Knowledgeable’s Score
Execs
- Stable construct
- Sturdy battery life
- Respectable principal digital camera
Cons
- Poor worth
- LCD not OLED
- No ultrawide digital camera
Our Verdict
The OnePlus Nord CE 2 Lite 5G is a stable reasonably priced smartphone, nevertheless it finds itself undercut by cheaper rivals and outmatched by the superior OnePlus Nord CE 2. It received’t let anybody down, however there are merely higher and extra thrilling choices on the market.
Finest Costs Immediately: OnePlus Nord CE 2 Lite 5G
£279
The OnePlus line-up has grown more and more convoluted in 2022. You would possibly assume that the OnePlus Nord CE 2 Lite 5G shares a great deal of DNA with the OnePlus Nord CE 2 5G earlier than it, however you’d be unsuitable.
This new entrant to the reasonably priced mid-range market is a totally completely different kettle of fish with a unique spec listing, but the worth tag falls simply £20 wanting its almost-identically-named brother. OnePlus is successfully competing with itself, which is considerably complicated.
Whereas it’s an undoubtedly stable telephone, the OnePlus Nord CE 2 Lite 5G lacks the aptitude, poise, and sense of worth of different OnePlus telephones. It’s a bit drab and a bit overpriced.
Design & Construct
The OnePlus Nord CE 2 Lite 5G is a much bigger and heavier telephone than the OnePlus Nord CE 2 5G. You wouldn’t name it unwieldy, however at 8.5mm thick and with a weight of 195g, it actually defies any light-weight expectations you may need based mostly on its all-plastic development.
The rear of the telephone has a fairly generic format and form, with the same old curved again panel and rectangular digital camera module.
Two particulars present some curiosity. One is the Blue Tide color of my check mannequin, which seems to shift from a deep blue to an virtually turquoise shade, with shiny yellowy highlights. There’s additionally a Black Nightfall mannequin when you insist on a stealthier look.
Jon Mundy / Foundry
The opposite element of observe is a patch of faint skinny vertical strains that extends throughout the width of the telephone and the size of the digital camera module. There’s no texture or perform to it, nevertheless it makes the telephone look rather less run-of-the-mill than it in any other case would.
There’s a side-mounted fingerprint sensor beneath the ability button, which is sweet and dependable. The underside fringe of the telephone is filled with a USB-C port, 3.5mm headphone jack, and a barely puny mono speaker.
Show
The Nord CE 2 Lite steps away from the reliable show used within the Nord CE 2 and different Nord handsets, and that’s a little bit of a downer.
Relatively than its brother’s 6.43in AMOLED, what you get is a 6.59in IPS LCD. Sure, which means it’s greater. It’s additionally smoother, with a 120Hz refresh price reasonably than the Nord CE 2’s 90Hz.
Each shows have FHD+ resolutions, however the IPS LCD used right here doesn’t output something like the identical vibrant colors or deep blacks because the CE 2. It merely doesn’t look as premium.
Jon Mundy / Foundry
It doesn’t really feel as premium both. The display has a greasy, smudgy really feel to it that had me making an attempt to wipe it clear on my T-shirt inside minutes of dealing with it for the primary time. OnePlus doesn’t point out whether or not it’s Gorilla Glass 5, just like the Nord CE 2 has, which leads me to suspect it isn’t.
Within the display’s default Vivid display color mode, I recorded a gamut protection of 99.6% sRGB, 80.8% Adobe RGB, and 97% DCI P3, which isn’t dangerous. Nonetheless, you’ll need to swap to the Regular color mode if you wish to optimise the stability and accuracy of that output.
When you think about that the Poco X4 Professional 5G provides you a 6.67in 120Hz AMOLED show for even much less cash, the Nord CE 2 Lite’s display actually isn’t something to put in writing dwelling about.
Specs & Efficiency
The OnePlus Nord CE 2 Lite runs on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 695 5G, which is similar low-end chip that powers the equally priced Poco X4 Professional 5G. That is backed by 6GB of RAM, although that may be expanded on the fly by as much as 5GB of momentary digital RAM.
It’s a set-up that helps the CE 2 Lite really feel fairly quick and fluid basically navigation. It might even deal with extra superior duties fairly effectively. Genshin Affect stays playable, if removed from silky easy, on Excessive/60fps settings.
In benchmark assessments the telephone falls a bit of behind the OnePlus Nord CE 2, each in CPU and GPU phrases. It’s kind of equal to the Poco X4 Professional, as you’d anticipate given the similar parts.
On the storage entrance you get 128GB as customary, plus the added bonus of a microSD slot.
Digital camera
OnePlus has packed this low-cost telephone with a type of triple digital camera techniques that’s actually a single-camera system. You get a 64Mp principal huge angle sensor, which is all effectively and good, however then a 2Mp macro and a 2Mp depth sensor that don’t actually do very a lot.
In different phrases, it’s the same set-up to the Nord CE 2, minus the ultrawide. As with that telephone, the Nord CE 2 Lite largely delivers the products in respectable lighting.
Colors are deep and vibrant with out trying completely false, element is nice, and dynamic vary is on level. It’s just about all you can need at this worth.
It struggles a bit of as soon as the sunshine drops, the place the smaller sensor and lack of optical picture stabilisation (OIS) begin to chunk, however I nonetheless obtained usable outcomes with the supplied Night time mode.
There’s no devoted telephoto digital camera however that principal sensor is sufficiently pixel-dense to make digitally cropped 2x photographs look satisfactory. It’s that ultrawide omission that basically bites right here.
Round entrance is a 16MP selfie digital camera, which struggles a bit of with publicity and with a sure softness, however is in any other case satisfactory.
Video recording solely extends to 1080p and 30fps. That falls effectively wanting the Nord CE 2 and its 4K at 30fps or 1080p at 120fps.
Battery Life & Charging
OnePlus has outfitted its reasonably priced telephone with a 5000mAh battery, which matches the Poco X4 Professional 5G and exceeds the non-Lite mannequin.
It’s ample to drive the OnePlus Nord CE 2 Lite 5G by way of a full day of reasonable utilization (3 hours half-hour of display on time) with greater than 50% to spare. That’s a robust consequence, although the Poco X4 Professional 5G achieved one thing related.
For some purpose, the PCMark Work 3.0 battery check repeatedly failed to finish throughout my time with the OnePlus Nord CE 2 Lite 5G, so I can’t provide up any of the same old benchmark comparisons.
On the recharging entrance, OnePlus packs its telephone with a 33W charger. It will get you from 0 to 51% in half-hour, and can get you to 100% inside 1 hour quarter-hour.
It must be famous that the OnePlus Nord CE 2 5G provides you a 65W charger for just a bit extra money, whereas the Poco X4 Professional 5G provides you a 67W charger for rather less.
Jon Mundy / Foundry
Software program
The OnePlus Nord CE 2 Lite 5G ships with Android 12 and the corporate’s customized OxygenOS 12.1 slapped on high.
The latter isn’t fairly the boldly unbiased Android UI it was, with Oppo’s takeover basically rendering it a unique model of its personal ColorOS. However it retains its engaging fonts and icons, not less than, and it’s good and easy to make use of.
I’m not an enormous fan of the OnePlus Shelf, a widget-filled menu that’s accessed by dragging down from the highest proper of the display. It appears to be like a bit of clumsy, and it feels weirdly divorced from the remainder of the UI. Nonetheless, not less than it’s doable to deactivate inside the Settings menu.
OnePlus is promising two main Android updates and three years of safety updates. That’s about pretty much as good because it will get at this finish of the market, and will see the telephone by way of to Android 14.
Worth & Availability
The OnePlus Nord CE 2 Lite 5G is accessible from the OnePlus website and Amazon within the UK. The only mannequin out there within the UK retails for £279, which will get you 6GB RAM and 128GB storage as customary.
In Europe it’s on sale from OnePlus in France for €319 and in Spain for €309.
It’s additionally on sale in India for ₹19,999 direct from OnePlus.
Whereas this locations the OnePlus Nord CE 2 Lite 5G effectively and really into the reasonably priced telephone class, it in some way nonetheless feels a tad overpriced. The likes of the Poxo X4 Professional 5G and the Realme 9 5G are equally specced, however value £20 to £30 much less.
Maybe extra problematic is the problem from inside. The OnePlus Nord 2 CE 5G is a flat-out higher telephone in many of the ways in which rely, but it solely prices £20 extra.
Try our greatest funds telephones and greatest mid-range telephones articles for extra challengers.
Jon Mundy / Foundry
Verdict
The OnePlus Nord CE 2 Lite 5G is one other extremely competent reasonably priced telephone from a now established model.
It’s solidly constructed, has a fluid 120Hz show, and runs fairly easily. The 64Mp principal digital camera, in the meantime, is able to capturing photos with actual pop.
Nonetheless, there’s no getting away from the truth that this is among the least thrilling OnePlus telephones we’ve seen for a while. In sure methods, it feels downright pointless.
For simply £20 lower than the OnePlus Nord CE 2 you’re getting a telephone with an inferior LCD show, inferior efficiency, slower charging, and a much less versatile digital camera system. In the meantime, rival efforts from Xiaomi and Realme present related and even barely higher specs for much less cash.
Specs
- Android 12, OxygenOS 12.1
- 6.59in, FHD+, IPS LCD, 120Hz, flat show
- Facet-mounted fingerprint sensor
- Qualcomm Snapdragon 695 5G
- 6GB LPDDR4X RAM
- 128GB storage
- 64MP, f/1.7 principal digital camera
- 2MP, f/2.4 macro digital camera
- 2MP, f/2.4 depth sensor
- As much as 1080p @ 30fps rear video
- 16Mp front-facing digital camera
- Mono speaker
- Twin-SIM
- Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac
- Bluetooth 5.2
- 5000mAh battery
- 33W charging
- 164.3 x 75.6 x 8.5mm
- 195g