OnePlus Nord CE 2 Lite 5G hands-on review

Design

The Nord CE 2 Lite 5G has a relatively simple and unassuming design. The back of the phone has a plastic cover with a two-tone finish. The area around the camera bump has a glossy, striated finish. The rest of the back has a matte finish.

The sides of the phone are also made out of plastic and feature flat edges throughout. On the right is a sunken power button with a fingerprint sensor built-in. On the left are the power buttons. There is no alert slider as seen on other OnePlus phones.

The front of the phone has a flat display and a display glass of unknown origin. We managed to get a few scratches on the display after a few days of use so long-term reliability seems a bit suspect. OnePlus also seems to have skimped out on the oleophobic coating as the glass gets covered with smudges very easily and is hard to clean.

Below the display, the phone has a prominent chin area. The cutout for the front camera is also quite large.

The phone has modestly large proportions coupled with a portly 195g of weight, which could make it difficult to handle for those with smaller hands.

The build quality and finish of the Nord CE 2 Lite 5G are good. Despite the all-plastic nature of the build, things like material quality and panel gaps were impressive. However, the phone has no ingress protection rating and we also didn't find any rubber gasket around the SIM tray, meaning very little has been done to protect the phone from dust or water.