OnePlus 6T Review: Performance, Quality And Price Leadership Again

OnePlus' custom Buttons and Gestures setup returns here, with Quick Gestures like Flip To Mute, Three Finger Screenshots, and Answer Calls By Gestures (like raising the phone to your ear). You also get the usual key utilities as well, like OnePlus' signature Gaming Mode with Network Boost packet prioritization for gaming apps and DND gaming features, along with other tools like a pure black and white reading mode. Beyond these enhancements and some camera tweaks, the rest of the software interface is fairly pure and clean Android 9 Pie that feels fast and lean with no bloat or lag between screen transitions. Maybe it's the fact that our device has 8GB of RAM on board (a standard setup at the $579 SKU), but nothing seems to slow this phone down, ever, as you'll see in the benchmark runs ahead.

On the camera side of the equation, the OnePlus 6T has learned a few new tricks and this new software package also came down as an update to the previous gen OnePlus 6. And so, with identical camera engines, sensors and optics, what you see here with for user interface and performance is what you'll get on both devices. 

One addition that OnePlus rolled into its Android 9 Pie and Oxygen OS setup is Google's new Night Sight, which does do a reasonably good job of grabbing low light shots with a slow shutter speed, if you have a steady enough hand. The more light in the shot, the better of course but the technology does an impressive job of bringing up any available light sources and exposing a scene. You can think of it as an occasional use feature, perhaps for that dimly lit nightclub shot of you and your crew living the life, if you want that sort of evidence out there on you of course.

In standard shooting, the OnePlus 6T performs admirably in outdoor daylight settings, with crisp, well-balance captures and natural color rendering. However, versus the original setup of the OnePlus 6, perhaps some of the detail is missing a bit in indoor shots. We've seen Yogi sitting on the stairs here looking more detailed and cleaner when we reviewed the previous generation device. However, in mixed lighting shots, the statue of Michael the archangel actually rendered a bit more balanced this time around. It seems maybe in general, indoor shots might be a touch over-exposed in spots now but it's not something that can't be worked out in a future firmware update. In addition, you'll want to leave the phone's Auto Night Scene Detection off for now and just flip on Night mode when you need it. Unfortunately, that feature currently results in rather grainy indoor shots, even when reasonably well-lit.

Video shots with the OnePlus 6T, especially its 4K 60FPS setting, are crisp and clean with good auto-focus and lighting response. If you're the type that often finds yourself capturing the moment on video, you won't be disappointed here. And audio capture is excellent as well, so long as you keep your paws off the mic port when shooting.

Finally, a bright spot for the OnePlus 6T is its Portrait mode shooting which, as you can see, can pull off some impressive shots, both indoors and out. Overall, we'd offer that the OnePlus 6T's camera performs competitively to some of the other flagship Android phones on the market today. It doesn't quite compete with the Google Pixel 3 XL or perhaps even Samsung's Galaxy S9 or Note 9 devices, however. We frankly were hoping for a bit more this time around from OnePlus but then again, for most mainstream users, the OnePlus 6T's camera is plenty serviceable, as you can see in the results above.