I know what you’re thinking, didn’t OnePlus release a new phone last month? It was done. More than five weeks after the announcement of OP15the company is back with the OnePlus 15R, a cheaper version of its new flagship that starts at $700 (or $200 less than its sibling). Above, this will be a shorter review because most of what I talked about OnePlus 15 also applies to OP15R. It’s a great phone that asks you to make a significant compromise.

OnePlus / Engadget

The OnePlus 15R has many of the same strengths as the more expensive OP15, but cuts $200 off by compromising on cameras.

Pros

• Fast processor
• Large, fast-charging battery
• Bright, vibrant OLED with a 165Hz refresh rate
• Available in a beautiful mint color

Cons

• A smaller camera than last year’s OP13R
• The rest of the cameras are bad
• Only four years of software support

$700 on OnePlus

Design and display

Like the OnePlus 15, the 15R looks like the OnePlus 13s and 13T, a pair of smaller, 6.32-inch phones that the company released in India and China this past spring. I said the design of the OP15 is boring and derivative of iPhone 16 Pro. The 15R did nothing to change that opinion. With a smaller camera, the OP15R doesn’t look that different from the iPhone 12 I’ve been hanging around since 2020.

That being said, I like the mint breeze color of the 15R (the phone also comes in charcoal black) better than the sand storm shade of my OP15. We’re big fans of minty phones here at Engadget, and OnePlus has a very pleasing color scheme on its new phone. In the redesign, OnePlus also improved the phone’s waterproofing, bringing it in line with the OP15. The new handset is IP69K-certified against moisture and dust, meaning it can withstand heated water shot at it under pressure. Like the OP15, the 15R trades in OnePlus’ old Alert Slider for a new Plus Key. It works like the Action button on the iPhone, allowing you to add a shortcut for a favorite feature. For example, you can configure it to open the camera app or act as a do not disturb toggle, among a few other options.

One departure from the OP15 is that the 15R has a larger 6.83-inch display, making it taller than its sibling. OnePlus is marketing this as a reason buyers might choose the 15R over the OP15, but holding the phones side by side, there isn’t much difference between the two. They are both big, and you either like that or you don’t.

Besides being big, the 15R’s screen can be refreshed at a fast 165Hz in games. The two displays are also comparable in terms of resolution and brightness; both can push 1,800 nits of brightness. One difference I noticed is the OnePlus 15 has a warmer panel, even though both phones are set to the same colorspace. I’ve reached out to OnePlus to find out what could be causing the difference, but for now it could be due to a quality control issue or the company’s software management.

One last thing, OnePlus has upgraded the 15R to add an ultrasonic fingerprint sensor under the screen. It’s placed in a nice spot towards the bottom third of the display, and it’s fast and accurate.

Performance and battery

The OnePlus 15R is the first phone in North America to come with Qualcomm’s latest Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 chipset. Not to be confused with the OP15’s Snapdragon Gen 5 Elite, this new chipset is similar to Qualcomm’s flagship system-on-a-chip but with a weaker CPU and GPU. This is shown in benchmarks such as Geekbench 6 where the OP15 easily outperforms the OP15R. It’s not even close, though, with the OP15 delivering standout single- and multi-core scores of 3,773 and 11,293, while the 15R posted more modest results of 2,857 and 9,512.

From that perspective, you lose a fair amount of performance, but real-world usage tells a different story. Except some games like Call of Duty: Mobile and PUBG supporting the OP15 and 15R’s 165Hz display, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 offers more than enough muscle for most applications. Even in most games (like the ones I like to play, including Devil Immortal and League of Legends: Wild Rift), the Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 is a good match.

OnePlus hasn’t skimped on the other internal components of the 15R either. You still get 12GB of LPDDR5X Ultra RAM and 256GB of UFS 4.1 storage. That’s the same configuration as the OP15 base model. This translates into a phone that doesn’t miss a beat when switching between apps and loading files like images and videos.

The 15R has a slightly larger battery, coming in at 7,400mAh, up from the OP15’s 7,300mAh. In practice, both phones offer the same amount of battery life. Putting them both through Engadget’s video rundown test, they both ran for 38 hours before their batteries died (which makes sense since the OP15R has a bigger screen). Like the OP15, the 15R comes with a OnePlus 55W SUPERVOOC charger in the box. The adapter can take the 15R from dead to 100 percent in less than an hour. If you don’t like charging your phone, the 15R makes the process as painless as possible, with a battery that lasts a long time and doesn’t have to be in an outlet for hours.

Cameras

At this point you’re probably wondering what OnePlus cut from the OP15 to make the 15R more affordable. The answer is – literally – an entire camera. The new phone lacks a telephoto camera, something you’ll find on its predecessor, the OnePlus 13R. And as far as I can tell, the two remaining cameras use the same 50-megapixel and 8MP sensors that OnePlus shipped with last year’s model. The company hasn’t upgraded the glass on either camera either. That leaves the selfie camera as the only area to see some change in the form of a sharp 32MP sensor and the addition of autofocus.

Unfortunately, none of the 15R’s cameras are visible. In general, they suffer from the same set of problems that plague the cameras of the OnePlus 15. They are fine on a sunny day, but when the light becomes a bit challenging, the 15R struggles with shadow details, resulting in muddy images. The more I used the OP15 and 15R, the more I came to the conclusion that OnePlus needs to go back to the drawing board with the new Detail Max Engine. It seems to hold back what should, at least on paper, be solid hardware.

Software

Not much to say here other than the 15R ships with OxygenOS 16like OP15. OnePlus also promises to support the 15R for the same amount of time as the OP15: four years with software updates and six years with security patches. That’s a shorter window than Google and Samsung, which both promise seven years on all their latest phones. Hopefully this is something that OnePlus decides to change starting with the OnePlus 16. The reason I bring that up is that the company’s version of Android is one that I really like. OxygenOS is slick, with animations that highlight the speed of the 15R’s processor and display. The fact that the phone comes with the latest version of OxygenOS means that you also get access to all the latest AI features of the company, including its Mind Space hub where you can save screenshots and notes for an on-device model to transcribe and summarize.

packing

In short, the OnePlus 15R is the phone for people who don’t care about photos and videos. That’s the same conclusion I came to in OP15. If you’re a fan of OnePlus, the 15R excels in all the areas you expect the company’s devices to perform well: performance, battery life and display responsiveness. Since I wasn’t too impressed with the OP15’s camera, I really recommend the 15R over that model. For $200 off the OP15’s starting price, you’re getting a device with almost all the same strengths as its more expensive sibling.

Compared to other phones in its price rangelike Pixel 10 and Galaxy S25 FEthe 15R isn’t quite as round, and can’t compete with the devices in terms of camera quality, but you get better performance, battery life and a display they can’t match.