OnePlus Pad 3 Assessment: A Premium 13” Pill That Rivals Samsung

	OnePlus Pad 3: MSRP $699 (With out Keyboard) The OnePlus Pad 3 is a slim, modern and enticing Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite-powered flagship Android pill that makes only a few compromises and delivers very good worth.
	Glossy, premium design Stunning 13.2-inch show Excellent efficiency Incredible speaker array Large battery with 80W charging Pleasant person expertise	Lackluster cameras No keyboard backlight

OnePlus Pad 3: {Hardware}, Design, And Efficiency

With the Pad 3, OnePlus is providing a modern (5.9mm skinny) aluminum pill with a good looking 13.2-inch 3.5k LTPS LCD (3392 x 2400 pixels, 7:5 side ratio, 144Hz refresh charge, 900 nits HBM). It’s powered by Qualcomm’s mighty Snapdragon 8 Elite SoC, paired with 12 or 16GB of LPDDR5x RAM and 256 or 512GB of UFS 4.0 storage. There’s a 12,140mAh battery underneath the hood, which helps 80W SuperVOOC quick wired charging.

OnePlus even consists of an 80W SuperVOOC quick charger within the field. The Pad 3’s cameras are primary, with a 13MP f/2.2 shooter with autofocus on the again and 8MP f/2.0 fixed-focus selfie digicam in entrance. It encompasses a handful of taking pictures modes, together with time lapse, evening and panorama (most important solely), portrait (selfie solely), plus a separate doc scanner app. Video recording maxes out at 4k 30fps (rear) and 1080p 30fps (entrance).

In phrases if its design, the Pad 3 appears like some other fashionable pill, with slab sides, rounded corners, and small, even bezels throughout. The rear shooter and LED flash are housed in a horizontal pill-shaped island within the Pad 3’s again. With the pill in panorama mode, the selfie digicam is centered within the high bezel whereas the ability/lock key and quantity rocker are situated on the edges, within the high left nook, and the USB Kind-C port is on the appropriate edge.

Different specs embrace WiFi 7 (802.11be), Bluetooth 5.4, USB 3.2 Gen 1 (5Gbps), twin mics, and face unlock. There’s no GPS or fingerprint sensor, nonetheless. On the audio entrance, the Pad 3 comes with a whopping eight audio system (4 woofers and 4 tweeters). These are mounted on the left and proper sides, and sound unbelievable. Within the US, Europe, and India, the Pad 3 is accessible in Storm Blue, however India additionally will get a Frosted Silver model.

As you’d count on from a tool powered by a Snapdragon 8 Elite chip, the Pad 3 feels good and fast. It ran every little thing we threw at it with gusto, from productiveness to communications to leisure apps. OxygenOS 15 is silky clean as all the time, and we didn’t expertise any hiccups. We ran a couple of benchmarks for good measure – GeekBench 6 and 3DMark Wild Life Limitless – and certain sufficient, the outcomes (under) affirm our expertise.

We didn’t have time to play video games for very lengthy, however the Pad 3 does a superb job with sustained workloads, dropping to only 81.5% of its peak efficiency after 20 iterations in 3DMark’s Wild Life stress check. Total, efficiency is in-line with the newest flagship cell gadgets powered by the Snapdragon 8 Elite.

Battery life is strong too. After utilizing it casually for per week, we lastly needed to cost the pill yesterday. Whereas penning this evaluation in Google Docs, we misplaced 15% of cost in 2.5 hours with the keyboard hooked up and the display brightness set to 75%.

Talking of which, the Pad 3’s show is great general, and shiny sufficient in most situations. The eight audio system array sounds loud and clear, with first rate bass for a pill. The one space the place the Pad 3 falls brief is imaging. Truthfully, its shooters are decrease high quality than we anticipated, even for a pill. Photographs are usually overexposed and lack element, colours are muted, and dynamic vary is missing. Our MacBook Air takes higher footage.

OnePlus Pad 3: Software program, AI, And Person Expertise

The OnePlus Pad 3 runs OxygenOS 15, which relies on Android 15, and continues to ship an exquisite person expertise. It’s quick and slick, clear and polished, but doesn’t stray too removed from inventory Android. However what actually units OxygenOS 15 aside – particularly on a pill – is Open Canvas. This multi-window interface, which was first launched with the OnePlus Open, is tremendous intuitive and makes juggling a number of apps a cinch.

Clearly, the Pad 3 additionally packs a bunch of AI options, together with OnePlus’s AI Toolbox, which makes it simpler to write down, translate, and summarize paperwork, along with Google’s Circle To Search and Gemini. You even get OnePlus’ AI-based picture modifying instruments within the Photographs app, together with AI Eraser, AI Element Increase, AI Unblur, and AI Reflection Eraser. We propose you learn our OnePlus Open and OnePlus 13 opinions for more information on these options.

With the Pad 3, you possibly can even share information with different gadgets, mirror your cellphone’s display in your pill, and distant management close by laptops. That is made doable with the O+ Join app, which is accessible for iOS, iPadOS, macOS, and Home windows. This performance is constructed proper into the Pad 3, and most up-to-date OnePlus and Oppo gadgets. We beforehand tried O+ Join – with combined outcomes – to entry a MacBook Air with the Oppo Discover N5.

O+ Join works fairly properly when you merely wish to switch information, AirDrop fashion, between OnePlus, Oppo, and Apple gadgets. We simply discovered the permissions it’s a must to grant the O+ Join app to distant management your Mac a bit too broad for our liking, and never well worth the safety dangers. Your mileage could fluctuate. Lastly, OnePlus is promising three years of OS upgrades and 6 years of safety updates for the Pad 3.

In all, the one factor actually holding the Pad 3 again is technically Android, and particularly the dearth of tablet-specific and tablet-optimized Android apps. That is the place the iPad and Apple’s pill app ecosystem actually shine. In the event you’re simply utilizing the Pad 3 for primary productiveness, communication, and leisure – together with gaming – you are all set. However the place are all the good content material creation apps for visible artists and musicians?

OnePlus Pad 3: Equipment

Our evaluation unit got here with three equipment: the OnePlus Pad 3 Good Keyboard ($200), OnePlus Stylo 2 ($100), and OnePlus Pad 3 Folio Case ($50). We largely used the Pad 3 along with the Good Keyboard, however we didn’t use the Folio Case a lot. The Stylo 2 is an identical to the one which shipped with final 12 months’s OnePlus Pad 2. It helps 16,000 stress ranges, double faucet to change instruments (as a substitute of a button), and haptic suggestions.

It’s nice to kind on, and the trackpad is responsive. You’ll even discover an NFC tag on the palm relaxation to immediately pair different OnePlus and Oppo gadgets. The one downside we bumped into is that when urgent on the trackpad to click on on one thing, the mouse cursor typically strikes away from the clicking goal barely, leading to missed or inaccurate clicks. Clearly, this gained’t be a problem when you allow utilizing faucet to click on, however we desire press to click on.

Additionally, the Good Keyboard lacks a backlight, which is an unlucky omission contemplating the $200 price ticket. However general, these are properly rounded and helpful equipment. We wouldn’t take into account shopping for the Pad 3 with out the Good Keyboard until you intend to solely use the pill for leisure or gaming. As for the Stylo 2, it’s fairly nice, however could also be price skipping until you favor taking handwritten notes or doodling.

OnePlus Pad 3: Our Takeaway

The OnePlus Pad 3 is likely one of the finest Android tablets obtainable as we speak. It boasts a stunning 13.2-inch show, speedy Snapdragon 8 Elite processor, 256GB base storage, loads of RAM, high quality audio system, large battery with 80W quick charging, and a nice person expertise due to Open Canvas – all wrapped in a slim, premium package deal that prices simply $699. That’s $200 lower than Apple’s 256GB iPad Air 13 and $400 lower than Samsung’s Galaxy Tab S10 Extremely.

The OnePlus Pad 3 just isn’t excellent, nonetheless. The cameras don’t stay as much as the competitors, and the elective Good Keyboard isn’t backlit. However finally, these are minor niggles. With the Pad 3, OnePlus has managed to present Samsung a run for its cash by making a aggressive and arguably higher pill for much less. In the event you’re looking for a flagship Android pill with few compromises and very good worth, we extremely advocate you try the OnePlus Pad 3.