OnePlus Nord CE 2 5G breaks cover with two key upgrades

OnePlus has added yet another phone to its mid-range portfolio. The OnePlus Nord CE 2 5G is a follow-up to last year’s Nord CE, which was the company’s first attempt at driving down prices in its Nord range.

Also read: The OnePlus Nord buyer’s guide

OnePlus’ goal with its CE or Core Edition devices is to cut down on the excess while still offering core features that make its devices special. That being said, the new OnePlus Nord CE 2 brings a lot of the same hardware as its predecessor. There are a handful of upgrades in there that you might care about, but is the phone special enough to make you open your wallets? Without further ado, here’s everything you need to know about the new Nord.

OnePlus Nord CE 2 5G: New wine, rebranded bottle

The latest OnePlus phone is not an entirely new device. It’s virtually identical to the OPPO Reno 7 SE, albeit with a few upgrades up its sleeve.

For one, the OnePlus phone gets a slightly better triple camera system consisting of a 64MP main sensor, an 8MP ultrawide sensor, and a 2MP macro lens. On the front is a 16MP selfie shooter. If this configuration also sounds familiar to you, it’s because the OnePlus Nord CE carried identical camera specs, with the exception of a 2MP depth sensor instead of a macro lens.

Also see: The best camera phones you can buy

Under the hood, the Dimensity 900 chip powers the OnePlus Nord CE 2. It’s the same SoC that runs the Reno 7 SE but is an upgrade over the Snapdragon 750G that featured on the first-gen Nord CE.

The octa-core MediaTek silicon has a smaller 6nm transistor compared to the 8nm Snapdragon chip. You should ideally see a bump in performance if you’re upgrading from the older Nord CE, but it may not be that significant.

Another improvement the phone boasts over the older device and the OPPO phone is its faster 65W charging. OnePlus claims the Nord CE 2’s 4,500mAh battery can go from 1% to 65% in just 15 minutes. This, the company says, makes the phone usable for 16 hours at a stretch.

Elsewhere, the Nord CE 2 gets the signature OnePlus 90Hz display, a 3.5mm headphone jack, dual-SIM slots, an in-display fingerprint sensor, and a dedicated microSD slot for expandable storage. Unfortunately, there’s no alert slider on the Nord CE 2, just like the previous phone.

You can see the complete specs of the OnePlus Nord CE 2 below.

OnePlus Nord CE 2 5G Specs

Price and availability

The OnePlus Nord CE 2 costs £299 (~$406) in the UK for the 8GB RAM version and €349 in Europe for the same configuration. In India, the phone starts at Rs 23,999 (~$319) for the 6GB RAM variant, while the 8GB RAM variant is priced at Rs 24,999 (~$333). The device will be available starting February 22 in India, March 3 in Europe, and March 10 in the UK.