OnePlus Nord CE 2 Lite 5G hands-on review

Camera

The Nord CE 2 Lite 5G has a triple camera system on the back. This includes a 64MP f1.7 main camera, 2MP f2.4 macro camera, and a depth sensor. This means, for all intents and purposes, the Nord CE 2 Lite 5G has essentially just a single usable camera on the back. On the front is a 16MP f2.0 camera.

The camera application is somewhat basic, taking into consideration the hardware on offer. There is a full pro mode, for example, but there's no option to capture images in RAW. You can zoom in but it's all done digitally. The video recording is capped at just 1080p 30fps in all modes. There is, however, a night mode as well as a portrait mode.

Camera app

Image quality

The 64MP quad-Bayer main camera captures 16MP stills. The images are a bit on the softer side and the level of detail is unimpressive. We are not sure if the images are impacted by the quality of the lens or subpar image processing.

Another issue with the images is the blurring of moving objects. Capturing foliage almost always results in blurred leaves as they move in the wind and the image processing seems incapable of keeping up with the motion. This further affects the level of detail in the images.

Main camera daylight

The color reproduction was also less than ideal. The colors may seem pleasing at first but it's only because the camera oversaturated them slightly while also going with a warmer color temperature for daylight images. The colors don't necessarily look bad per se but they also aren't accurate.

The dynamic range was surprisingly good. The camera has good control over the highlights and also handles the shadows a lot better than other recent OnePlus phones we have reviewed.

Going back to the topic of lens quality, the Nord CE 2 Lite 5G camera cannot gracefully handle being hit by bright lights at angles. There is very prominent flaring visible in some of the images and it doesn't always manifest itself as artistic, aesthetically pleasing shapes but more as washed-out colors in parts of the frame.

Without a RAW capture mode, we didn't have much use for the pro mode, aside from occasionally correcting the white balance when the camera strayed too far from reality. A RAW mode would have also let us see how much of the issue with the detail is because of the lens or the image processing.

The camera has a 64MP capture mode but as we have seen in the past these are simply upscaled from the sensor's native resolution, which in this case is 16MP. This means you don't really get any additional detail for shooting in this mode and the files simply take up more space on the phone.

64MP mode

The 2MP macro camera is the same as the one we have seen in previous OnePlus phones. It's just really poor quality and absolutely not worth using.

Macro camera

Low light performance without night mode isn't very good. Night mode, however, works really well here and the images go from being unusable to surprisingly decent.

Night mode off vs on

Finally, let's talk about the video. The Nord CE 2 Lite 5G can capture only 1080p 30fps video from the main camera. The 1080p video simply does not have the amount of detail it can have and look quite soft and a bit blurry as a result. The electronic stabilization does a decent job of stabilizing vertical movement but there's still some horizontal movement left in walking videos, which looks like the footage is oscillating sideways as you walk.

Overall, the camera on the Nord CE 2 Lite 5G is okay. The lack of an ultra-wide could be a deal-breaker for some people and it's odd that OnePlus decided to leave out this feature, considering there are cheaper phones out there with it. We would have gladly traded both of the remaining two cameras on the back for a single ultra-wide considering they bring absolutely no value to the table. But they are cheaper to implement and inflate the spec sheet, so here we are.