OnePlus entered the smartwatch category back in 2021 with the original OnePlus Watch, and it’s not an exaggeration to say that it crashed and burned pretty quickly. From poor performance to unusable software, the watch was positioned to fail from the get-go. So, for the OnePlus Watch 2, the company set out to make things right by improving every single aspect of the experience, and the result is a watch that’s essentially the polar opposite of the original model.
Priced at $300, the OnePlus Watch 2 is one of the best Wear OS watches I’ve ever used. With a classic design, great performance, plenty of fitness features and long battery life, there’s very little here that you’d miss if you bought it over a Galaxy Watch 6 or Pixel Watch 2. But there are certain sacrifices you have to make if you buy one, and if I’m being honest, some of them could be deal breakers.
Let’s dive in, shall we?
With a beautiful screen, lots of fitness features and 100 hours of battery life, the OnePlus Watch 2 makes an excellent companion to your Android phone.
What we liked about it
A unique design and a gorgeous screen
It can be tough to stand out in the smartwatch market if the watch you build isn’t square like an Apple Watch, yet OnePlus has figured out a way to add character to the Watch 2 that you won’t find anywhere else. The watch, which uses stainless steel for its construction, has a flat edge on the right side which houses a crown and a side Action button that can be programmed to do anything you want. The unique shape of the watch is quite sharp; it takes a bit of getting used to, but it’s one of my favorite smartwatch designs to date.
Although, like many of my friends who have reviewed this watch, I’m confused as to why the crown doesn’t do anything when you rotate it. It definitely rotates; you can see it happen, thanks to its grooved design. But nothing happens on the screen. I wonder why?
Compared to a Pixel or Galaxy Watch, the Watch 2 does a good job of standing out enough that you can tell it’s a OnePlus watch from afar. Its standard silicone band can be swapped out for any 22mm watch band you come across, but I will admit that it’s one of the nicer preinstalled bands I’ve used.
For colors, OnePlus offers Black Steel and Radiant Steel, the former of which I received to review. If I’m being honest, the Radiant Steel is more my style with its silver finish and green silicone band, but I do enjoy the gunmetal aesthetic of the Black Steel. Either way, you’ll get a beefy watch with solid durability, including 5 ATM water resistance (meaning it can go under up to 50 meters of water), MIL-STD-810H certification for drop protection and 2.5D sapphire crystal glass on the display, the same stuff that Apple and Samsung use to cover their displays.
Speaking of which, the display on the Watch 2 is stunning. OnePlus uses a 1.43-inch AMOLED panel, and it has everything you could want: inky black levels, vibrant colors and enough brightness that it’s easy to see in any lighting condition. It also comes with an always-on mode for quickly glancing at the time on the go, an important feature that helps it keep up with the rest of today’s smartwatches.
Speedy performance and super-long battery life
The OnePlus Watch 2 blazes a new trail for Wear OS watches with its unique Dual-Engine Architecture. OnePlus engineered a new computing platform that combines a Snapdragon W5 and a BES 2700 chip, allowing the watch to trade tasks between the two to optimize performance and battery life.
The result is a watch that performs just as well — if not better — than any Wear OS device on the market. Swiping through Tiles, opening apps, managing notifications and tracking my health data are a breeze and make Wear OS feel just as smooth as watchOS does on my Apple Watch. That’s never happened before with a Wear OS watch I’ve tested, so I give massive props to OnePlus for optimizing the hardware as well as it did.
The company told me that the BES 2700 chip runs a different operating system than the Snapdragon chip, which lets it operate while consuming less power. That chip handles things like notifications and the GPS, which, in turn, asks less of the battery inside the Watch 2 and saves more juice for things like workout and sleep tracking.
I’ve never used a smartwatch with a chip setup like this, so I was curious to see how long it could last on a charge. OnePlus has been boasting claims of up to 100 hours without plugging in, which is kind of wild when you consider the Apple Watch Ultra 2 and Galaxy Watch 6 Classic are only rated for up to 36 to 40 hours.
Surprisingly enough, the OnePlus Watch 2 can easily last three to four days on a charge while using Smart Mode, which is enabled out of the box. While you don’t lose a ton of functionality with the mode enabled, you can’t use things like the always-on display. But even with it enabled and tracking multiple workouts during the day, I could still get through two days before having to recharge it, making it the longest-lasting Wear OS watch I’ve ever used.
The one thing I’m still testing is Low Power Mode. When enabled, this mode can lead to 12 days of battery life, at least according to OnePlus. I’ve used the feature a bit and noticed that it only sips about 5% to 10% every full day I use it, which is incredible. Of course, you’ll only have access to fitness and health features when it’s on since apps tend to draw a lot more power, but it could come in handy if you left home for a weekend trip and forgot your charger.
Compared to other smartwatches on the market, the OnePlus Watch 2 has some of the best battery life I’ve ever tested. It rivals the likes of Garmin and Fitbit when it comes to tracking your fitness and offering smartwatch features like notification management while not crapping out by the end of the day. If you’ve held off on buying a Wear OS watch because their battery life always sucks, the OnePlus Watch 2 is what you’ve been waiting for.
Thank goodness for Wear OS
I’ve used the Galaxy Watch 6 and Pixel Watch 2, and I can tell you that Wear OS feels mostly the same on the OnePlus Watch 2. You get all the Google stuff you could ask for, from Google Wallet and Maps (which is finally available on Wear OS) to Google Calendar and the Assistant, a feature that’s not always available on Wear OS watches. The Watch 2 is powered by Wear OS 4.0 and will receive updates for a couple of years. It’s not the best update policy, to be honest, but it’s the least OnePlus could do after the original OnePlus Watch fiasco.
In fact, that watch is the reason I’m highlighting the software. This is a plain-Jane Wear OS with a few OnePlus touches on top, including an Apple Watch-like app menu, different iconography and some proprietary apps. But compared to the original OnePlus Watch, this may be the biggest upgrade of the entire experience. That watch ran a custom operating system that OnePlus designed, and it was absolutely abysmal. It was slow, it would crash all the time and it had zero third-party app support.
Wear OS on the Watch 2 isn’t just a welcome inclusion; it was a necessity if OnePlus wanted to have a chance of selling any watches. Lo and behold, the company made the switch, and thank goodness it did.
Plenty of workout options with sleep tracking and precise GPS tracking
OnePlus made sure to equip the Watch 2 with a lot of the fitness features you’ll find on other smartwatches, all through its OHealth app for Android. The company says it spent years on research and development for these health-tracking features, with more than 100 of its staff members partaking in various tests to get them up and running.
The result is a list of workout options that’ll check every single box. OnePlus includes over 100 different workout options with special modes for things like running, walking, cycling, rowing and ellipticals that can record more granular data. For example, when running, the watch uses GPS data, elevation, stride length, breathing patterns and more to determine your fitness gains. There are also special modes for playing tennis, badminton and skiing, which add to the watch’s focus on cardio health. Your data is poured into the OHealth app where everything is broken down into easy-to-understand charts and graphs, much like other wearable fitness trackers.
One of the best fitness features on the Watch 2 is the GPS. OnePlus uses a dual-frequency GPS that utilizes L1 and L5 GPS signals, which improves the accuracy of virtually every aspect of the GPS. Your location, route map, distance and pace will all be recorded with far higher accuracy than most other smartwatches, which makes the Watch 2 a great hiking or walking companion outdoors. Comparable watches include the Apple Watch Ultra series and most Garmin watches, which generally cost far more than the Watch 2.
Of course, the watch can also track your sleep at night, with results lining up almost identically to what I get with my Whoop band and Oura Ring. You can see your results in the OHealth app and get a breakdown of how well you slept, how long you spend in each sleep stage and whether you’ve been doing the right stuff to increase your time catching zzz’s. OnePlus also includes recommendations to improve your sleep, which is a nice bonus.
In addition, you can record your blood oxygen saturation using the Sp02 sensor on the back of the watch, as well as track your heart rate all day using continuous heart rate tracking.
What we didn’t like about it
Fitness tracking can be very spotty, and key features are missing
While the GPS is surprisingly accurate on the Watch 2, the rest of the sensors aren’t.
Compared to my Apple Watch Series 8 and Whoop band, the OnePlus Watch 2 seems to be far less accurate when recording my heart rate and calories burned during workouts. When exercising on an elliptical, the Watch 2 regularly misrepresented my heart rate by 20 to 30 beats per minute (bpm), while my Apple Watch would give me a far more realistic number. After a software update, it got better and the Watch 2 would only be off by around 10 to 15 bpm, but that’s still not amazing.
Similarly, the Watch 2 likes to think I burn a lot of calories. During a strength workout, the OnePlus watch would regularly claim that I burned north of 1,000 calories, while my Apple Watch said around 600 and my Whoop claimed about 450.
The watch also liked to tell me that I was stressed out all the time, which I can tell you is incorrect. While my heart rate may be elevated due to whatever I’m dealing with, the Watch 2 thought I was stressed out and would push a notification my way saying so.
I imagine that error is because the Watch 2 relies heavily on the heart rate sensor inside for the fitness-tracking experience, given the fact that it’s missing a lot of other features competing smartwatches come with like skin-temperature tracking, fall detection and EKG support. It’s by no means a complete fitness-tracking experience; there are just a ton of workout options in the fitness app. If you want something more accurate or robust, you’ll have to shop elsewhere.
No option for LTE
One of the most popular features on a smartwatch is LTE connectivity, which lets you leave your smartphone at home and exclusively use your watch to manage incoming calls, check notifications?and track your fitness. There’s an LTE option for almost every major smartwatch out there … except the OnePlus Watch 2.
For some reason, OnePlus decided not to include LTE connectivity on its wearable, which is a curious decision given how popular it is on competitors’ offerings. I suspect it’s due to the battery-life situation. LTE radios tend to draw a lot of power from whatever device they’re in, and OnePlus probably didn’t want to make the sacrifice. So it left the feature on the cutting-room floor, and that’s a pretty big bummer.
It only comes in one size: big
Speaking of things that are big, the OnePlus Watch 2 is just that: big.
It comes in a single 47mm case size that, admittedly, sits comfortably on my wrist. But I can’t imagine anyone with a smaller wrist than me would enjoy using it. It’s just too big. Plus, it’s far from the thinnest watch around. At 12.1 millimeters, it’s slightly thicker than Apple Watch Series 9, which clocks in at the 10.7 millimeters thick, so you’ll definitely notice it on your wrist.
I’ll admit, there’s nothing wrong with selling a big watch. I’m a fan of big watches; therefore, I’m a fan of the OnePlus Watch 2. But if you’re partial to wearing something smaller that accents your wrist rather than dominates it, the Watch 2 isn’t for you. Hopefully, OnePlus offers a couple of different sizes with the eventual Watch 3.
Bottom line
The OnePlus Watch 2 is a mixed bag of good features and those that could use some improvement. But for $299, it’s one of the best Wear OS watches you can buy today. It has far better performance and battery life than the Pixel Watch 2, and its design makes it a strong rival to Samsung’s Galaxy Watch 6.
Missing features like LTE and EKG recording can be deal breakers, and I wouldn’t blame anyone who thought this thing was way too big. It also sucks that I can’t sit here and tell you the fitness-tracking features are great, because they aren’t. Unless you’re strictly tracking things with a GPS (which no one does), I don’t think you’ll get as accurate a representation of your health by using the Watch 2.
On the flip side, if all you want is a good Wear OS watch to pair with your Android phone, and you’d like longer battery life than a single day, the Watch 2 is worth exploring. It’s not perfect, but compared to the original OnePlus Watch, it’s a massive improvement, and you’ll enjoy using it if you’re okay with the sacrifices it makes along the way.
