In terms of design, the OnePlus 13R is like a flatter avatar of the OnePlus 13. The broad design outlines (spherical camera unit, alert slider) are the same but while the OnePlus 13 had tried to put some elements of a curve on the back and front of the phone, the OnePlus 13R is dead flat, front, back and sides. We know there are some who do not like this manner of design, although the likes of the iPhone and Pixel have adopted it, but all said and done, we think the OnePlus 13R does look premium. It is just 7.58 mm thin, and comes in silver white (Astral Trail) and black (Nebula Noir). We got the Astral Trail variant and it looks rather premium and eye catching with those concentric circle patterns. Some might even think it looks BETTER than the OP. It comes with IP65 dust and water resistance too, but has not Hasselblad branding for its cameras! As usual.

There are some decent innards within that frame. The display is a 6.78 inch LTPO AMOLED display with 2780 x 1264 pixel resolution and 120 Hz refresh rate, The cameras on the back are a 50 MP main Sony LYT-700 with OIS, another 50 MP telephoto with 2X optical zoom, and rather underwhelmingly, an 8 MP ultrawide (the OP13 has three 50 MP sensors). The selfie camera is also a bit of a disappointment - we again the 16 MP snapper that seems a OnePlus favourite.

The real stars of the OnePlus 13R are however, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip, which was the darling of flagships last year (it was on the likes of the Galaxy S24 Ultra), combined with massive RAM and storage options of 12 GB/ 256 GB and 16 GB/ 512 GB. There's also a hefty 6000 mAh battery (impressive in a phone this slim), that charges at 80W, and a 80W charger in the box too. You also get Android 15 with the much improved OxygenOS 15 on top (with lots of AI goodies), stereo speakers and a commitment to four years of OS updates. Pretty nifty, we think.

You get all of this at Rs 42,999 for the 12GB/ 256 GB variant, and Rs 49,999 for the 16 GB/ 512 GB variant. Now those are pretty good prices when you think of the hardware on offer. The cameras seem a little off the pace, but that display, that chip, all that RAM and storage, the clean software with AI tricks, and most of all, that still super processor make this a great phone for gamers who do not want to fork out the big bucks for the Snapdragon 8 Elite device (the most affordable of which, the iQoo 13 starts at Rs 54,999 for a 12 GB/ 256 GB variant). In fact, we would say this is pretty similar to the original flagship killing OnePlus. Which is not a bad thing at all.