Apple’s iPhone 8 may be the favorite new smartphone of the year, but it’s not the only one fans are waiting for with excitement. The OnePlus 5 is expected to launch much sooner, and it’s a brand that has attracted a sort of cult following among Android users. Many are beginning to see the OnePlus 5 as the budget-friendly equivalent of the iPhone 8, as it seems fans can hardly wait to see it.
OnePlus 5 rumors
The handset’s launch could be a little over a week away, and the rumors show no sign of stopping. The company is probably enjoying all the attention though, as while many popular upcoming tech gadgets are the focus of rumors, this much attention is usually reserved for the likes of Apple or Samsung. The makers of the OnePlus 5 are doing their part in keeping the ball rolling, as they post a teaser or some other tidbit nearly every day to accompany the rumors or fill in any lulls in the conversation.
Conflicting launch dates for the OnePlus 5
We’ve seen two different proposed launch dates for the handset, which are June 15 and June 20. The company has not made any official announcement about a release date, although it has picked up the pace of its teasers and Twitter posts about the smartphone, which indicates that it can’t be too far away.
Both rumored launch dates for the OnePlus 5 appear to have originated on the Chinese micro-blogging platform Weibo, but we have reason to believe that June 20 is fake, despite the photo that accompanied the leak. Android Headlines traced the image to the official announcement about the launch date for the OnePlus 20, which was unveiled on June 20, 2015. The image has the company logo on it at the bottom, which led many to believe that June 20 will really be the reveal date for the OnePlus 5.
Given that the image is old, it’s unlikely to be an indication of the launch date for this year’s handset. On the plus side though, the company has said it will launch the smartphone this summer, so fans don’t have much longer to wait.
Here’s what we know about the OnePlus 5’s specs
As the launch date approaches, OnePlus has been teasing fans by offering specs and tidbits about the device, but that hasn’t kept fans from looking for additional information about it from other sources. In fact, data on the OnePlus 5 hit the benchmarking site Geekbench today, and according to Gizbot, it suggests that there could be multiple variants of it.
One handset is listed as model OnePlus A5000, and it has 4GB of RAM, but the OnePlus 3 and 3T both had 6GB of RAM. As such, it’s probably that this isn’t the top-of-the-line version but rather, a less powerful “lite” variant. The Geekbench listing also indicates that the phone is powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 820 chip and runs on Android Marshmallow rather than the newer Nougat. We would add that previous Geekbench listings supposedly suggested that the OnePlus 5 is more powerful than the Galaxy S8, so either the previous listings were fake and fans will be hugely disappointed, or this latest Geekbench listing is for a low-end variant.
OnePlus has confirmed that its next flagship handset will have the 64-bit octa-core Snapdragon 835 SoC, so this Geekbench listing has left some scratching their heads. The company has also confirmed that the OnePlus 5 will have a full HD display, which many expect to be 5.5 inches. OnePlus has hinted via social media posts that the phone will have a headphone jack, and a fingerprint scanner on the front rather than the back as some manufacturers have begun to do.
The OnePlus 5 is expected to have a dual-lens camera setup on the back, and the company said it has been working with DxO, the makers of the popular camera benchmarking software, to improve the camera on the phone. The handset is also expected to have 6GB or 8GB of RAM and come with Android Nougat out of the box in addition to OnePlus’ own OxygenOS skin. OnePlus CEO Pete Lau shared an image of the “OnePlus 5 desktop” on Weibo showing that it was running HydrogenOS and offering up other tidbits like 4G and dual-SIM card support.
Improved customer service to support OnePlus 5
OnePlus has certainly done an excellent job of building excitement and sustaining it, but one potential problem that can appear whenever a product is hyped ahead of its launch is weak customer support. The company attracted attention in previous years by turning out a budget-friendly Android smartphone with high-end specs, but what upset many customers was the lack of customer service.
However, the company apparently realized that it had some problems in this area and now is trying to reassure potential customers as it prepares to launch the OnePlus 5. It shared this video on YouTube detailing the improvements it has made to its customer service, so hopefully, if it really does sell a record number of handsets this year as it probably expects to, customers won’t have the same problems they had in past years.
So all the building blocks for a successful launch seem to be in place. All we need is the OnePlus 5.
