Design
You’d be forgiven for mistaking the OnePlus 10T for the older OnePlus 10 Pro given their very similar looking rear plates. On the 10T, the camera module has four distinctive rings with three camera lenses joined by a circular flash in the top right position.
I didn’t like the look at first, but it has grown on me, much like the green hue of my ‘jade green’ review sample has. Its glossy finish made of Gorilla Glass 5 instantly picks up fingerprints but does make the phone grippier and is finished off with glossy silver side rails. It’s a good looking, great feeling phone although it slides off flat surfaces including tables with the slightest nudge. A case is required to avoid impact disaster.
The camera bump melds into the unibody frame beautifully with no seams, though I suspect the matt finish of the alternative ‘moonstone black’ model (which is, and I quote, “inspired by the texture of basalt”) would better evade fingerprints and appeal more to most colour-cautious smartphone buyers.
OnePlus says it left it off the 10T as the component takes up space inside the device, which would have had to have been thicker and bigger to accommodate it as well as a large two-cell battery – the company preferring the latter. Apple puts a two-position mute switch on all its iPhones, but no other Android manufacturers have such a hardware switch, and it’s a shame it’s not on the 10T.
Display and Camera
OnePlus 10T comes with a 6.7-inches AMOLED display flaunting a pixel density of 393ppi. The smartphone capacitive touchscreen also features a screen resolution of 1080 x 2400 pixels along with an aspect ratio of 20:9. The brand has provided a punch-hole at the top, housing the front camera. Moreover, the entire front screen is protected with a Corning Gorilla Glass layer.
On the backside of the OnePlus 10T, the brand has installed a triple-camera module. It is composed of a 50MP Main Camera, an 8MP Ultra-Wide Angle Lens, and a 2MP Macro Sensor. The main camera setup is loaded with multiple features like Phase Detection Autofocus and futuristic OIS technology, besides LED Flash, HDR mode, ISO Control and Digital Zoom. A 16MP Primary Camera is made available at the front to shoot beautiful selfies.
Battery
Alongside its lightning pace the OnePlus 10T is blessed with 150W wired charging, a small step up on the 10 Pro’s already superb 80W speeds but in reality the difference is minimal in charging times. The compromise on the 10T is that it does not have wireless charging.
Storage and Connectivity
OnePlus 10T includes 128GB of internal memory which is non-expandable by nature. Connectivity features loaded within the smartphone includes 4G (VoLTE), 5G, Wi-Fi 802.11, b/g/n, USB Type-C, Mobile Hotspot, NFC, A-GPS and Bluetooth v5.1.
Performance
The OnePlus 10T is blazing fast. It’s got the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 chipset, which is basically an overclocked 8 Gen 1, the processor found in the OnePlus 10 Pro, Sony Xperia 1 IV, Vivo X80 Pro, Galaxy S22 Ultra, and several other high-end Android phones.
In GFX Bench’s performance tests we run on every phone we review, the 10T scored amongst the best scores we’ve ever seen, hitting 59fps or 60fps for each test, 60fps being the highest possible score.
Software
OxygenOS 12.1 based on Android 12 is great. It largely keeps out the way but does prompt you to agree to many statements of usage when you first tap on system apps or various software options. I had to fiddle with the very customisable skin for some days to tweak it to my preferences – things like icon shape, size, accent colours, display and font sizes, etc – but now it feels great and very personal.
Most other Android phones with Android 12 get around their lack of physical mute switch or alert slider by showing whether the phone is in ring, vibrate, or silent with three different icons allowing you to quickly switch modes whenever the volume buttons are pushed. Maddeningly, this is not the case on the 10T, and you can only switch between either ring and vibrate, or ring and silent. I only worked out how to switch between those two options with trial and error.