Best flagship killers 2024 - buyer’s guide

The Xiaomi 13T Pro is among the best phones you can get for €600. It delivers on every single promise and has plenty of flagship-grade, class-leading features. The new IP68-rated design, especially the one with the vegan leather back, is classy and stunning.

The 13T Pro impresses with one of the best OLED screens in the industry that is jam-packed with premium features, and it can also brag with the smallest punch hole. Furthermore, the Xiaomi 13T Pro employs one of the fastest chipsets on the smartphone market, which delivers excellent performance and stability across the board.

The Leica cooperation must be paying off, as all rear cameras deliver outstanding photo and video quality day and night.

Let's not forget the good battery life, the loud stereo speakers, and the incredibly fast 120W charging - these deserve to be mentioned. Xiaomi's dedication to four major Android updates and five years of security patches is very welcome, too.

The only real setback we encountered on the Xiaomi 13T Pro was the selfie camera. It is a 20MP Quad-Bayer shooter is an insult to any cameraphone, let alone one co-developed with Leica. Its photo and video quality are quite average, too.

Long story short - the Xiaomi 13T Pro is one of the best all-round phines right now, with top-notch hardware, exceptional execution across the board and a mid-range price. Sounds like a flagship killer, doesn’t it?

The €330 or so Poco X6 Pro turned out a solid smartphone with all sorts of premium features. The Poco's greatness shines brightest on the front, where the thoroughly excellent display tops things off nicely with Dolby Vision playback and 68B colors- a most welcome rarity. The speedy charging complements a solid battery life result too.

A key selling point for the X6 Pro is the chipset has power to spare and actually comes in a package that's not a one-trick pony. There's also the evolution from an already widely loved MIUI into an ever so slightly nicer HyperOS. The largely unremarkable camera hardware, meanwhile, turns in pretty great stills, with a knack on low-light shooting that's not to be overlooked.

In the end, we'd say the Poco X6 Pro does a few things exceptionally, many things very well, and falls short in only a few areas (IP54 ingress protection, poor ultrawide camera). That makes it an easy recommendation in our book for this category.

The Pixel 8 offers an improved viewing experience in line with 2024's industry standards, excellent camera experience, faster charging, 7 years of software support, and timely major OS updates. And, it is one of the most compact smartphones on the market, one of the most powerful, and one with a remarkable photo quality from its cameras.

But the Pixel 8 isn't without its flaws. For instance, a 3x telephoto unit would have been greatly appreciated as well wider availability for its smart features. After all, many of Pixel’s clever software features can't be utilized to its fullest in many markets. Charging and battery life aren't particularly impressive either, although somewhat okay in Pixel terms. We also wonder why Google decided to skip the autofocus feature on the selfie camera and the support for Pro camera mode on the smaller Pixel.

Bottom line, the Pixel 8 is an easy recommendation because, despite its issues, it's a significant upgrade over the previous generation, manages to pack competent hardware into a compact body, offers top-notch power, and has a mid-range price..

The €330 OnePlus Nord 3 is easy to like - it has an impressive high-resolution display with even more impressively thin bezels and cutout. The flagship-grade hardware is a real treat in this price range, and so is the flagship battery life and charging. And we cannot but appreciate the IP54-rated body, a thoughtful step that gives an extra peace of mind.

The camera has been improved since the Nord 2, there is no doubt. The main camera saves great photos and videos, day and night, and so does the ultrawide shooter. Over-processed a bit, sure, but still better than what Nord 2 had to offer.

The selfie camera is a bit disappointing, and the macro cam turned out pretty poor. But not having electronic stabilization for the 4K videos is a real crime. That, and the Quad-Bayer selfie sensor. Oh, and being a BBK-made phone, the OnePlus Nord 3 does not offer high frame rate gaming.

Even with these imperfections, the Nord 3 manages to impress us with everything else - screen, performance, speakers, charging speed and battery life, overall camera quality, fluid OxygenOS. It has a competitive price, too, and we do suggest putting the Nord 3 on your shortlist, somewhere around the top picks.

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The Nothing Phone (2) is an excellent sequel and a tempting offer in a pretty over-saturated market, especially at that €550 price tag. The phone has something that no other phone has, well, except the Nothing phones, of course, and that's the Glyph UI. Even better, the LED functionality has been expanded, and it's a really cool and convenient way to see what's happening on your phone without looking at its screen.

The Phone (2) has a larger and brighter LTPO OLED display, with a much more adaptive refresh rate, a welcome update over the Phone (1). The most notable upgrade is the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 flagship chipset, which makes working with the Phone (2) a breezy experience, gaming included.

Then there is the improved battery life. The richer audio from the stereo speakers. And better photo and video quality across the board. Let's not forget the faster 45W charging speed.

The Nothing Phone (2) also impressed us with the fluidity of its Nothing OS 2.0 - it's so clean, simple, and fast.

The Nothing Phone (2) is not without its issues, though. First - it does not support High Frame Rate gaming, which is a bit disappointing considering the capable hardware platform. The Phone (2) is still not water-resistant despite the now higher ingress protection rating.

The Glyph UI remains the most important thing of any Nothing Phone. You either love it and use it, or you don't, and then the Phone (2) becomes an offer like any other. If you have no use for Glyph, we've explored plenty of alternatives and are sure some will fit your needs and budget.

But if you do, or you just want a breath of fresh air, an innovation of sorts in an otherwise boring market, the Nothing Phone (2), or (1), will not disappoint you. On the contrary, the Phone (2) offers a thoughtful pick of features with a pinch of premium and two of innovation, and that's why we do recommend considering the Phone (2) and even buying it. Because "they just don't make them like the old times" does not fully apply here.

The OnePlus 12R is an excellent offer in India, and the markets it is available in. It’s an INR 40,000 smartphone with a large Fluid AMOLED screen with 1B colors, 120Hz refresh, and Dolby Vision. It also packs flagship-grade Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset with proper cooling solution that helps for good sustained performance.

The OnePlus 12R's specsheet already revealed some of its key weaknesses. The lack of wireless charging and the IP rating that doesn't promise submersion survival will possibly disqualify it for some potential buyer. More limiting, we reckon, is the camera system that features a so-so ultrawide and is missing a zoom unit - that's the weak point that rivals can readily exploit. After all it is not a cheap phone.

That said, stills performance is superb on the main camera and not half bad on the ultrawide, with both excelling in the dark - that's anything but a disappointing performance, if you don't particularly care for video. Add to that a wonderful display, class-leading battery life, and charging speed that's also among the best (in any class), and the 12R isn't looking too shabby, all things considered.

Ultimately, whether the OnePlus 12R is merely good enough or just great for you will be decided on exactly how much you want to be zooming in or out on your cameras. For everything else – it is a fine flagship killer specimen.