We wouldn't blame you for not paying attention to Chinese phone launches, but the OnePlus 15 just debuted in its home territory, and the announcement has us excited for the upcoming global launch.
As we've seen in previous years, OnePlus has announced its latest flagship phone with a China-only initial reveal. While you wouldn't want to buy this particular phone yet (import fees and a China-specific OS are two big reasons), a worldwide release should happen soon, perhaps in November as some rumors are suggesting.
OnePlus 15: Price and key specs
Pricing information with phones launching in China is often a little muddy. OnePlus is asking for RMB 3,999 for the basic Chinese edition of the 15, which converts to about $560 USD.
That sounds incredibly cheap, but direct price comparisons between countries with different methods of taxing tech, especially when that tech is built domestically versus in a nation you're currently in a trade war with, aren't always helpful.
A better guideline will be last year's OnePlus 13's launch price in China, which at RMB 4,799, makes the latest model about 17% cheaper than before. It's also cheaper than the older OnePlus 12, which started at RMB 4,299, perhaps suggesting that OnePlus wants to go back to its roots of beating flagship phones from a lower price point rather than competing directly.
It takes only a glance to see that the OnePlus 15 has a fresh look, with a square rear camera block, rather than the company's usual circular one. This does have precedent though, as it's the design we first saw on the OnePlus 13T, the miniaturized version of the OnePlus 13 that sadly isn't sold outside China and India.
The Plus Key is something else inherited from the OnePlus 13T. This replaces the OnePlus Alert Slider, which will be basically blasphemy for OnePlus' longest-serving fans. In return for removing the slider, you instead get a rebindable button that can still mute the phone but can do many more things, such as activate the phone's Plus Mind AI features.
OnePlus' color offering for this model consists of Absolute Black, Sand Dunes (which is cream/gold) and Mist Purple. It's a pleasantly wide-ranging set of options, even if it misses out a classic OnePlus green.
We often see flagship phones rated IP68 against water and dust intrusion, but OnePlus has decided to get the 15 four different ratings: IP66, IP68, IP69 and IP69K. That means the phone should definitely keep dust away from the key components, and won't be beaten by water either, whether you're submerging the phone or attacking it with hot water jets.
An enormous 7,300 mAh battery lives within the OnePlus 15, which is a way higher capacity than any other flagship smartphone you can buy right now. To help fill up all that space, OnePlus has kept its usual fast charging promise by equipping the 15 with 120W wired and 50W wireless charging capabilities.
The battery goes toward powering both the phone's 6.78-inch AMOLED display. It features an impressive 165Hz peak refresh rate, higher than the usual 120Hz that modern Android phones offer.
The other key component in the phone is its Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chipset, the latest flagship chip from Qualcomm that should offer the best possible performance. You can then spec either 12GB or 16GB RAM and between 256GB and 1TB of storage to accompany it.
For photography, the OnePlus 15 uses triple 50MP cameras on its back, covering main, ultrawide and 3.5x telephoto duties. There's also a 32MP selfie camera on the back. These cameras use a new DetailMax camera engine, instead of tuning from camera maker Hasselblad like the previous four generations of OnePlus flagships. Photos taken on OnePlus phones have always been good, but not excellent like those you'd snap with the latest Samsung or Google. We're keen to try out how this all-new camera processing will change things.
So while we've still got at least a few weeks until we see the OnePlus 15 launch officially where we live and buy phones, the Chinese launch has more than whet our appetite. Hopefully none of the specs above are altered, or at least altered significantly, for the global model, as OnePlus looks to have one impressive phone on its hands. And if it's cheaper than we've seen from them in a while, as the Chinese price suggests, then this could be one of the best value phones of 2026.
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