OnePlus is a fascinating company to cover as a reviewer. Half year hardware refreshes and aggressive software updates keep you on your toes. Really using a OnePlus means following a conversation around refining a product after its launch.
As we close out the year, it’s worth taking a second look at a premium OnePlus, to see if these refinements improve performance over the phones launched earlier in the year. Especially looking at hardware scores from an older version of Android, as the 8T is one of the first phones to launch with Android 11 out of the box.
How are each of these tests performed? Here’s my process for benchmarking phones!
Synthetic Bench – GeekBench 5
Starting off with a synthetic bench, it seems to be a trend that updating from Android 10 to Android 11 brings a slight reduction in GeekBench scores. Throughout this write up, we’ll also be comparing against the OnePlus 8 Pro on Android 10 and on Android 11.
Single core CPU scores are still what we would consider “high end”, but there’s a consistent 3-5% drop from the high point set on the OnePlus 8. Multi-Core CPU similarly sees a around a 5-8% from the scores we witnessed on Android 10.
The flip-side for synthetic tests, all of our GPU scores improve from the beginning of the year. Qualcomm made some bold claims about GPU drivers for the Snapdragon 865. If there’s one area where our numbers get bigger, the Android 11 update seems to utilize GPU hardware better. Across the board, Vulkan scores benefit the most from this update.
I think it’s important to keep these synth scores in mind as we look at real world tests. How a phone uses a testing platform can be very different from how it uses a real app. Based on these early results, should we see around a 5% drop in performance for CPU tasks, and a similar uptick in gaming?
Video Render – PowerDirector
Chewing up a complex video project, we see render times improve on PowerDirector. It’s not night and day, and no phone is quite able to catch the V60 this year, but it is a consistently tracked improvement. A slightly faster render time from the 8T, but the 8 Pro does also benefit from Android 11.
Video Transcode – PowerDirector
Similarly, in a simpler transcode test, all of our Android 11 devices get a small boost when manipulating video data.
Podcast MixDown – Audio Evolution
I wasn’t running this test when the 8Pro originally launched, so these scores are fresh. As a comparison point against other premium tier devices, the 8T is on the slower end of the fastest performers. This is “VERY GOOD” processing against a few phones that can drive a little harder.
Synthetic Photo Test – PhotoMate R3
The synthetic test for PhotoMate R3 shows a similar trend. Top of the line chipset, and a bunch of RAM, but the 8T is falling just outside the top scores of other premium tier devices. This is another test I’ve just started tracking, so there are no comparable Android 10 scores for me to show on the 8 Pro.
Photo Batch Process – PhotoMate R3
One area where the synthetic scores nicely predict real world performance. The 8T is “very good” at processing a huge batch of RAW photos, but it also falls just outside the top tier of devices in this test. Thankfully, the thermal management is respectable, where the 8T throttles by an average margin over the course of the test.
Anecdotally, looking at some of my older videos, the 8T would seem to be a nice improvement over the 7T for managing performance and higher temperatures.
Stabilization – Google Photos
This is still my voodoo test.
The 8 Pro is slightly slowed cleaning up a UHD video file, but the 8T seems more significantly throttled. My previous hypothesis was looking at phones that had high refresh rate displays, those devices often performed better. The 8T doesn’t perform “poorly”, but it’s a sharp decline from the OnePlus 8 on Android 10. Back to the drawing board on explaining video stabilization performance…
Synthetic Compression Test – RAR Lab
The 8T’s synthetic RAR score is at the lower end of tested SD865’s. The 8 Pro shows marginal difference comparing Android 10 to 11.
Real World Compression – RAR Lab
RAR Lab’s synthetic test in short bursts though, rarely compares against a longer real world compression test. Here we see the 8 Pro on Android 11 struggle to keep pace with its Android 10 scores, and the 8T claws up to a decent mid-pack compression result. Real world performance punching above the RAR synthetic data rate.
Gaming – Brightridge
Frame rates here are about where we would predict.
It seems software does help improve this GPU performance, even on an older title with demanding PC style graphics options.
The OP8T falls about 1-3FPS behind a phone like the Galaxy S20 Ultra with a Snapdragon 865+ on Android 10. We should hope to see some similar improvements for Samsung hardware after Android 11 updates. Android 11 closes some of the graphics gap between the SD865 and SD865+.
A little more testing might be needed?
The 8T is a solid overall performer. There’s a respectable price to performance ratio, and the company absolutely still markets on the “feel” of speed. OP devices “FEEL” snappy and quick. While nimble, the 8T is often near the top of the pile, but rarely able to scratch out a significant victory.
Specs on paper are impressive, but we shouldn’t be too critical about benchmarking losses, when those losses are often against phones that cost a bit more.
What continues to be a difficulty in measuring this performance, higher refresh rate displays have a small, but consistently tracked impact on results. From GeekBench scores, the OnePlus 8 Pro can “split the difference” when turning the resolution and refresh rate down. Simply driving the display has a tangible effect on the numbers the phone can spit out. In other testing situations, this likely contributes to other aspects of the phone like battery life.
Android 11 is a pleasant surprise.
Often a new operating system comes with some degradation in phone performance, but thankfully most tests seem to hold steady, with a few improving over last generation’s OS. There’s evidence where a manufacturer can refine and improve, but at least the base from Google doesn’t seem to be as much of a performance hog as the Android 9 update was.
At least as it relates to OnePlus, Oxygen OS is in very good shape, even for a heavier skin. However, the most performance focused owners will likely want to change their display settings.
My OnePlus 8 standard version has better scores than both the pro and t on android 11. Just did a geekbench test 3149/885
My OnePlus 8 standard version has better scores than both the pro and t on android 11. Just did a geekbench test 3149/885
Oops the black boxes threw me off. Ok so my older phone is as good as the newer and better than the pro… Geekbench wise. And it looks better than both.