OnePlus Ace 3 Pro launched: Say goodbye to battery anxiety

OnePlus teased the arrival of so-called Glacier Battery technology last week, promising much-improved battery life and more. The day has arrived, as the newly announced OnePlus Ace 3 Pro is the first phone with this tech.

OnePlus says the Ace 3 Pro has a 6,100mAh battery, making it quite possibly the biggest battery we’ve ever seen in a OnePlus handset. This battery also dwarfs the OnePlus 12 (5,400mAh) and Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra (5,000mAh) batteries. The manufacturer adds that the phone is just under 9mm thick, so you’re not really compromising thinness for such a huge battery. OnePlus says you can expect two days of usage out of the Ace 3 Pro.

OnePlus says the phone supports 100W wired charging speeds, although it’s disappointing to see glacial USB-PD charging speeds of just ~13.5W. It’s really high time that the brand and other manufacturers embrace fast PD charging.

OnePlus has long claimed that its phone batteries can withstand 1,600 charging cycles (e.g., four years of usage) before hitting 80% effective capacity. Thankfully, the Ace 3 Pro also supports this tech. So you should still see great battery life several years down the line.

It’s worth noting that this is far from the biggest battery we’ve ever seen in a smartphone, but these huge batteries tend to be the domain of rugged phone brands and niche manufacturers. A ~6,000mAh phone is still very rare to see from major OEMs. 

OnePlus Ace 3 Pro: What else makes it stand out?

The rest of the OnePlus Ace 3 Pro is a hybrid of flagship and mid-range phone. There’s a top-shelf Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 processor, for one, and OnePlus says this is the first Android device to run Genshin Impact at 120fps. You’ve also got a 6.78-inch 1.5K OLED screen (8T LTPO), up to 24GB of RAM, and up to 1TB of fixed storage.

The phone otherwise brings a mid-tier 50MP+8MP+2MP rear camera trio, so don’t expect the OnePlus 12’s periscope camera here. A 16MP camera handles selfies and video calls.

There’s no wireless charging either, and you’ll have to settle for an IP65 rating instead of full-fledged water resistance. But at least the firm’s rainwater touch tech is present, enabling more accurate touch input in the rain or with wet fingers.

The Ace 3 Pro also has the rather intriguing ability to make calls in environments with weak or no internet connectivity. We’ve previously seen apps like Firechat that offered messaging capabilities over local networks (e.g. Bluetooth, Wi-Fi), but we’re not sure if this calling feature is based on similar technology.

Other notable features include a three-stage alert slider, an IR blaster, NFC, dual stereo speakers, Bluetooth 5.4, and Wi-Fi 7.

OnePlus is also offering a Supercar Ceramic Edition version of the Ace 3 Pro (seen above), featuring a white design and ceramic back.

OnePlus Ace 3 Pro pricing and availability

The OnePlus Ace 3 Pro is available in China at a starting price of 3,199 yuan (~$440) for the 12GB/256GB model. Expect to pay 4,599 yuan (~$633) for the top-end 24GB/1TB model.

We’ve asked OnePlus about wider availability and will update the article if it gets back to us. The original Ace Pro appeared in global markets as the OnePlus 10T, but the OnePlus Ace 2 Pro was a China-exclusive product as the company didn’t offer a OnePlus 11T last year. Nevertheless, if OnePlus decides to launch a OnePlus 12T, it’ll presumably be a rebadged OnePlus Ace 3 Pro.