OnePlus 10 Pro camera features revealed — here's the first photo samples

OnePlus 10 Pro
(Image credit: OnePlus)

Update (Jan 7th): We've chosen the OnePlus 10 as one of the most interesting phones revealed during CES 2022.

Once again, an official OnePlus 10 Pro teaser has emerged to get us hyped for the upcoming Android flagship phone. This latest reveal is all about the cameras, as OnePlus spills the beans on its new photo features and shows off some samples, which we've included below.

First up, OnePlus wants to draw attention to its "Billion Color Solution". This lets all three of the phone's rear cameras — the 48MP main sensor plus the 50MP ultrawide and 8MP telephoto lenses — shoot in 10-bit color. The result should be more natural and precise capturing of the tones, which OnePlus says is 64 times more powerful than the system used on the OnePlus 9 Pro.

A OnePlus 10 Pro camera sample, showing the phone's Billion Color Solution processing on an image of a figure stood in the sea

(Image credit: OnePlus)

OnePlus has also updated the Hasselblad Pro mode for the OnePlus 10 Pro. When this mode is enabled, it unlocks shooting in 12-bit RAW format for maximum editing information. The gallery of images below shows how the original image (the first one) can be re-edited in multiple ways.

You can alternatively use a new RAW Plus format that combines enhanced detail with the post-processing the phone normally performs, giving you the best of both worlds. That results in a different though still diverse range of final edits, as you can see below.

The ultrawide camera on the OnePlus 10 Pro has been upgraded to use a 150-degree field of view, which is much wider than what the average smartphone offers. For context, the iPhone 13 series and the Samsung Galaxy S21 series both use ultrawide cameras with a 120-degree FOV, while the OnePlus 9 series had an impressive but now surpassed 113-degree FOV. The OnePlus 10 Pro will be able to not only to fit more into a shot, but also operate a new Fisheye Mode effect. 

If a 150-degree FOV sounds too wide for your liking, OnePlus will let you set the FOV to 110 degrees instead.

Finally, there's Movie Mode, effectively an expanded version of the basic video mode. Controls such as ISO and shutter speed can be adjusted both before hitting record and on the fly, plus you get the option to record in a LOG format for more detailed editing later. This feels very similar to the iPhone 13 Cinematic Mode and ProRes features that we saw last year.

While the introduction of the Hasselblad partnership on the OnePlus 9 series last year improved the photo and video capabilities significantly for OnePlus' phones, it wasn't quite enough to get them into a top spot on our best camera phones guide. These changes should all appeal to the advanced photographer/videographer audience that you need to show off, but if anything, the most important thing OnePlus needs to get right is the default experience. The iPhone 13 and the Google Pixel 6, our two top camera phones, both make it really easy to get amazing shots without diving into the depths of its options. That's something we'll only learn once we get our hands on the OnePlus 10 Pro, not from this teaser.

We'll get the full lowdown on the OnePlus 10 Pro on January 11 when the phone launches in China. A global launch for other markets, including the U.S. and U.K, will follow later., 

2022 will mark some big changes for OnePlus' flagship phone in several ways. Its software is merging to adopt elements for ColorOS from Oppo, as the two phone makers are merged together. On a hardware level, the OnePlus 10 Pro is getting 80W wired and 50W wireless charging, some of the fastest speeds we've seen on a phone. It'll also be using the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1, the powerful chipset that we expect to see in several other big phones launched this year.

Richard Priday
Assistant Phones Editor

Richard is based in London, covering news, reviews and how-tos for phones, tablets, gaming, and whatever else people need advice on. Following on from his MA in Magazine Journalism at the University of Sheffield, he's also written for WIRED U.K., The Register and Creative Bloq. When not at work, he's likely thinking about how to brew the perfect cup of specialty coffee.