The OnePlus 13 is a win in my book, but I’m still not updating: Here’s why

As someone who has a satisfying memory of using the OnePlus 7 Pro for more than two years and planned to return to OnePlus someday, the decision wasn’t easy given how close the OnePlus 13 came. While the latest OnePlus flagship pulls off the basics well, it failed to crack the idea of what a complete flagship phone should be, falling short of meeting important expectations.

OnePlus 13 nails the specs but fails to realize its power

The phone doesn’t know how to utilize its power to create more impact

Flagship phones are no longer defined by raw specifications and snappy performance because, for better or worse, the mid-range phones have gotten much better and deliver a flagship-level performance. While it’s great for our pocket, phone makers must work extra hard to deliver a unique experience alongside powerful specs to make their flagships more appealing.

OnePlus 13 has everything needed to deliver a great experience but chose a different path. It decided to be another premium OnePlus phone, with some improvements here and there, while it could’ve done much more. The addition of the IP69 rating, a better camera, and the mighty Snapdragon 8 Elite collectively offer welcome improvements. Still, the OnePlus 13 suffers from the company’s flawed understanding of a flagship phone.

I have a Samsung Galaxy S21 Plus that is over three years old. It’s not a perfect phone in any way, shape, or form, and it can’t compete with the OnePlus 13 when it comes to performance. However, my S21 Plus symbolizes one simple idea about getting the flagship right: specs create a more meaningful impact only when they help us do more.

I was overjoyed when I connected my S21 Plus to an external monitor and completed basic computing tasks without issues. It’s a computer in your pocket. You won’t want to use it as a replacement for your laptop, but the S21 Plus can turn into a solid backup computer when your desktop computer or laptop acts up. For a person who doesn’t care about what’s going under the hood, it creates an impression that Samsung Galaxy phones have magical power. In reality, they’ve almost the same core specs as their competitors. That’s called value.

However, OnePlus doesn’t have to look up to Samsung or Apple for inspiration. The answer lies in its approach to flagships. It must stop being the prisoner of its disturbing past of adopting standard flagship features late or ignoring them on its top-tier phones. It’s evident in the OnePlus 13 that this history still lingers if you look beyond the introduction of the IP69 rating.

Learning that the OnePlus 13 offers Qi2 wireless charging support in a half-baked way reminded me of the poorly executed waterproofing solution in the OnePlus 7 Pro. Worse, despite being powered by the Snapdragon 8 Elite, the OnePlus 13 lacks UWB functionality, which is super useful for car owners, smart home users like me, and anyone who wants close-range location tracking with high precision.

After the OnePlus 13 euphoria was over, I asked myself an important question: What would I do with all that power when my S21 Plus works perfectly fine and has features like Samsung DeX and UWB and indispensable features like Modes and Routines and Secure Folder? I couldn’t find a solid answer because the OnePlus 13 has none. You won’t, either, if you have a OnePlus 12 or 11.

Maybe it’d have felt different if I was a gamer, or maybe not because of the missing bypass charging capability. Switching to the OnePlus 13 means I lose those features I use almost daily. The OnePlus 13 missed the trick by being just a powerhouse without using that power to maximize its benefits.

OnePlus 13 tries to address the long-standing slipperiness issue but makes the problem more complicated

The vegan leather isn’t the answer

I’m a staunch critic of phone makers prioritizing premium looks over durability and forcing users to put a case on their phones. What’s the use of that stunning back panel if I have to hide it behind a case? OnePlus, in particular, is a serial offender. Instead of coming out of the mindset that plastic phones can’t be premium, the company again introduced a glass back in the OnePlus 13, making it as slippery and prone to damage as its previous flagships in the last few years.

The company tried to fix this long-standing issue by adding vegan leather to the OnePlus 13’s Midnight Ocean variant. While leather provides a better grip and a unique appearance, it might also introduce a new set of problems.

As appealing as leather looks, it wears over time. In a phone, high-pressure areas like the bottom edges are more likely to wear out faster, leading to a patchy, messy, and unattractive surface. Your only option is to look for the best cases. I expected OnePlus to be more transparent about the back panel, especially since many questions about how the material will age remain unanswered.

OnePlus needs to come up with a true flagship phone to win me over

When you buy a million-dollar car, you are not concerned about how powerful the engine is. The main focus is on the workmanship, design, and other details. OnePlus CEO Pete Lau said this while talking about the transition from 60Hz to 90Hz displays in an interview with a Chinese news outlet in 2019. However, based on what I’ve seen from the company, I’m skeptical if OnePlus still follows that philosophy.

OnePlus looks dependent on what’s successful and incremental updates, perhaps more than ever in its history. With every upgrade, all that it does is offer a better processor, a slightly better camera, sometimes a better battery life, and some cosmetic tweaks, and that’s about it.

Instead of boasting about how good the proverbial car engine is, the company should focus on how to smartly put it to use and fix long-standing issues without giving rise to additional problems to make the flagship phones stand out from the crowd, even if that means pricing its premium phones a bit higher (which the company has been doing since the last few years, anyway). It’d take the old OnePlus that used to take risks by trying bold ideas like replacing the notch with a pop-up selfie camera to pull it off. It’s simple: go bold or go home.