With all that is on offer, does the OnePlus Nord 3 5G offer the best value for your money? Here is our full review to help you find out.
OnePlus Nord 3 5G price in India
The OnePlus Nord 3 5G has been launched in India in two storage options. The base model offers 8GB of RAM and 128GB of storage and is priced at Rs. 33,999. The variant we have for review comes with 16GB of RAM and 256GB of storage, and is priced at Rs. 37,999.
OnePlus Nord 3 5G design and display
The OnePlus Nord 3 5G, with its design and colour options, looks like a premium version of the OnePlus Nord CE 3 Lite 5G (Review), which was launched earlier this year. The new phone has slightly curved edges for the glass back which is Corning Gorilla Glass 5. We have the Misty Green colour which looks quite good but attracts fingerprints and smudges easily due to the glossy finish. I prefer the Tempest Grey colour, which has a matte-textured finish. Both colour options come with an IP54 rating for basic water and dust resistance, something that was missing in the previous model.
The OnePlus Nord 3 5G has a flat plastic frame with a matte finish. Its right side has the fan-favourite Alert slider and the power button. The volume rocker is on the left side. On the bottom edge, there is room for a USB Type-C port, primary speaker grille, microphone, and a dual-SIM slot. At the top, there is also an IR emitter which can be used to to control appliances in your home.
OnePlus Nord 3 5G continues to feature an alert slider
I like the overall in-hand feel of the OnePlus Nord 3 5G. The slight curvature of the rear panel around the edges ensures that the frame does not feel very sharp when playing games or holding the phone for long periods. Weight distribution is also good and it does not feel top-heavy. For the spec sheet nerds out there, the Nord 3 5G weighs 193.5g and measures 8.15mm in thickness.
On the front, the handset features a tall 6.74-inch 'Super Fluid' AMOLED display. Unlike the slightly more affordable Realme 11 Pro+ 5G (Review) and Motorola Edge 40 (Review), the OnePlus Nord 3 5G offers a flat display instead of a curved-edge one. The bezels are fairly thin, including the chin, which helps offer more screen and provides an immersive viewing experience.
Content viewed on the OnePlus Nord 3 5G's 10-bit AMOLED panel with a 1.5K resolution (2772x1240 pixels) looks crisp. The display also produces vivid colours, and with HDR10+ support on Netflix and Amazon Prime Video, you get those deep blacks. The dual speakers feature Dolby Atmos enhancement and offer rich sound. They also get loud enough to fill a small room.
OnePlus Nord 3 5G has a fairly thin chin bezel
The OnePlus Nord 3 5G's display offers a touch sampling rate of up to 1,000Hz and features a dynamic 120Hz refresh rate. During my time with the device, I did not notice any stutter while scrolling and the animations felt smooth.
The Nord 3 5G has an in-display fingerprint scanner which is fairly quick to authenticate and unlock the phone, although it is placed a bit low for my liking. Alternatively, you can use the less secure but more convenient AI-based face recognition for authentication.
OnePlus Nord 3 5G specifications and software
The OnePlus Nord 3 5G gets the flagship-grade MediaTek Dimensity 9000 SoC which is based on a 4nm fabrication process. The SoC features a Mali G-710 GPU and is paired with up to 16GB of LPDDR5X RAM along with 256GB of UFS 3.1 storage. There is no microSD card slot or headphone jack. The handset supports eight 5G bands, Bluetooth 5.3 and Wi-Fi 6 connectivity. The OnePlus Nord 3 5G packs a 5,000mAh battery and offers 80W fast charging support.
In terms of software, the OnePlus Nord 3 5G boots Oxygen OS 13.1 based on Android 13. OnePlus' custom skin is known to offer a bunch of personalisation and customisation options. You can not only change wallpapers and themes but also adjust the icon shape, size and the fonts. Oxygen OS 13.1 supports Android's Material You theme, which allows you to match the system and UI colours to that of the wallpaper. You can check our OnePlus 11 review, where we have shared our experience with the new Oxygen OS 13 features.
The Nord 3 5G comes preloaded with a bunch of OnePlus and Oppo apps, such as Zen Space, Community, O Relax, OnePlus Store, Clone Phone, etc. There are very few preinstalled third-party apps such as Netflix, Amazon Prime Video and Spotify.
OnePlus Nord 3 5G runs on the latest Oxygen OS 13 update.
OnePlus has promised to provide three major Android updates and four years of security patches for The Nord 3 5G. This is the longest support that a Nord smartphone has ever received at launch.
OnePlus Nord 3 5G performance and battery life
During my time with the OnePlus Nord 3 5G, I played a bunch of games while performing other routine tasks on the device. The experience was quite fluid, to say the least. Apps loaded quickly and gaming performance was also excellent. I played Battlegrounds Mobile India (BGMI) and Asphalt 9: Legends on the phone, both of which ran smoothly. BGMI supported up to Ultra HD graphics with an Ultra framerate. However, if you want to use the Extreme frame rate option, you will need to set graphics to HDR.
RAM management on the 16GB RAM variant of the Nord 3 5G was excellent as apps remained in memory and continued to load from where I had left them. Of course, heavy games such as BGMI did reload after switching back to it after a while. The area around the camera module did get slightly warm while playing games for long periods but it was nothing alarming.
The OnePlus Nord 3 5G scored 8,47,115 in AnTuTu (v10), which is slightly less than the lower-priced Poco F5 (Review), which scored 10,94,798 points with its Snapdragon 7+ Gen 2 SoC. The phone scored 863 and 2,978 points in Geekbench 6's single-core and multi-core tests.
There is the new iQoo Neo 7 Pro (First Impressions) which is priced roughly the same as the Nord 3 5G. It features a Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 SoC and while we are working on the full review, our initial AnTuTu test of the Neo 7 Pro returned a score of 12,63,884 points, whereas, in Geekbench 6 it scored 1,727 and 4,459 points in the single-core and multi-core tests.
OnePlus Nord 3 5G does not get hot while playing games
In terms of battery life, the OnePlus Nord 3 5G can last a full day on one charge. The average screen-on time (SoT) that I got was about eight hours and 30 minutes on days with medium usage. On days when I played games and shot photos and videos, the SoT dropped to seven hours and 15 minutes. In our HD video loop test, the Nord 3 5G lasted for about 21 hours and 12 minutes. The phone takes about 40 minutes to charge from 1-100 percent using the bundled adapter.
OnePlus Nord 3 5G cameras
The OnePlus Nord 3 5G features a triple-camera setup on the back. This includes a 50-megapixel Sony IMX890 primary camera with optical image stabilisation (OIS), an 8-megapixel ultra-wide camera, and a 2-megapixel macro camera.
The primary camera's daylight performance is quite impressive. You get good details and dynamic range and colours look vibrant. It managed to capture some detailed and colour-accurate shots even when it was quite cloudy or raining outside.
OnePlus Nord 3 5G primary camera samples (tap to see larger size)
Oddly, the Photo mode in the camera app tends to adds some pink hue over human skin tones. Portrait mode shots on the other hand offer good background blur while getting the skin tones right. In low light, there's a good balance of exposure between the highlights and shadows. The good thing here is that the night sky does look grey and not dark blue. So far, the OnePlus Nord 3's primary camera performance is one of the best that I have seen in its segment.
OnePlus Nord 3 5G camera samples (Top row: Portrait mode, Photo mode; Bottom row: Low-light camera samples)
The ultra-wide camera, though, is quite average. For starters, the colour temperature is different compared to the main camera with slightly cooler tones. As expected, details are weaker, especially around the distorted edges. The 16-megapixel front camera's daylight performance is good for the price. It gets human skin tones right most of the time and the portrait mode blur looks natural too.
OnePlus Nord 3 5G camera samples (Top row: Ultra-wide; Bottom row: Front camera)
Recorded videos from the OnePlus Nord 3 5G is quite impressive for the price. The rear camera can capture up to 4K 60fps videos. The dynamic range performance is quite good and so are the colours, which are close to natural. The front camera gets the segment-standard video recording limit of 1080p 30fps, which is quite okay with natural colours and passable dynamic range performance.
Verdict
The OnePlus Nord 3 5G checks almost all the boxes to be a potential contender for the best smartphone under Rs. 40,000 in India, at the moment. It has a bigger and better display than its predecessor, a flagship-grade performance unit and a capable set of cameras. Software experience also is pretty clean and feature-rich.
The only downsides that I see are the underwhelming ultra-wide camera and the fact that it only gets a basic IP rating. The slightly affordable Motorola Edge 40 and the Samsung Galaxy A34 5G (Review) offer IP68 and IP67 ratings, respectively.
The price of the Nord 3 5G has also gone up by a few thousand rupees compared to the outgoing model. The 16GB RAM variant sits quite close to the OnePlus 11R (Review), which is priced at Rs. 39,999 and offers a curved-edge AMOLED display and a Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 SoC, with a similar set of cameras and slightly faster 100W charging. However, if you want an all-rounder smartphone without stretching your budget too much, I think the OnePlus Nord 3 5G is still a great buy.
The Nord series from OnePlus has offered solid devices in the mid-range smartphone market ever since it was launched in India back in 2020. With impressive build quality, great software, capable cameras, and blazing-fast charging speeds, these phones offer some of the most coveted features to the end users without breaking the bank. However, with each passing year, the pricing for this series is increasing and now edging close to the ‘R’ series from OnePlus. In the near future, the brand might have to decide on the eventual direction for these two series unless the pricing for the flagship phone moves further up, clearing the headspace for the phones from the Nord and R series. Currently, the latest entry in the Nord series – the Nord 3 5G – is available for under Rs 35,000 in India and has been received well since it was released in the market, by both critics and users. In fact, when we reviewed the OnePlus Nord 3 back in July, we called it “a job done exceptionally well.” Now that the phone has been out for some time and with recent festive sales, become more affordable than ever, if you are considering buying it, I am here to help you make your decision. I’ve been using the phone as my primary driver in the last few weeks and here is my experience using it in November 2023.
What still works in the phone’s favour?
Display and audio quality
One of the strongest points that work in favour of the OnePlus Nord 3 is that the phone comes with a gorgeous display that offers a dynamic refresh rate between 40Hz and 120Hz. The 6.74-inch Super Fluid AMOLED panel features support for 10-bit colour depth and HDR10+, ensuring a viewing experience that is simply a cut above the other phones in this price range. I was recently using the iQOO Neo7 Pro for a performance test, and in comparison to the Nord 3, the colours on the iQOO phone’s display appeared dull and washed out. Along with a brilliant display, the Nord 3 also comes with dual Dolby Atmos speakers that offer amazing audio quality. If you are the sort of person who consumes a lot of multimedia content, this combination of a great display and impressive audio quality could be one of the primary reasons why you should consider buying this phone.
Primary and ultra-wide camera sensors
The OnePlus Nord 3 comes with the same primary camera sensor as the brand’s flagship OnePlus 11 5G. This 50MP Sony IMX890 sensor with OIS is capable of clicking nice shots in all kinds of lighting conditions. As you might expect from a flagship-grade camera unit, the phone lets you capture detailed shots with good dynamic range. In portrait shots, the edge detection is really good and the bokeh effect comes across nicely. The 8MP ultra-wide-angle sensor offers a field-of-view (FoV) of 112 degrees and manages to click some really good shots. Thankfully, the shots taken from this sensor also do not show even the slightest hint of the Fisheye effect.
Clean and easy-to-use interface + useful features
With the Oxygen OS 13.1 (based on Android 13), the OnePlus Nord 3 offers a butter-smooth usage experience. Thanks to some polished animations, using the phone feels like a breeze. Instead of bombarding the user with countless features that might not even be used, the phone focuses on offering limited features that add actual value. For example, while gaming, you get the option to choose Championship mode which lets you avoid any banner notifications, calls, alarms, and more. Additionally, you can choose options such as a stable refresh rate, Ultimate touch experience, and Performance breakthrough to get actual benefits while using the phone. If you’re looking to avoid distractions, the O-Relax app on the phone comes with a collection of soothing sounds, calming white noise, and mini games to aid relaxation.
Battery backup and charging speeds
One of the common aspects of any good phone is that you want to keep on using it. That’s why the long-lasting battery backup on the OnePlus Nord 3 feels like a godsend as the phone is extremely efficient and conservative with its battery life. Even months after launch, the phone gave me an average screen-on time of around 7-8 hours, which means you can easily survive a normal day even if you forget your charger at home. Speaking of charging, with the blazing-fast 80W charging speed, you won’t even have to remain tethered to the wall for long with the handset as it charges easily within an hour.
What doesn’t work?
Better performers in the same price range
While the OnePlus Nord 3 is no slouch when it comes to performance, I found that the phone heats up after just 20-25 minutes of gaming. Despite the presence of the capable MediaTek Dimensity 9000 SoC at the helm, the phone also faced occasional app crashes during my usage. Considering that there are other phones in this price range that offer more capable chipsets – iQOO Neo7 Pro and Realme GT 2 Pro – that can handle the same tasks without breaking a sweat, shows that the Nord 3 hasn’t aged particularly well in this department. At the time of our original review, we were satisfied with the phone’s overall performance and didn’t even face any heating issues as such but somehow these issues are now prevalent on the phone.
Macro camera performance
While the primary camera and the ultra-wide-angle unit seem to have received a lot of love on the OnePlus Nord 3, the same cannot be said about the macro sensor. The macro unit on the phone doesn’t take quite as impressive shots as one would hope. As you might expect, the low-resolution sensor (2MP) takes average photos that lack details.
Selfie camera performance
The front camera on the OnePlus Nord 3, as we pointed out in our detailed review as well, gets the job done but this is definitely not the best selfie camera that you can buy in the phone’s current price range. In comparison, some other phones such as Vivo V29 in this same price range come with much more capable front shooters that can click highly detailed shots with accurate skin tones. These handsets will easily get preference over the Nord 3.
Should you buy the OnePlus Nord 3 5G?
OnePlus Nord 3 is one of the best phones you can buy under Rs 35,000 right now in India particularly if you are looking for a phone with great display and battery backup. The phone’s simple user interface also feels inviting and offers some actually useful features on top of Android 13. The phone’s primary camera is capable of taking some nice pictures and the Nord 3 can walk toe-to-toe with any other phone in this price range when it comes to picture quality. However, if you are looking for a phone that offers stellar performance and doesn’t heat up easily, you could consider the iQOO 7 Pro, which falls in the same price bracket. The front camera on the iQOO handset also leaves you wanting for more and in this aspect, you could take a look at a phone like the Vivo V29.
Design
Taking a look at the phone, it’s obvious that this phone is 100% identical to the Nord CE 3 Lite. It’s just in a different color that they’re calling Misty Green and that instantly reminded me of the grey-green color of the Galaxy Z Fold4. They’re very similar, and I love it.
And surprisingly, we have the alert slider on this phone too! It’s the same as their flagship OnePlus 11. There are 3 levels, either ring, vibrate, or complete mute. I absolutely love this feature.
Then if we take a look at the top of this phone, we have a black, glossy dot. This is an IR blaster and I am surprised to find this on a OnePlus phone, honestly. OnePlus also included another app to help you control your devices via this IR blaster too. The app is simple to use – and if you’re familiar with Xiaomi’s IR blaster then it practically works the same here.
Software
Let’s continue to talk about the software. This phone comes with OxygenOS 13.1 on top of Android 13 and it is pretty much the same as what we’ve talked about before. OxygenOS is very clean, with no bloatware – maybe except for the inclusion of Netflix which can be deleted really easily – and a few OnePlus apps.
I like the Shelf feature even more since we can add IR blaster remotes onto the Shelf directly, but I still think having the ability to add homescreen widgets to the Shelf will be even better.
By the way, OnePlus is also upping its software update policy too. The OnePlus Nord 3 will have 3 generations of Android OS upgrades and 4 years of security patches. While it is not the best, it is still a very good step forward.
Now, if we head back to the “about device” page, you can see something peculiar. 16GB RAM. Yes, this phone comes with 16GB RAM of real RAM. I doubt we can actually use more than 10GB of RAM, so having so much RAM seems like a waste. We did a video talking about RAM usage on phones too – link at the top right corner there.
Truthfully speaking, I think only the ROG Phone 7 with the background mode feature will be able to take advantage of more than 8GB RAM consistently. The RAM expansion feature is something that we won’t talk about here since it is much slower than the real RAM.
But, there is one thing that I need to repeat again. You see, this phone comes with a 120Hz screen and the OnePlus Nord 3 can run some games can indeed run at 120fps. Some, because most games are literally not allowed to go beyond 60fps.
That seems to be a limitation from OxygenOS part as I have specifically selected PUBG New State to run at 90fps but it only goes 60fps at most.
I do want to highlight that the speaker position on this phone is very good. I never block it at all when I was playing games on it. Good job.
Screen
Now, let’s talk about the screen then. This is a relatively skinny and tall 6.74-inch AMOLED screen with a higher-than-usual resolution of 2772×1240 pixels and goes up to 120Hz refresh rate, like what we’ve said earlier.
Of course, we also tested the capabilities of the screen too. Our colorimeter reports that it covers 99.87% of sRGB and 98.91% of DCI-P3 color gamuts while having a maximum ΔE of 3.28. Rather high, but I doubt anyone will notice it anyway.
As for the maximum brightness, it can go up to nearly 1050 nits and obviously – you won’t have any issues using this screen outdoors.
My only issue with it though, is the placement of the under-display fingerprint scanner. It’s too low and it’s just not ergonomic to use.
Cameras
Now then, the cameras. There are triple cameras on the phone but one of them is a macro camera so we’ll be skipping over that. However, by just looking at some pictures taken with the OnePlus Nord 3, I think it’s easy to tell why I love this phone so much.
To take a look at all the photos taken by the OnePlus Nord 3 5G.
Battery
Now then, what about the battery life? The OnePlus Nord 3 comes with a total of 5,000mAh in a dual-cell configuration. From our battery life test of PCMark 10 at 100 nits brightness, it can last nearly 11 hours and I’d say that it will last you through one full day if you’re just a bit more conservative.
Charging time
That dual-cell battery though, is actually to further increase the charging speed and efficiency.
There is an 80W charger in the box and we can charge the phone from 15% to completion in about 30 minutes only. That is surprisingly quick.
Unfortunately, this is a proprietary charging standard and does not support USB-PD standards. When I plugged in our Ugreen 140W GaN charger, the OnePlus Nord 3 only takes in a maximum of 18W and takes about 3 times the time required to charge from 15% to completion. I really do hope more brands will adopt USB-PD standards instead of fully relying on their own proprietary charging standard.
A few more things to mention
Okay, a few more things to mention here. The OnePlus Nord 3 does not have an audio jack and does not have any microSD card slot either. It is also rated to have IP54, and as per mentioned earlier – it has both an IR blaster and an alert slider.
This phone is still using a USB 2.0 port so you won’t be able to connect it to a larger screen or your TV via that USB-C port. Transferring a gigabyte also takes about 2 minutes – which is extremely slow. This is obviously a way to keep the price of the phone low.
Should you buy the OnePlus Nord 3 5G?
And that’s everything we have to share with you about the OnePlus Nord 3. It’s an interesting phone nonetheless – a flagship phone from a year ago remade as a mid-range smartphone. The performance is magnificent, the main camera is good, the screen is good, both battery life and charging speed are good, and even the software is objectively better than some of its competitors. However, I truly worry about the price the most.
As of the time of recording this video, we do not have the price yet. We prodded OnePlus to share the price but they said it’ll be a surprise. I really do hope they price this phone reasonably because it will show all the other smartphone manufacturers how to make a great phone.
You know what, let’s do wish. I wish this phone is priced at RM1,999 even though I know it is quite impossible because of that 16GB RAM. I do think that the 16GB RAM is just unnecessary, honestly. 8GB is plentiful and 12GB is already excessive. Again, watch our video at the top right corner or in the description to know why.
I think the maximum price to pay for this phone will be RM2,499. Anything higher will kind of defeat the purpose of this phone is a “OnePlus experience for less money”.
We’ll update this review again when we have the price. From what we’ve seen, Malaysia will only get the 16GB RAM variant with 256GB storage and will cost RM2,199. It’s a really good price, though I do think OnePlus can opt for 8GB RAM and price it at RM1,999. That’ll be even better.