OnePlus Nord 4 Review: All-Metal Mettle

OnePlus Nord 4 is the company’s latest mid-range smartphone to debut in India, and the company has touted it as the first 5G handset with an aluminium unibody design. The smartphone is powered by a Snapdragon 7+ Gen 3 chipset with up to 12GB of RAM. It features a 50-megapixel primary rear camera and a 16-megapixel selfie camera. The Nord-branded handset sports a 6.74-inch AMOLED screen with a 120Hz refresh rate. We’ve spent the past few days testing the OnePlus Nord 4 to see how it fares against similarly priced competitors.

Pricing for the OnePlus Nord 4 in India starts at Rs. 29,999 for the base configuration with 8GB of RAM and 128GB of built-in storage. The smartphone is also available in 8GB+256GB and 12GB + 256GB memory variants priced at Rs. 32,999 and Rs. 35,999, respectively.

• Dimensions: 162.6x75x8mm
• Weight: 199.5g
• Colours: Mercurial Silver, Oasis Green (in this review), and Obsidian Midnight

The Nord 4 looks and feels different compared to most other smartphones available today, including its predecessor, the OnePlus Nord 3 (Review). It’s been a while since I’ve seen a phone with a body that is mainly made out of metal, and it reminds me of the good old HTC One (M8) (Review). The rear panel has a subtle green shade and a camera island with a smooth glass-like finish at the top, with a darker colour background.

OnePlus Nord 4 is equipped with a dual rear camera setup

On the left side of the OnePlus Nord 4 is the company’s tri-state alert slider that lets you switch among three modes — ring, silent, and vibrate — and this is one of my favourite features on the smartphone. The volume and power buttons are both located on the right side. The company has also placed two antenna lines on all four edges of the handset.

OnePlus Nord 4 has an IP54 rating for dust and splash resistance

There’s an infrared (IR) transmitter located at the top edge of the Nord 4, along with a microphone. On the bottom, the phone has a USB Type-C port for charging and data transfers, along with a speaker grille and a microphone. The phone ships with a charging brick, a USB Type-A to USB Type-C and a translucent TPU cover.

OnePlus Nord 4 Software: Not so premium

• Software: OxygenOS 14.1
• Version: Android 14
• Latest security patch: July 5, 2024

OxygenOS 14.1 ran smoothly on the OnePlus Nord 4, even when the phone was put through its paces. During the setup process, the company prompts you to enable certain features, including one called Lock Screen Magazine that randomly updates your lock screen image — it kept replacing my lock screen photo, and I couldn’t find a way to prevent it from appearing when I swiped to the left on the lock screen.

The phone offers some software features that are powered by artificial intelligence (AI). One such example is the AI Eraser option in the Gallery app that allows you to get rid of people and other objects from photos after downloading a 90MB plugin. It worked somewhat reliably when tested with images clicked using the smartphone’s camera, but only when the photos had enough detail.

The recorder app also offers the ability to automatically summarise recordings, but there’s an unspecified minimum length required — I tested it with a 20-minute audio recording in English, and it recognised most words spoken with a neutral accent. You can also use inbuilt features that allow you to extract text from images or perform translations, which is handy.

OnePlus Nord 4 supports AI-powered text extraction and object eraser features (tap to expand)

Meanwhile, the phone ships with a handful of preinstalled apps and games, including Agoda, Bubble Pop, Fitbit, Tile Match, and Word Connect. These are the same apps included on the cheaper OnePlus Nord CE 4 Lite (Review), and it’s a little disappointing to see them on a phone costing around Rs. 30,000.

Another application (App Picks) automatically downloaded a game called Fire at Will, claiming that I had pre-ordered it on May 23. This alternative app store also sends out a couple of notifications about apps per day — these can be turned off by long-pressing the icon and disabling the app.

On the bright side, OnePlus says that the Nord 4 will receive four Android OS updates and six years of security updates. This means the handset will receive the same number of Android OS updates as the Samsung Galaxy A55 and Galaxy A35 (Review), which currently offer the longest support window in the midrange segment.

OnePlus Nord 4 Performance: Meets expectations

• Processor: Snapdragon 7+ Gen 3
• Memory: Up to 12GB (LPDDR5X)
• Storage: Up to 512GB (UFS 4.0)

OnePlus has equipped the Nord 4 with the first Snapdragon 7-series chip to feature on-device AI capabilities, which powers the previously mentioned AI features on the handset. The company sent us the 8GB+256GB configuration for this review.

Running on the top-end chipset in the Snapdragon 7-series, the OnePlus Nord 4 can handle heavy-duty tasks like editing a 4K video in InShot and exporting it to the phone’s inbuilt storage, or simple day-to-day activities like browsing the web on Chrome, scrolling through Instagram and X (formerly Twitter).

The phone can also run graphics-intensive games like Genshin Impact with no issues — the game defaulted to medium graphics settings on this handset, but it runs fine even when playing it on a higher setting. The aluminium rear panel got slightly warm after about 5 minutes of playing, but there was no lag or stutter even after the one-hour mark.

OnePlus Nord 4 benchmark test result (tap to expand)

The OnePlus Nord 4 achieved lower CPU benchmark scores than its closest competitor, the Realme GT 6T, also equipped with a Snapdragon 7+ Gen 3 chipset. The latter scored nearly as well as the Poco F6, equipped with a more capable processor.

The Nord 4 didn’t lag in graphics benchmark tests, however. It’s also worth keeping in mind that synthetic benchmark tests are not a clear indicator of real-world performance, which also depends on software optimisation. The benchmark scores in the table below show how the Nord 4 fared against other similarly priced smartphones.

There’s a 6.74-inch Full-HD+ (1,240 x 2,772 pixels) AMOLED screen with a 120Hz refresh rate and 450ppi pixel density on the OnePlus Nord 4, and the company claims that the phone supports a peak brightness of 2,150 nits. In day-to-day use, the display is bright enough for outdoor use and gets quite dim at night.

The display on the OnePlus Nord 4 is bright enough for outdoor use when automatic brightness is enabled

Like the flagship OnePlus 12 and other handsets like the Realme GT 6 (Review), the Nord 4 has a “ProXDR” feature that automatically adjusts the brightness and contrast levels when viewing images on the phone. The feature can be misleading, as the phone shares the original pictures via Quick Share or when uploading them to social media — what you see on your phone may appear different to others online. Thankfully, there’s a way to completely disable it via the Photos app.

OnePlus Nord 4 Cameras: Mostly reliable

• Main camera: 50-megapixel (OIS, EIS), up to 4K/ 60fps video
• Ultra-wide angle camera: 8-megapixel, up to 1080p/30fps video
• Selfie camera: 16-megapixel, up to 1080p/30fps video

When capturing images during the daytime using the primary camera on the OnePlus Nord 4, you get clear images with a lot of detail, even when you zoom in on images in your gallery. The primary Sony LYT-600 sensor offers 2x in-sensor zoom support, and images captured at this focal length are also clear and detailed.

The primary camera on the OnePlus Nord 4 captures detailed images during the day (tap to expand)

The ultra-wide angle camera on the Nord 4 doesn’t offer the same colour accuracy (tap to expand)

The ultra-wide angle camera on the Nord 4 has a lower-resolution sensor, which delivers usable images during the day, but they do not offer the same colour accuracy as the primary camera, and there’s also a bit of distortion around the edges.

In low-light scenarios, the primary and secondary cameras both do a good job lighting up dark scenarios. However, there’s a vast gap in image quality between the two — the primary camera delivers sharper images, while there’s a lot of smoothening in images captured with the ultra-wide angle camera. The camera app automatically takes a long exposure shot when it’s dark outside, and it takes 2-3 seconds to capture an image — there’s no way to disable this.

In low-light scenarios, the primary camera captures more detail with less softening (tap to expand)

The selfie camera can capture clear images when you’re outdoors during the day and in well-lit areas indoors. It struggles a little in dimly lit areas but still captures enough detail. Meanwhile, the screen is used as a flash in very dark scenarios with decent results if you stay still for enough time.

You can record video at up to 4K/60fps using the primary camera, but it’s worth noting that image stabilisation for videos is only supported at 1080p/ 60fps — you can’t even select 1080p/30fps or a lower resolution. There’s no stabilisation support on the ultra-wide angle camera or the selfie camera, which both record videos at up to 1080p/ 30fps.

OnePlus Nord 4 Battery: Dependable

• Battery Capacity: 5,500mAh (Dual-cell)
• Wired Charging: 100W SuperVOOC
• Charger: 100W (Included)

Powering the OnePlus Nord 4 is a 5,500mAh battery, which offers reliable day-to-day use and a slow standby drain. I got about six and a half hours of screen time on a single charge, and the phone lasted about a day and a half before it had to be charged again. Overnight battery drain is also quite low, with the phone’s battery level dropping by 2 percent over an eight-hour period.

OnePlus Nord 4 offered more than a day of battery backup on a single charge with moderate usage

In our HD video battery loop test, the phone lasted for 18 hours and 15 minutes. The included 100W charging brick took 33 minutes to fully charge the dual-cell battery on the OnePlus Nord 4, which did not get too hot during the charging process.

Realme GT 6 Review: Verdict

Despite a few drawbacks, the Oneplus Nord 4 offers a lot of value for a smartphone priced under Rs. 30,000. It delivers reliable day-to-day performance, fast battery charging, a good primary camera, and an ideal software support window. The slightly less impressive ultra-wide angle camera and unwanted software on the smartphone are the only things holding it back, and one of those can be resolved by uninstalling or disabling the apps in question.

While the Nord 4 is definitely worth your consideration, other phones in the same price segment that also offer good value include the Realme GT 6T and the Poco F6 (Review). Both these phones offer performance that is on par with the OnePlus Nord 4, but the latter’s camera performance leaves a little to be desired, as we found in our review of the handset.

You can also consider the Samsung Galaxy A35 (Review), which isn’t as fast in synthetic benchmarks but offers good day-to-day performance and gets four Android OS updates. If your focus is primarily on camera performance, you can also consider the older Pixel 7a (Review) from Google that occasionally drops to the Rs.30,000 mark on Flipkart.