[OnePlus 8 Pro  Guides, News, & Discussion] kristofpetho:
Introduction

I have never written anything like this before. You might know me as the creator of the Omega kernel for the 6T, and now the 8 Pro. But I wanted to share my experience coming from a OnePlus 6T, to help everyone make a better decision whether to upgrade or not -> I'll cut to the chase... Upgrade now. :)

I have been using the OnePlus 6T since it was released in November 2018. Before I had almost every OnePlus since the 2, but kept changing between the current top iPhones and OnePlus-es. That changed with the 6T. I was blown away by the speed and responsiveness vs the iPhone 8 Plus I had before that, and Google really upped their game with Android Pie.

Since the 6T I never really wanted to get back into the Apple ecosystem, Android was just too good to use.

Kernel devving on the 6T was also very enjoyable, once a person finds out some of the quirks of the OnePlus code additions.

Enter the 8 Pro

I'll just say this comparing it to the 6T (I never wanted to try the 7 Pro series because of the pop-up camera): OH MY GOD. It's like going from a Fiat Panda (no offense to Fiat) to a Tesla. It's mind-blowing.

The looks. The blue on the 8 Pro is so beautiful, this is the first time I will keep the clear case on the phone that was provided in the box.

The speed. I know, it's mostly a perception, because of the 120Hz display, but oh my does that make a difference... Of course there is the 865 chipset, faster RAM, etc, but that screen is what blows you away the first time you boot it up.

The feel of the device. It's heavier than the 6T, but that's a good thing. You feel it's sturdier.

The experience. It's like opting for the red pill. You never want to go back. I think OnePlus perfectly nailed the combination of hardware and software on this one. After so many years a true flagship.

Setup

It took about an hour to setup from scratch. Yes, I know there is a OnePlus Switch app, but that would rob me from experiencing the setup itself, and I need that. Blazing fast.

Near stock Android experience, with just the right additions. I can tweak to exactly how I like it.

For those who are like me, and want to turn off vibration for everything (since I find it annoying). Go into USB debugging mode, and do:

adb shell

appops set android VIBRATE ignore

This disables all standard Android vibrations. If you are finnicky and want to be more granular, or do away with vibrations coming from a certain app:

Microsoft Teams - which I use quite a lot - seems to ignore every single setting I have in notifications, but you can disable app-specific vibrations with:

appops set com.microsoft.teams VIBRATE ignore

Just substitute "com.microsoft.teams" with the package name you want to turn vibrations off for...

I always disable Sleep Optimization, as I need to have notifications always.

Initial thoughts

Now this is a flagship. Incredible. From the way it feels in your hand, to how blazing fast it is. Battery seems good (see attached screenshots) - I know it has to settle in since it has only been 16 hours, but still. I'm impressed.

By default the screen is set to 120Hz but FHD display. I changed it to 120Hz and QHD resolution. I mean why have a phone like this if you don't enjoy to the max? :)

How is it vs the 6T?

Huge upgrade.

Camera - will test further over the weekend, but one-two pics I already took are much crisper and more vibrant

Speed - incredible jump forward, and the 6T is still no slouch in 2020...

WiFi - much more stable, seemless roaming now works fully on my home mesh router system. It didn't on the 6T...

OxygenOS - I know most of the added stuff in OOS 10.5 will come to the 6T, but the additions are very nice. Horizon lights, the new fingerprint animation, raise the phone to quiet the ringtone, are all very nice touches.

As I spend more time with the phone I will update this thread accordingly. If anyone has any questions, don't be shy to ask.

The display

OK guys, after two weeks now, let's talk about the display. :)

Few points: resolution, size, refresh rate, colors, brightness.

Resolution:

You can run in in 1080p or 1440p - some say they can't tell the difference between the two, but I personally can, and I can't go back to FHD... Text is crisper, photos have more detail, it simply looks better. And I read a lot of emails, so it's good to have beautiful fonts on the screen -> BTW I stay on stock Android's Roboto fonts, I simply prefer the more condensed fonts.

Size

6.7". Damn. I never thought I would have such a big screen, but after two weeks my wife's iPhone XR's 6.2" is just small. :) Because of the size, more calendar entries, more emails, and all my Fitbit stats actually fit on one screen! ...finally

One thing, though. On 1080p, the display density is set differently than 1440p. So if you switch to 1440p (QHD), all text becomes bigger. I'm not that old (yet), so you can actually go into System - Developer options - about 2/3 down Drawing - Smallest width - and change from 411 to 432. Now the scaling is the same as with 1080p, but the fonts are still crisper. (This took me two weeks to figure out :))

Refresh rate

This is the biggest jump from my 6T. At first, I was like "yeah it's smooth". After a week, I looked at my son's Pixel 3a, and I asked "what's wrong with it?!?". Then I looked at my wife's iPhone XR, and I asked "what's wrong with it?!?" I'm now spoiled with the 120Hz, and now my work laptop seems slow...

This is the red pill I talked about.

And now the technical part: frame render time is around 6ms, meaning that there is virtually no dropped frame. It took precision to tune the hardware and software to perfection, and it shows!

Colors

Two categories: bright(er) screen is perfect. Colors are accurate, and photos show exactly what it is in real life. Perfect.

Dimmer screens do seem to have a green tint (standard settings), and overblown blacks (DC dimming). But this is something I'm certain will be fixed in an upcoming update, so I'm not worried.

Brightness

After the refresh rate, this is the next best thing. I started testing the phone inside, so it was nothing special. But when I used it in the car as a GPS, even in direct sunlight I was able to see everything clearly. Incredible. Compared to the 6T, and even an iPhone 8 Plus, this thing is bright, and beautiful to look at!

Performance

OK, so next up is performance. It's now been a bit more than 3 weeks with the phone, and I've had ample time to check out performance. Again, this is coming from the 6T.

Few points: general feeling, multitasking, gaming.

General overall feeling

It's fast :D

In more detail LOL: With the 6T, after booting up the phone, I always had to give it 4-5 hours to "settle in", and after that time performance was great. With th 8 Pro, I'm not really seeing that. It's already fast to begin with.

My primary usage is: emails, WhatsApp, Microsoft Teams, phone calls, camera, photos. I do tons of multitasking, listen to music in the meantime, etc., and not a glitch, no lag.

Some raw performance indicators: snapping multiple portrait shots one after another is finally working. The 865 chipset does wonders for this, and on the 6T I had to wait 2-3 seconds before I could shoot again.

Multitasking

Snappy, no reloading of apps, everything stays in memory. And now with 12Gb of RAM, everything stays in memory even if I use the most memory-hog app of all, the camera. Switching on a "regular" work-day between emails, calendar, Teams, Spotify, etc. is so seamless, it's an incredible experience.

Everything stays in memory (it does get cleared overnight to help with idle drain, but I'm good with that). Coming from the 6T (and maybe that has to do with the kernel moving from 4.9.y to 4.19.y), memory management is tons better than before. Background task killing decisions are much better, and not once have I had Fitbit close on me during an exercise, it always was able to track my GPS in the background.

Another (previously taxing) scenario was: biking with Fitbit tracking my stats in the background, checking out Google Maps where I am, and doing a Whatsapp video call (I have a bike mount). On the 6T, after the video call, it started killing either Fitbit or Maps in the background, now it's all good.

I guess all this can be attributed to two things: better memory management code written by OnePlus (YAY!), and the faster LPDDR5 memory. All in all great.

Gaming

I'm not much of a gamer, I'd consider myself a social gamer. I occasionally have Clash Royale installed - when my son also installs it :). But, it's limited to 60fps, and on top of that the Android code optimization is terrible, so not much of an experience there.

But lets' talk about two games in particular that manage higher FPS: Fortnite and Pokemon Go.

Fortnite: I just had to try it. I rarely play on my PC, but with all the hype, I wanted to try it on the OnePlus 8 Pro. And WOW - they really mean business...

In the menus and before playing, it's limited to 30fps (I guess to save battery, and it doesn't matter in the menus anyways), but during gameplay it was just as smooth as my gaming PC which has a 90Hz monitor. Impressive. And I even got to 4th place! :victory:

If anyone of you is into playing FPS on your phones, this is a game-changer. Also, because of the high RAM, in-game experience is top notch, with zero lag.

Battery seems decent, based on my 20-minute round, I reckon one can go around 4 hours of playtime, which is quite incredible.

Pokemon Go: Previously, my biggest gripe with Android was the performance (or rather lack of...) of Pokemon Go, especially compared to iPhones. The game takes full advantage of the 120Hz display, and it's simply gorgeous. Throwing curveballs is a breeze, and overall exprerience is now MUCH better than the iPhone. Plus add to that that I could probably manage 5-5.5 hours of game time with a full charge.

Summing up

I guess when you have a powerful phone, it doesn't matter what you throw at it... It simply performs incredibly well. And the 8 Pro is a damn powerful phone.

Camera

OK, it's camera time! It's now been 4 weeks with the phone, let's talk about the camera. Again, this is coming from the 6T.

Few points: general feeling, everyday shots, videos, low light.

General overall feeling

This rocks. On the 6T, I almost always had to shoot multiple shots to ensure I have a good picture there. Now - my use case is mostly taking pictures of the family, and they are always moving :) Also, family sports don't have when there is good lighting, so I was almost always struggling with getting good pictures...

Not anymore. In the first few weeks I did take multiple photos (habit I guess), but it's no longer needed. 95% of the time the photo I take is simply perfect. I think the biggest testament to this is my broader family, and everyone uses iPhones -> since the 8 Pro, they keep on complimenting me on the quality of the photos, and always ask me what phone I have :D

Everyday shots

Yes, because the family is always moving around (including our rabbit), it's very difficult to get a decent picture. With the 8 Pro, it's actually very easy to do that now. I guess because of the better sensor, shutter times have been reduced, so motion is no longer showing on the pictures (unless of course there is significant movement). But these are the more difficult scenarios.

For simpler scenarios, like group picture with everyone posing, the rabbit laying down, etc., the pictures are perfect, good enough to immediately take to a print studio, even without editing.

Videos

Honestly, this is the best part :) I am lucky to have a 21:9 QHD monitor, and I love watching movies on it. I was always bummed that none of the previous phones was able to shoot in that format. With the 8 Pro, they introduced Cinematik 4K. I now always shoot in this mode, in 60fps. And oh my it's beautiful. It already fills the whole screen on the phone, and it's immersive, but when I show the family the videos on my home computer, they are in awe. And it's perfectly fluid with 60fps! And this captures every single detail in sports, so perfect.

Low light

I only include this section because for some reason people actually take photos in low light... :)

Now in the Netherlands it only gets dark after 11PM, so this is a bit difficult to test, but every single dusk picture I took turned out perfectly, again prompting my family members to ask me what kind of phone I have. LOL

That sums it up (for now), do let me know if you have any questions!