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OnePlus 13s review: A compact flagship for small hands and tight pockets
Tushar Kanwar The OnePlus 13s combines performance with compact design. It has a powerful Snapdragon 8 Elite chip, a long-lasting battery, and a sleek aesthetic, offering a flagship experience without the bulk Small is beautiful
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Compact flagships have been in and out of favour over the past few years, with the likes of the iPhone 'mini' series and the smaller Asus Zenfone models trying and failing to make smaller phones a mainstream success. Off late though, there's been a bit of a renaissance for pocket rockets—compact, reasonably sized flagships with the latest chips and very little to no compromises as compared to their large-screened brethren (cue cheers from folks with average sized hands and ladies who are tired of having to figure out the complex maths needed to fit large flagships in tight pockets).
Compact flagships have been in and out of favour over the past few years, with the likes of the iPhone 'mini' series and the smaller Asus Zenfone models trying and failing to make smaller phones a mainstream success. Off late though, there's been a bit of a renaissance for pocket rockets—compact, reasonably sized flagships with the latest chips and very little to no compromises as compared to their large-screened brethren (cue cheers from folks with average sized hands and ladies who are tired of having to figure out the complex maths needed to fit large flagships in tight pockets).
Just in the past year alone, we've had the base iPhone 16/16e and the S25, along with the Google Pixel 9/9Pro, and let's not forget the excellent Xiaomi 15, all of which have done their bit to make small phones desirable again, sans the usual caveats of compromised specs and anemic battery life. And now, we have the OnePlus 13s ( ₹ 54,999 excl. bank discounts), the 'smol' member of the OnePlus 13 family that may just have cracked the code for making all the right decisions for OnePlus' first compact flagship. Design details
OnePlus has veered strongly off the track with the design of the 13s, and there's an unmistakable resemblance to the iPhone design, with the flat aluminum frame, glass back and curved corners. Not that that's a bad thing – the fit and finish is excellent, and the phone looks as impeccably put together as the pricier iPhone Pros—it's just that it doesn't have that distinctive OnePlus design language.
Furthering that impression is the iconic alert slider giving way to the new 'Plus' key on the left edge, which invokes the AI Plus Mind utility similar to what Nothing has done with its Essential Space app (more on this later). Again, it's a bit of a nod to the iPhone's Action button, not bad at all but just not the OnePlus you've come to know all these years. The squircle camera module
Not only is the design easy on the eyes—check out the gorgeous green variant with that neatly integrated 'squircle' camera module to know what I mean—it's easier on the hands as well, and the ergonomics feel great. It's well balanced, easy to grab and go, and the buttons are all within reach, although the 6.32-inch display is still a bit of a two-handed affair when you want to reach for the notification panel, despite its slim bezels.
Compared to its peers, it's about the same size as the 16e or the Pixel 9a, and just a tad smaller than the Xiaomi 15. That said, it's got this dense feeling about it, but I'd ask you to read ahead to the battery life for the 185g weight to feel perfectly justified. In terms of durability, you get Gorilla Glass 7i on the front and Panda glass protection on the rear, and a somewhat limited IP65 ingress protection—good enough for the splash or water or light rain but not enough to take a dip in the pool.
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Now, you're obviously getting a smaller 6.32-inch 2640 x 1216-pixel AMOLED LTPO display, with a 120Hz refresh rate, Dolby Vision/HDR10+ support and a 800 nits display that's sufficiently bright but noticeably less bright than the flagship OnePlus 13. It's also a bit stubbier and less immersive as a display for gaming or watching content, but hey, you wanted a smaller phone, right? At least it's good to see the wet-finger-friendly Aqua Touch tech works on this screen, and the optical fingerprint sensor works well even as it is placed far too low on the display to be comfortable to use without adjusting your grip. Stereo speakers are loud and offer good stereo separation but get a bit tinny when loud. Under the hood
Traditionally, smaller phones tend to scrimp on flagship hardware, citing thermal management issues due to the limited space available. Not on the 13s, which is powered by the same Snapdragon 8 Elite chip that powers most of today's Android flagships (not some underclocked variant) and you get 12GB of fast LPDDR5X memory and a choice of either 256GB or 512GB ( ₹ 59,999) of UFS 4.0 storage. Yet, the 13s is dealing with physics, and despite a massive 4,400mm² vapor chamber which does well to keep the chip cool and prevent throttling during games like Genshin Impact and Grid Legends, it does top out on performance quicker than the bigger 13 over longer gaming sessions. Real world performance is excellent, and there's never a situation where one found the phone even remotely lacking in performance.
Like the rest of the OnePlus 13 family, the 13s runs OxygenOS 15 based on Android 15, and the aforementioned AI Plus Mind feature takes screenshots of any information you want to save, and saves it in the Mind Space app. Thereon, the app uses AI to extract information, which stays pretty much inside the same app, ready to be added to external apps when you open the Mind Space. It's a little limited in utility for now, but elsewhere you get AI transcription, translation and summarization across popular apps like YouTube, Instagram and WhatsApp, and an AI call assistant for real time call translation and summarization on phone calls. And as always, Google's Gemini features are there should you not want to dip your toes in OnePlus AI waters just yet. Battery wizardry
Yet, it's the battery where OnePlus has pulled out some A-grade witchcraft. Not only has it packed in a whopping 5,850 mAh battery which is much larger than most larger flagship phones, but it's tuned for efficiency so well you regularly end up with 7 hours-plus on screen-on-time. Talk about shaming the competition—it's smaller YET manages to pack in a larger battery and lasts longer…and this is without employing the newer silicon-carbon tech batteries. And when you do run low, 80W charging gets you up and 75% running in 30 minutes, with a full charge taking a little under an hour. There's also a bypass charging feature which powers the phone directly during gaming, to lower battery strain and excess heating. No wireless charging though, likely a victim of the price point. Photo realistic
It's with the camera that OnePlus has chosen a slightly unconventional approach—a dual camera system with a 50MP rear and a 50MP 2x telephoto, but no ultrawide that we see on many phones including the cheaper 13R. Given the 50MP main sensor would be perfectly capable of 2x-cropping into the image without any loss of detail, it's an odd decision to ship without an ultra-wide shooter…or to not pack in a higher zoom telephoto. Plus no optical image stabilization on the telephoto, or any macro capabilities either. The 32MP selfie camera does a bit to redeem the situation – it's the first selfie shooter with auto-focus for a OnePlus device. Images shot on the main shooter offer good details, rich colors and punchy contrast, while the telephoto matches the main camera, just a bit softer. It'll do well for social media and casual sharing, but it's when you compare it to its peers that the 13s' biggest compromise becomes evident. It can't match the 16e's consistency or the Pixel 9a's portrait mode, and then you compare it to the Xiaomi 15, which blows all other compact flagships out of the water. Verdict
OnePlus has had to make some tough choices to make a compact flagship, and it has chosen well…almost. It's a solid looker that's easy to handle, the performance is top-shelf stuff, and the battery capacity and longevity are the sort of stuff others would do well to emulate. There are a few omissions linked to the less-than-flagship pricing – wireless charging, IP68 waterproofing and USB 3 speeds on the Type-C port, not to mention the odd exclusion of the ultrawide – which makes it a wee bit less feature complete than the true flagships. Just know this - this one won't stretch your pocket, in more ways than one.
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