[OpenCanvas 7 Serial Number
Everardo Laboy
There I was in the second row at the Google Pixel 8 launch event. The keynote was about to start, and while other journalists pulled out their laptops and started typing away, I whipped out the OnePlus Open, the new folding phone from the Chinese company that makes good mid-priced Android devices.
Samsung is on its fifth generation of Galaxy Fold phones, and while it has continued to refine the experience with every iteration, it has largely stuck with the same size and shape. This year, companies like Google and OnePlus are entering the fray with fresher designs that, in my opinion, offer a better folding phone experience.
The OnePlus Open has a 6.31-inch front screen that's practically normal looking. It's not awkwardly narrow like the front screen on Samsung's Galaxy Z Fold5, and it's not short and wide like the outer face of the Google Pixel Fold. This, coupled with the surprisingly svelte body that measures 11.7 millimeters thick when folded, makes the Open feel closer to a normal phone and not some chunky device. For reference, the iPhone 15 Pro Max is 8.25 mm, the Pixel Fold is 12.1 mm, and the Fold5 is 13.4 mm. The Open is also one of the lightest folding phones in its class at just 239 grams. (The Fold5 is 253 grams, and the Pixel Fold is 283 grams.)
The only hardware gripe I have is with the massive camera module on the back. My hands are big, and my index finger frequently sits over the bump. That doesn't feel great, and I'm constantly smudging the camera glass. This might not be much of a problem if you have smaller paws. At least the whole thing looks gorgeous, especially in the Emerald Dusk color.
As you first start turning the OnePlus Open over in your hands, it feels like the company spared no expense in its construction. It feels luxe, and OnePlus even brought back the multi-position Alert Slider on the side of the phone, which lets you to switch between silent, vibrate, and ring with a satisfying flick.
The AMOLED screens on the front and on the inside have sharp 2K resolutions and 120-Hz refresh rates with low-temperature polycrystalline oxide (LTPO) 3.0 tech, allowing them to dial the refresh rate up or down based on what's happening on the screen. This makes them more battery-efficient, since they can conserve cycles when they're not needed. The displays get plenty bright too; I never had any issues reading either screen on sunny days.
Open the Open and you'll find some unique software that makes the user experience singular. OnePlus has developed a layer over Android called Open Canvas that allows apps to exist in various sizes without having to conform to the shape of the screen. Apps like Instagram no longer feel like blown-up rectangles that poorly mimic the normal smartphone experience. Instead, Instagram on the Open's screen has a sidebar on the left with tabs to access DMs, likes, and the search page, just like the desktop experience.
The star of the show is Triple Splits, which sounds like a ballet move, but is a software trick that allows three apps to be launched side by side on the main screen. I've found it really handy to have a messaging app all the way on the right, slightly out of frame but always there so I can monitor an ongoing conversation. Two other apps can then take up the main part of the screen.
Like on other booklike folding phones, there's a persistent taskbar that lets you drag and drop apps to any part of the screen; this taskbar has an app tray you can open to add any other app that's not saved in the taskbar too. There's a Recents folder here as well, which lets you quickly access recent documents and photos to drag and drop them into select apps. Nifty! Oh, and if you close the Open, you get the choice to swipe up and continue the app you were last looking at on the front screen. (It's not quite the all-or-nothing option on other folding phones.)
I also noticed that the slightly wider main screen enabled more desktop-grade web-browsing experiences in Chrome. For example, pull up WIRED.com on the Galaxy Z Fold5 and you get the normal, skinny mobile browsing experience. On the OnePlus Open, you can see a design that's more space-optimized and just looks plain nicer. However, some apps like Gmail still require you to turn the phone into landscape mode to access the two-pane view.
I want to note that I did run into some apps that just didn't play well with the Open Canvas system, plus some other optimization bugs in the software as a whole. OnePlus says my software isn't the final version, so you can hopefully expect some tweaks before the phone launches. I'm still not a huge fan of OnePlus' OxygenOS operating system as a whole. (The way it handles notifications is clunky.) But these new multitasking features are impressive, and I'm glad to see OnePlus committing to four Android OS upgrades and five years of security updates.
I'd be remiss if I didn't touch on the rotund camera module on the back. Yes, OnePlus is continuing its partnership with camera maker Hasselblad, so you get its enhancements to the image processing software, including its color science knowledge and other fine-tuning smarts. More impressive is the hardware itself: a 48-megapixel main camera, 64-megapixel 3X optical zoom camera, and a 48-megapixel ultrawide. There's a 20-megapixel camera for when you're using the main display and a 32-megapixel selfie camera on the front. It's not all those numbers that impress, but the fact that these cameras all have larger sensors than what you'll find in the rest of the folding phone competition.
I compared the camera against the Pixel Fold and the Galaxy Z Fold5, and in a nutshell, the larger sensors are able to pull sharper details across the board. Whether it's with the 3X optical zoom or the ultrawide, there's a strong chance the OnePlus will always deliver a sharper image. It also captures some wonderfully nuanced low-light images that aren't over-brightened by the software.
It doesn't win in every scenario. There are times when the Pixel and Samsung pull ahead, particularly when capturing photos of subjects in motion. I also noticed the Open has trouble autofocusing in some scenes. The biggest downside is that the OnePlus does oversaturate its images, and it doesn't do a great job with skin tones. (It made my wife look like she was wearing makeup when she wasn't.) The Open's HDR capabilities within complex scenes with bright brights and dark shadows are also not as good as the Pixel Fold's.
If you're in the market for a folding phone, it's a nice time to buy one. You have options! You should know that OnePlus is offering $200 off if you trade in any phone in any condition. That's not a preorder offer, either, it will exist for the lifecycle of the device, bringing the price down to $1,500. The Open works on AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon too, 5G and all, which wasn't always the case on older OnePlus models.
I'd likely still gravitate toward the Pixel Fold (I like the short and wide screen and all of Google's smart software features), but despite Samsung's years of refining its Galaxy Folds, I just might pick the OnePlus Open over one of those.
I've gone hands-on with more than a dozen of this year's newest smartphones, so believe me when I say it's been a very strong year for everyone's favorite pocketable smart device. As a result it's hard to nominate an outright champion. But I know that my own personal pick for phone of the year is the OnePlus Open, a foldable that feels like the biggest step forward for the category since folding phones first appeared half a decade ago.
If you've looked at our best foldable phones guide, you'll see that the Open sits right at the top, as you would hope. It has a spot on our best phones overall too, although nowhere near the top. Foldables unfortunately are still not a good fit for the general smartphone buyer, although OnePlus is leading the way in changing that with the Open, and doing it in a number of ways.
For one, it's well-proportioned, with a short and wide front display that makes the phone feel familiar to use while still folded. Even if it's still thicker than a normal smartphone because of its doubled-up display, you can still type, swipe and tap around the interface with one hand.
It's handsome too, coming with a lovely green glass or black leather back, shiny highlights around the edge of the phone and a prominent circular camera block. It's a premium phone that looks and feels like it, which doesn't impact its functionality much but sure helps it feel special every time you pick it up.
The OnePlus Open manages to do all of this while costing a little less than rival foldables. It perhaps doesn't matter when you're spending north of a grand and a half on a phone, but it could still be a key difference, especially if you've got a phone to trade in with OnePlus' generous $200-guaranteed exchange offer.
Even beyond our original review, we kept finding more ways to appreciate what the Open could do. I left my laptop behind for a day's work solely on Open Canvas, while my colleague John marveled at how good its long-lasting battery was. Plus Tom's Guide's UK editor-in-chief Jeff Parsons happily put his iPhone down to try it out as his primary device, which is possibly the greatest endorsement any foldable could wish for.
The OnePlus Open's victory is thoroughly earned since this was a great year for foldables elsewhere too. Earlier in the year we saw the Google Pixel Fold, Google's first foldable and a similarly well-designed device, only with a greater focus on AI features and app optimization. The Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5 and Motorola Razr Plus raised the game for the compact foldable sub-segment, while phones like the Honor Magic Vs appeared in select markets to show the world that you don't have to charge the earth for a slim and light yet expansive folding phone. Even the Galaxy Z Fold 5, which doesn't change much from previous Z Fold generations, remained a contender thanks to its built-out foldable-specific interface, and stylus compatibility.
795a8134c1