OnePlus just announced its Android 15 update, OxygenOS 15, which brings new features and other upgrades, and is certainly running remarkably smoothly.
Within OxygenOS 15, based heavily on Oppo’s ColorOS 15 announced last week, there are three core areas that have been changed, starting with the “Fast and Smooth Experience.” Oppo has put a lot of effort into animation improvements to make ColorOS, and in turn OxygenOS, feel faster and smoother than ever. One of the key points made is the addition of “Parallel Processing” for animations, which allows one animation to start even while the other is still running, without any of the animations being aborted.
The clear focus of this – which OnePlus and Oppo have used in examples – is on the test made popular by Ice Universe, a frequent tipster in the mobile space. During the test, users open and close apps quickly and check whether the animation is stopped or slowed down. “Parallel processing” eliminates this do lead to a smoother experience. But realistically, this is a change that virtually no one will actively notice. That would defeat the purpose anyway, because this is definitely a change that does its job best if you don’t know anything about it in the first place.
Changes can also be made through the system. OxygenOS still feels as much like ColorOS as ever, and with a little more iOS influence throughout the system.
Most noticeable is a change to the notification tray, where the Quick Settings and Notifications have been split. This is optional, with a pop-up appearing on our OnePlus 12 immediately after setup asking which style is preferred. The experience using the split layout isn’t too bad, with notifications still able to be swiped away in either direction, and a swipe in an empty space allowing users to jump between the two halves. Yet it is not as fast or intuitive as existing behavior.
You’ll also find some custom designs in OxygenOS, with many of the first-party apps featuring some beautiful gradients.
There are also new features like “One-Take”, which lets you take a subject in a photo and use it in home screen wallpapers, lock screen wallpapers, and an always-on display with some fun styles.
Much more impactful is the arrival of Open Canvas on the smaller screen, which enables faster split-screen multitasking on the smaller screen of the OnePlus 12 on which we tried the update. Open Canvas first debuted on OnePlus Open and later came to the OnePlus Pad 2, and it is by far the best software feature OnePlus has come to market with. This expansion into traditional smartphones seems strange at first, but the ability to switch back and forth between apps so quickly makes split-screen multitasking feel useful. It’s much faster than traditional multitasking and offers much more flexibility in what you’re trying to do.
And of course you think so too a lot of of AI.
Like everyone else, OnePlus (and Oppo) has this update packed with new AI features. There’s an AI assistant in the Notes app, an AI-powered Google Wallet integration in the Photos app (not Google Photos) for turning images into cards (which is super cool), an AI Reflection Eraser in the Photos app, and both AI-powered Blur and Upscaling features. The reflection tool works well, just don’t expect miracles.
There’s also ‘Intelligent Search’, which combines on-device search and online search into one feature, allowing search to refer to both things found online and things stored on your device, such as images or documents. I haven’t had much time to play with these features yet, but Intelligent Search sounds extremely useful if it works as well as OnePlus says.
There’s also a new “Share to iPhone” shortcut that… well, no one is going to use.
OnePlus has also delivered Circle to Search in its Android 15 update, a feature we’ll hopefully see on other OnePlus devices soon. Similarly, Gemini will become the default assistant on OnePlus devices in the future, although Google Assistant will remain on OnePlus 12 until you manually change it.
I was wary of this update before trying it, but it doesn’t really feel all that different from the previous one. It’s a bit smoother, has a few more features, and brings at least one major update in the arrival of Open Canvas on traditional phones. I’d call that an overall victory in my book.
OxygenOS 15 will be available for OnePlus 12 (in open beta) and other devices from October 30.
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