro (codename "Lemonade" with model numbers "LE2110", "LE2217" and "LE2219") will have the latest and greatest hardware: the Snapdragon 888 SoC, combined with 8GB RAM and 128GB of storage. This corresponds to what was seen on a Geekbench benchmark. Max Weinbach confirmed that the OnePlus 9 Pro will get maximum 12GB of RAM. OnePlus confirmed on their Chinese forums that the 9-series will use UFS 3.1 storage and LPDDR5 RAM.

This time, the basic model will have wireless charging as well - just like the 8 Pro. It is however unknown at what rate the regular 9 will charge. Max Jambor said on Voice that the 9 Pro will be able to charge wirelessly up to 45W. For reference, this was up to 30W for the 8 Pro. 91Mobiles says the regular 9 will have a 4500mAh battery and is able to charge wirelessly with up to 30W. As for wired charging, this will be up to 65W, just like the 8T. It is not known yet how fast reversed charging on the OnePlus 9 (Pro) will be. On another note: many news websites earlier reported that this is the first OnePlus device that will support reversed wireless charging. This is not true: the OnePlus 8 Pro already supported (3W) reversed wireless charging. The chargers of the 9 and 9 Pro have been recently certified as well, a user called "Digital Chat Station" said.

In a post on the forums, OnePlus announced that the 9 Pro will be able to charge wirelessly up to 50W. For wired that is up to 65W. The regular 9 will be able to charge up to 65W wired, but what's remarkable is that OnePlus did not speak about wireless charging regarding the regular 9.

With what we know now, it seems like the OnePlus 9 is a hardware mix of the OnePlus 8 Pro and 8T. Mainly because the OnePlus 9 will have a flat display, just like the 8T.

Earlier, the rumour was circulating that OnePlus that OnePlus will collaborate with Leica for the OnePlus 9-series, but that turned out to be untrue. Back in December, in an interview with InputMag, Pete Lau (OnePlus' CEO) said that OnePlus will be "looking at improving camera photography with a bigger focus on software and hardware". OnePlus announced on the 8th of March that they are collaborating with Hasselblad for the cameras of the 9-series. Hasselblad is a Swedish company that focuses on making DSLRs. OnePlus said that now they are collaborating with Hasselblad, you should expect "to be able to capture your dearest memories in higher quality, sharper detail and, perhaps most importantly, more accurate color." The partnership with Hasselblad will be for the next three years and applies to the future generations of OnePlus flagship cameras, including the Nord-series.

Hasselblad and OnePlus have been working closely together for several months to re-define the colour accuracy on OnePlus smartphones. They have developed a new mode in the camera as a standard: Natural Color Calibration with Hasselblad – that will now serve as OnePlus' new standard for colour calibration for future OnePlus smartphone camera systems.

In the announcement, OnePlus said that they plan to continue developing the camera with Hasselblad for the upcoming three years which starts at software development, what includes colour tuning and sensor calibration. As icing on the cake, OnePlus says they will invest $150 million "to continue upscaling and improving our imaging capabilities to deliver cutting-edge camera technologies that meets your growing expectations." According to the post, the 9-series will get a freeform lens as well. They've said the following:

• We’re pioneering new areas of smartphone imaging technology for future OnePlus camera systems, such as a panoramic camera with a 140-degree field of view, T-lens technology for lightning-fast focus in the front-facing camera, and a freeform lens – to be first introduced on the OnePlus 9 Series – that practically eliminates edge distortion in ultra-wide photos.
• We’re also further developing four major research and development labs around the world, including two innovative imaging labs based in the United States and Japan.

In another post they announced that the 9-series will use a custom 48MP Sony IMX789 sensor. Mind that megapixels is not everything that matters (for example, sensor size also matters a lot). The Twitter account of OnePlus India revealed that one of the sensors (or probably the IMX766, as the IMX766 is 50MP) should be 50MP. OnePlus claims that they have developed the IMX789 together with Sony for the last two years. Furthermore, Pete Lau revealed that the 9-series will also have an ultra-wide IMX766 sensor. Shortly said, this ultra-wide sensor supports the following features:

• 4K 120FPS
• Digital Overlap HDR
• Freeform lens
• 140 degree field of view (Super Panoramic Camera)
• T-lens/Bionic Lens

More information can be found in this forum post. Pete Lau also held an interview with TechRadar. Samples shot with the 9-series are available in both posts.

Roland Quandt (informally known as OnLeaks and a trusted leaker) posted renders of the 9 and 9 Pro on WinFuture. Here we can see that the OnePlus 9 will get a flat display, just like the 8T, while the 9 Pro should get rounded edges just like the 8 Pro. 

OnePlus 9 Pro

OnePlus 9 Pro

OnePlus 9

OnePlus 9

On the 20st of March, Pete Lau posted images on their forums, showing the OnePlus 9 Pro Pine Green.

It was said that the Pro-variant gets a 6.7"-display with rounded corners, while the regular 9 gets a 6.5"-display. It is likely that the OnePlus 9 gets a plastic frame instead of a metal one. It is possible WinFuture predicts that due to the lack of antenna lines on the sides The 9 will be available in black, blue and purple while the 9 Pro will be available in black, green and silver. You may remember that we wrote an article about the 9-series colour variants (including carrier-branded devices), when our team member OneNormalUsername found strings in an Engineering Mode APK sent to us by a trusted source.

In another post of OnePlus, where they talk about the display, the 9 Pro gets a QHD+ (1440p) resolution, 10-bit colour depth, HDR10+ certification and Automatic Colour Temperature Adjustment. The 9 Pro also has a feature called Fluid Display 2.0, which makes use of the LTPO technology. This feature ensures that the screen keeps a high refresh rate whilst consuming less power. This means the 9 Pro will have a 120Hz display, just like the 8 Pro and 8T. The minimal refresh rate is 1Hz and will be scaled down based on the content that is shown. In practice, it should reduce the power consumption by 50%.

OnePlus hasn't talked about the regular 9 in that post, but we expect it to have a 120Hz 1080p screen.

Further, we want to share some screenshots of what OxygenOS on the 9-series looks like.

The homescreen and background in OxygenOS

The OnePlus Camera application showing Pro mode and the rest of the interface. The screenshot also confirms that there will be an option to record videos in 8K resolution.

The settings in OxygenOS

Prices and availability

The latest report has a source which says that the OnePlus 9 will be priced around $600 (approx Rs 44,200). The price of the 9 Pro is unknown. Both devices will be announced via a livestream on the 23rd of March.

To sum it up, below are the specs of the OnePlus 9 and 9 Pro in a table

9 Pro