OnePlus Nord 3: Should You Buy This Phone Instead of the iQoo Neo 7 Pro or the OnePlus 11R?

OnePlus Nord 3 is the latest mid-range handset from OnePlus and the newest entry in the Nord series of smartphones. Unlike its predecessor, the Nord 3 brings some notable improvements in the performance and camera department. The phone competes with several similarly priced smartphones in India such as the newly launched iQoo Neo 7 Pro, the Samsung Galaxy A34 5G, and the Motorola Edge 40 — as well as the slightly more expensive OnePlus 11R 5G, which offers a more powerful Snapdragon 8 series chipset and slightly faster charging. 

On this week’s episode of Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast, resident smartphone expert Pranav Hegde talks to host Siddharth Suvarna about the latest Nord 3 smartphone from OnePlus. We discussed some of the most notable upgrades that the OnePlus Nord brings to the table.

OnePlus has equipped the Nord 3 with a powerful MediaTek Dimensity 9000 SoC. This is a flagship-grade chipset that is based on a 4nm fabrication process. You also get LPDDR5X RAM, that is typically found on flagship phones. This means that the OnePlus Nord 3 offers a huge jump in performance over the OnePlus Nord 2, which featured a weaker Dimensity 1200 SoC.

For photography, the OnePlus Nord 3 is equipped with a triple rear camera setup, comprising a 50-megapixel Sony IMX890 primary camera with optical image stabilisation (OIS). You also get a 8-megapixel ultra-wide-angle camera, and a 2-megapixel macro camera. The phone lets you capture up to 4K 60fps videos, while the 16-megapixel front camera can record videos at 1080p 30fps.

This is the first OnePlus Nord-series phone that is promised to receive three OS updates and four years of security updates. It is preloaded with a few third-party apps — colloquially known as bloatware — such as Amazon Prime Video, Netflix, and Spotify. OnePlus’ OxygenOS 13.1 skin supports the Material You theming engine introduced with Android 13, which means you can easily customise and select a specific colour palette for the system interface.

If you’re new to the Gadgets 360 website, you can easily find the Gadgets 360 podcast Orbital on your favourite platform — be it Amazon Music, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Gaana, JioSaavn, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your podcasts.

Don’t forget to follow the Gadgets 360 podcast wherever you’re listening. Please also rate us and leave a review.