OnePlus Nord N30 5G Review: Is it Worth $300?

In this article, we are reviewing the newly launched OnePlus Nord N30, a mid-range smartphone with a 108MP camera, a 6.72-inch display, and a 5,000mAh battery. We will go through its design, display, battery life, speakers, performance, camera test, and more to know is this really best mid-range phone.

Design

The Nord N30 design is a little on the bland side, and I’m completely fine with the all-plastic build. However, the back of this phone attracts dust and fingerprints like crazy. There’s a capacitive fingerprint scanner embedded into the power button, which I personally prefer over the in-display scanners. This one is pretty good, as I’ve had zero issues. There’s also the option for a less secure 2D Face Unlock if you prefer that.

Nord N30 Display

One of the main compromises that this phone makes to hit that lower price point is the screen. Nord N30 features a 6.7-inch 1080p LCD display with a refresh rate of up to 120 hertz. While OLED would have been ideal, the screen on this phone is perfectly fine. It reaches a brightness of 550 nits and up to 680 nits of peak brightness. OnePlus claims it’s bright enough to use in direct sunlight, but I’d say that’s a bit of a stretch. Personally, I would have preferred it to be a bit brighter. However, I do appreciate that there’s a pre-installed screen protector out of the box, which is one less thing to worry about and saves you a little money.

Speakers Audio Quality

The speakers were a bit of a surprise to me. N30 has stereo speakers that sound good, though not amazing, but very respectable. What’s surprising is that they can get super loud. It features what they call Ultra Volume mode, which is labeled as 200 volume. I measured 80 decibels at maximum volume and 88 decibels in Ultra Volume mode. So yeah, it’s very close to being twice as loud. Besides watching content or listening to music, I found that the extra volume came in handy when taking calls on speaker, especially if you’re outside in traffic, for example. These are probably some of the loudest speakers I’ve heard on a phone.

Battery Life

There’s a 5,000 milliamp-hour battery packed inside, which comfortably gets me through a full day with battery to spare. Honestly, with very light usage, you could probably stretch it to two days. In comparison to the Pixel 7A, which I just finished reviewing, this phone is definitely more efficient in terms of battery. For example, a 30-minute trip navigating in Google Maps drained 8% battery on the Pixel 7A, while the OnePlus only dropped by 5%.

Overall, battery life is also pretty solid for other semi-demanding tasks like video recording or gaming. As I mentioned earlier, you get a 50-watt charger included in the box. It will charge up to 80% in 30 minutes, which isn’t as fast as the flagship OnePlus phones, but still noticeably faster than what Samsung, Google, and Apple are doing.

Nord N30 Performance

Phones	Scores
iPhone SE (2022)	2210 / 4794
Pixel 7A	1380 / 3071
Galaxy A54	1008 / 2797
OnePlus Nord N30	896 / 2076

Now, this phone is powered by the Snapdragon 695. I looked it up, and it turns out it was released in late 2021. The benchmark numbers aren’t all that impressive, as it’s actually the least powerful among the batch of phones I mentioned earlier. However, the good news is that for everyday smartphone tasks, this phone has been very smooth to use during the past couple of weeks. It may have stuttered once or twice and certain apps may take a couple of extra seconds to load here and there, but nothing that has made me think, Wow, this chip isn’t cutting it.

With that being said, more demanding games like Ghenshin Impact won’t run very well on this phone. You’ll barely get 30 frames per second at low settings. However, more casual gaming is fine. But keep in mind, this is not the phone you want to buy if gaming is your main priority.

Software and UI

The phone runs OxygenOS 13.1, and you know what? I actually don’t mind a lot of the software experience. There are like four or five pre-installed OnePlus apps, but I was able to uninstall every single one. It has some special features like resizable floating windows and a sidebar for launching apps or shortcuts, which reminds me a lot of what you see on Samsung phones.

There are quite a few customization options as well. For example, you can change the shape and size of the icons or even use icon packs downloaded from the Play Store. You can choose from a variety of different transitions when scrolling between home screens too. Additionally, there’s this icon pulled-down gesture, which I think is really cool. Swiping upward on either side of the screen pulls down all the icons, and then you can scrub over to the app you want to open. Just let go, and it’ll launch that app. This feature is completely separate from one-handed mode and makes using a big screen phone like this a little more ergonomic.

However, it’s not all perfect. I find the Shelf feature to be a little redundant. Why can’t they just let us use these widgets on the home screen like all the other widgets? Additionally, I’ve been getting pop-ups from time to time asking me for location access, which is a little annoying.

OnePlus Nord N30 Camera

If you take a lot of pictures and want the best phone for that around this price point, I’m going to be honest with you: go grab yourself the Pixel 6A or 7A. Honestly, the Pixels have spoiled me. The Nord N30 has a triple camera setup, but because there’s a depth and macro lens, you’re essentially working with a single lens. It’s a 108-megapixel camera, but the picture quality isn’t going to blow you away. During the day, it can get the job done, but most of the time, the pictures come out very flat with not a lot of life to them. You can get impressive photos, but it’s very hit or miss, especially with less than ideal lighting or any sort of movement. If you’re looking for video, it shoots at 1080p and 60 frames per second. Once again, the footage isn’t all that impressive to me. However, it’s perfectly usable for the occasional clip here and there.

Final Thought

The $300 price point for this phone is very attractive, and I can see a lot of people giving it a shot just for that reason alone. It also has a headphone jack, expandable storage, and still comes with a charger in the box, which are all very good reasons to choose this phone. At $300, you can’t deny that there’s good value here. However, here’s the thing: nothing else about this phone really stands out, except maybe for the super loud speakers.

Even when considering the update policy, OnePlus is lagging behind. But hey, it’s cheaper, right? It’s honestly a decent option for a mid-range phone. There are no real deal-breakers in my opinion. If you’re tired of Apple, Google, or Samsung and want to try something different, the Nord N30 is worth a look, as usual.

89%

89%

Best Budget 5G Phone

The $300 price point for this phone is very attractive, and I can see a lot of people giving it a shot just for that reason alone. It also has a headphone jack, expandable storage, and still comes with a charger in the box, which are all very good reasons to choose this phone.

• Design

  10
• Display

  9
• Speaker And Audio Quality

  9
• Battery Life

  8.5
• Performance

  8
• Camera

  9
• User Ratings (1 Votes)
  6.8