OnePlus 9R confirmed: Budget model for Indian market
- Pete Lau, CEO of OnePlus, has just officially confirmed the new OnePlus 9R.
- This cheaper entry in the upcoming OnePlus 9 family will land in India. There is no confirmation that it has reached any other country.
- Lau claims the 9R will take what the company offered with the OnePlus Nord to the next level.
On March 23, there will finally be the official launch of the OnePlus 9 series. We’ve known for a while that the launch would include a OnePlus 9 and a OnePlus 9 Pro. However, there has been much speculation that there would be a third, cheaper model in the family.
Connected: OnePlus 9 Series: Everything We Know So Far
Now Pete Lau, CEO of OnePlus, has confirmed that it is. The third entry in the 9 series is called the OnePlus 9R. In an exclusive interview with News 18Lau, an Indian news agency, confirmed the phone’s name as well as its overt Indian exclusivity.
Unfortunately, Lau hasn’t revealed much about specs, pricing, or other details. However, he had a few things to say that indicated what to expect.
OnePlus 9R: taking the north one step further
In the interview, Lau refers to the OnePlus Nord. He mentions that the phone was very successful in India and OnePlus fans praised it highly. Then he says this:
With the OnePlus 9R, we want to go even further to bring out a well-balanced handset with the latest technology and a top-notch industrial design that offers an overall superior user experience and also offers fast and smooth experiences for daily use and intense gameplay.
This is a classic example of Lau’s advertising tactic of putting several keywords in a subsequent sentence. However, there is still a little more we can learn about the telephone from this statement. For example, the fact that the phone is not part of the Nord series but rather the 9 series strongly suggests that it will be more powerful than the Nord. Lau’s phrase “go further” supports the idea that the 9R could be like the Nord, but better.
Lau’s reference to “difficult gameplay” is also interesting. The OnePlus 9R is almost certainly not a “gaming phone”, but if it wants to keep up with mobile games, it needs a powerful chipset. It is possible that the 9R has an inferior chipset than the Snapdragon 888 that we expect in the OnePlus 9 and 9 Pro, but a higher quality chipset than the Snapdragon 765G in the OnePlus Nord. This could mean the new Snapdragon 870 or even the Snapdragon 865, last year’s flagship.
The above teaser image finally confirms that the OnePlus 9R has 5G connectivity. This is interesting given that India does not have a 5G network and Lau has confirmed that the phone is India exclusive, at least for now. This also supports the idea that the 9R could have an 800 series chipset.
March 23rd is only a few days away at this point, so we will know everything early enough!
