OnePlus I’m a big fan of OnePlus phones. From the day I got my invite to buy the OnePlus One to happily using the OnePlus 13 for much of 2025, OnePlus’s Android handsets have really resonated with me over the years. The company’s focus on smooth performance, long battery life, fast charging, unique hardware, and opinionated cameras are all things I value in an Android phone, and OnePlus has consistently delivered on them. And yet, with the OnePlus 15, I find myself feeling rather conflicted. OnePlus did a lot right with the phone, and its commitment to performance, battery, and charging is more evident than ever. But at the same time, OnePlus sacrificed other parts of its identity to the point where I’m not even sure I recognize this as a OnePlus phone. As a OnePlus fan, what are your first impressions of the OnePlus 15? 97 votes It looks great! Better than previous OnePlus phones. 39 % I'm disappointed, especially compared to the OnePlus 13. 29 % I'm not sure / waiting for reviews. 30 % Other (let us know in the comments). 2 % Hardware and software that’s moving in the wrong direction OnePlus That lack of identity is first seen with the OnePlus 15’s hardware. The OnePlus 13 has one of my favorite Android designs in recent years, thanks mainly to its stylish camera housing and wonderful faux leather back. It was a fantastic evolution of the OnePlus 12 and OnePlus 11 designs (both of which I also liked), and it helped the OnePlus 13 stand out from virtually all of its competitors. But with the OnePlus 15, OnePlus abandoned its last three years of design work in favor of what can only be described as “just another Android phone.” It’s not offensively bad or ugly, but it also just doesn’t look like anything. The square camera bump is a tired design choice, and the limited color selection is much less vibrant compared to previous years. If the OnePlus logo wasn’t there, you wouldn’t know it’s a OnePlus phone. The design changes OnePlus settled on feel so uninspired. That’s also evident in the alert slider, or, rather, the lack thereof. The alert slider has been a staple of OnePlus smartphone design since the beginning, but the OnePlus 15 abandons it in favor of the “Plus Key” — a new hardware button that summons OnePlus’s Plus Mind AI feature. To be clear, I’m not criticizing OnePlus just because the OnePlus 15’s hardware is different; I’m all for new ideas and designs. But the changes OnePlus settled on feel so uninspired. There’s nothing clever or unique about the OnePlus 15’s aesthetics. Replacing a beloved hardware slider with an AI button — a trend that cannot die soon enough — is a bad move. Change can be good, but the way OnePlus went about it with the OnePlus 15 doesn’t feel like the OnePlus I know and love. Mishaal Rahman / Android Authority It’s a similar story with the software. OxygenOS 15 is an excellent Android skin. It’s fast and well-optimized, wonderfully customizable, and has one of my favorite split-screen interfaces on Android (Open Canvas). All of that is still true of the OxygenOS 16 update that ships on the OnePlus 15, but like its hardware, the changes OnePlus made to its software are … unoriginal. The app drawer, for example, now categorizes your apps into folders just like the iPhone. Much of the interface has been given a glassy, reflective coating not unlike Apple’s Liquid Glass. The weather and calculator apps look more indistinguishable from the iPhone’s than ever before, and OnePlus is even touting the ability to pair an Apple Watch with OxygenOS 16. OxygenOS 15 already had some Apple-inspired design elements, but it still very much felt like its own thing. With OxygenOS 16, however, OnePlus has put so much effort into copying iOS at the expense of carving out its own software identity — and that’s a bummer. The Hasselblad elephant in the room Robert Triggs / Android Authority There’s also the looming debate around the OnePlus 15’s cameras. As you’ve likely heard by now, the OnePlus 15 doesn’t carry the Hasselblad partnership that OnePlus phones have had since the OnePlus 9. That, paired with sensor downgrades for virtually the entire camera system, puts the OnePlus 15 in an awkward position. We’ve already talked at length about why the OnePlus 15 camera downgrades are a problem, but it’s worth reiterating just how big a change this really is. Before the Hasselblad partnership, OnePlus cameras were always just Fine. They weren’t terrible, but they also never did enough to meet or beat the competition; they sort of just existed and didn’t stand out in any meaningful way. But once OnePlus partnered with Hasselblad, things immediately changed. The OnePlus 9 Pro camera wasn’t perfect, but it was a substantial leap forward for OnePlus — the biggest we had ever seen. This continued to get better year after year, to the point where the OnePlus 13 is one of my favorite camera phones of the past year. Its color science is opinionated and so much more unique than anything Samsung and Google are doing. Combined with excellent shooting modes like XPan, the OnePlus 13 makes me feel more creative with my photography and encourages me to try new things. With Hasselblad no longer in the picture, all of that is at stake. We don’t know if or how OnePlus will concoct its own version of XPan. I certainly hope it still exists, but I worry what it’ll be like without Hasselblad’s expertise. As for photo quality and color reproduction with OnePlus’s new DetailMax imaging engine, I’ll let you form your own opinions based on our first OnePlus 15 camera samples. What happened to the OnePlus I love? Joe Maring / Android Authority When you add all of this together, I think you’ll see what I mean when I say the OnePlus 15 isn’t recognizable as a OnePlus phone. OnePlus’s unique hardware identity? Gone. The famous alert slider? Gone. Original software design? Gone. A meaningful and impactful camera partnership? Gone. All of these have been pillars of OnePlus phones for years, but in one generation, OnePlus has abandoned every single one. To OnePlus’s credit, there are still hints of the company’s identity in the OnePlus 15. The 7,300mAh battery is one of the largest on a mainstream Android phone. 120W wired charging is absurdly impressive, and the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 should offer all the performance you can dream of. All of those things play into OnePlus’s typical strengths, and I don’t want to discount them at all. However, the beauty of the OnePlus 12 and OnePlus 13 was that OnePlus delivered on its battery and performance aspirations while also still offering everything the OnePlus 15 lacks: original hardware design, the alert slider, non-copycat software, and powerhouse camera systems — things that make OnePlus phones OnePlus phones. If the OnePlus 15 isn’t a true OnePlus phone, what is it? Right now, it looks like one of the Android phones of all time. A phone that lacks the character of its predecessors. A phone with a compromised camera system and a phone that would rather copy Apple than have its own ideas. The OnePlus 15 looks like a OnePlus phone that forgot how to be a OnePlus phone, and as a OnePlus fan, that hurts to see. Follow