OnePlus users frustrated over broken promises and lack of communication

A long-time OnePlus user has launched a viral campaign to address how the company has treated its old customers, and it’s already reached over 400,000 people online.

When we talk about OnePlus, it’s either the very first OnePlus smartphone, which epitomized disruptive technology, or the OnePlus 3/3T, the company’s current flagship. Indeed, the OnePlus 2 and its odd sibling OnePlus X are often forgotten. That’s why David Monteiro, a long-time user of OnePlus products and a former moderator for the company’s forums, took to Thunderclap to illustrate the company’s lack of communication and transparency.

His campaign has garnered over 1,400 supporters so far and boasts a social reach of almost 430,000. And it still has 14 more days. Monteiro emphasizes that his campaign is not exclusively about the Nougat update that was promised to OnePlus 2 and OnePlus X users, but rather, that’s just a part of the broader lack of support from the company:

I’d like to clarify that this campaign is not specifically about the lack of a Nougat update, but about how OnePlus is treating its earlier customers and how it’s breaking promises made… I decided to create this campaign to try to bring OnePlus back to its former self and to see that old customer also matter.

In his Medium article, Monteiro describes the three letters that the company CEO Carl Pei promised to write to the community: the first was published in December 2016 and acknowledged the importance of fans. The second, published in February, was “all about marketing and SEO” according to Monteiro. The third letter has not been published yet, and Monteiro seems convinced that it will never be.

He adds that in addition to Pei’s disappointing letters, Pei’s promise to support the OnePlus One with Oxygen OS for at least two whole years was never honored: he says that the first community build was released back in January 2015, which means the OnePlus One should have seen updates until January 2017, but the last Oxygen OS update happened in January 2016.

Of course, the debacle over whether Nougat will be arriving on the OnePlus 2 and OnePlus X is an integral part of Monteiro’s article. The fact of the matter is that Android Nougat cannot officially come to devices powered by Snapdragon 800 and Snapdragon 801. Though the exact reason is unknown, it’s speculated that it has something to do with Google’s decision. That’s probably why the One Plus X never got the update. Now, the trouble is that OnePlus has made promises – albeit without any specific time frame – to bring Nougat to the OnePlus 2, which is powered by the Snapdragon 810 processor, and the update is nowhere to be seen. As you can see from Monteiro’s article, OnePlus’ communication has been ambiguous at best, with the company failing to deliver timely bug fixes and security patches.

OnePlus is often mentioned alongside companies like Google and Samsung, and it’s quite impressive how far it’s come since the beginning. However, for a company who takes pride in its community- and fan-based identity, something like this could potentially be very damaging.

What are your thoughts on OnePlus? Have you added your support to David’s Thunderclap campaign? Let us know!