OnePlus Nord N20 5G review

The last great version of OxygenOS

The OnePlus Nord N20 comes with OxygenOS 11 out of the box. Although this isn't the latest version, OxygenOS 12 wasn't a favorite among OnePlus fans due to the significant changes made to the operating system. In recent years, OnePlus and Oppo merged its software centers and tried to merge the look and feel of OxygenOS with elements of Oppo's ColorOS.

The result was a confusing and inconsistent UI without an identity. OnePlus has since promised it would revert the changes it made, but until then, we'll brush over what you can expect with OxygenOS 11.

When setting up, you can decide whether to use the traditional navigation buttons or swipe gestures. You'll also be asked to set up your fingerprint and face unlock is available as well, though it isn't as secure.

Fingerprint setup • Gesture navigation

This T-Mobile variant is a little more bloated than other OnePlus devices we've seen, although the bloat will try to install itself after the initial setup. When a T-Mobile's "AppSelector" app prompts you to "complete setup", make sure you read the prompts carefully and don't just hit 'Next' willy-nilly because if you do, you'll inadvertently give permission to install apps onto the device. The great news is all these bloat apps can be removed.

T-Mobile's "AppSelector" app

OxygenOS 11 has a clean interface with rounded icons all about. The interface is tidy and snappy, and there are plenty of options and settings to customize many aspects of the UI.

Home Screen • Drawer • Recents • Split Screen • Quick Settings • Lock screen

To the left of the home screen is the Google Feed, but there's also a tab for a 'T-Mobile Play' feed. Basically this is content curated by T-Mobile that's also part of the carrier's free content network powered by Xumo. It features clips from News and TV (some are junky), and there are some channels to stream from for free. Think Pluto TV but with curated news clips, fewer channels, and ad spots that play before a stream starts.

Google Feed • T-Mobile Play

While a swipe up from the home screen opens the drawer, a swipe down will open OnePlus shelf. It's a customizable tray of tools, shortcuts, and widgets. There's a handy parking tool and step counter. You can also look at recently used apps, write notes, and check the weather.

OnePlus shelf and settings

The Nord N20 has an ambient display feature. It's nice to see at this price point, but there's seemingly no way to customize the content being displayed. Although, you can customize the context of when it should display, like when lifting the phone, as per a time schedule, or it can be activated by a nifty power-save mode that turns it off after the device has been stationary for a while.

Ambient display settings

You can customize many aspects of the UI. OxygenOS supports icon packs, and you can change the accent color of the UI. You can also change the shape of the quick settings, and appearance of the fingerprint icon.

Personalization settings

OnePlus has several pre-installed apps. Clone Phone for transferring data from another device, Community app for participating in forums, a stock file manager, Gallery app, game optimizer, Notes app, voice recorder, weather, and Zen mode.

Stock apps: Clone Phone • Gallery • Games • Notes • Recorder • Weather • Zen Mode

Performance

The Snapdragon 695 5G chipset is a solid entry-level 5G SoC built on the 6nm process, making for improved performance and lower power consumption compared to the 690. The Snapdragon 695 has one dual-core performance Kryo 660 Gold cluster clocked at 2.2GHz and a hexa-core Kryo 660 Silver efficiency cluster clocked at 1.7Ghz.

The 128GB storage module is of the UFS 2.2 variety and graphics are handled by the Adreno 619, an update to the Adreno 619L from the 690. This new chipset also supports LPDDR4x RAM, and the N20 comes with 6GB of it.

The updated chipset should see a boost in CPU performance by 15% and GPU performance should jump 30%. We did see this reflect in our synthetic benchmark tests. We pinned the N20 against smartphones in the same price class with competing chipsets as well.

GeekBench 5 (single-core)

Higher is better

• Apple iPhone SE (2022)
  1729
• OnePlus Nord 2
  814
• Realme GT Master
  785
• Motorola Edge 20
  762
• Xiaomi 11T
  742
• OnePlus Nord CE 2 5G
  728
• Poco X4 Pro 5G
  687
• OnePlus Nord N20 5G
  676
• Honor Magic4 Lite
  666
• OnePlus Nord N10 5G
  608
• Samsung Galaxy A32 5G
  505

GeekBench 5 (multi-core)

Higher is better

• Apple iPhone SE (2022)
  4629
• Realme GT Master
  2917
• Xiaomi 11T
  2834
• OnePlus Nord 2
  2792
• Motorola Edge 20
  2550
• OnePlus Nord CE 2 5G
  2157
• Poco X4 Pro 5G
  2063
• OnePlus Nord N20 5G
  1945
• Honor Magic4 Lite
  1906
• OnePlus Nord N10 5G
  1848
• Samsung Galaxy A32 5G
  1673

AnTuTu 9

Higher is better

• Apple iPhone SE (2022)
  723486
• OnePlus Nord 2
  598022
• Xiaomi 11T
  590837
• Realme GT Master
  529263
• Motorola Edge 20
  488574
• OnePlus Nord CE 2 5G
  436640
• Honor Magic4 Lite
  387218
• Poco X4 Pro 5G
  384646
• OnePlus Nord N20 5G
  380672
• Samsung Galaxy A32 5G
  222125

GFX Car Chase ES 3.1 (offscreen 1080p)

Higher is better

• Apple iPhone SE (2022)
  97
• Xiaomi 11T
  47
• OnePlus Nord 2
  46
• Realme GT Master
  33
• Motorola Edge 20
  33
• OnePlus Nord CE 2 5G
  24
• Honor Magic4 Lite
  21
• OnePlus Nord N20 5G
  20
• Poco X4 Pro 5G
  20
• OnePlus Nord N10 5G
  14

GFX Car Chase ES 3.1 (onscreen)

Higher is better

• Apple iPhone SE (2022)
  60
• Xiaomi 11T
  40
• OnePlus Nord 2
  38
• Motorola Edge 20
  29
• Realme GT Master
  27
• OnePlus Nord CE 2 5G
  19
• Poco X4 Pro 5G
  17
• Honor Magic4 Lite
  17
• OnePlus Nord N20 5G
  16
• OnePlus Nord N10 5G
  13

GFX Manhattan ES 3.1 (onscreen)

Higher is better

• Xiaomi 11T
  72
• Apple iPhone SE (2022)
  60
• OnePlus Nord 2
  57
• Motorola Edge 20
  51
• Realme GT Master
  46
• OnePlus Nord CE 2 5G
  35
• Poco X4 Pro 5G
  30
• OnePlus Nord N20 5G
  29
• Honor Magic4 Lite
  29
• OnePlus Nord N10 5G
  23

GFX Manhattan ES 3.1 (offscreen 1080p)

Higher is better

• Apple iPhone SE (2022)
  146
• Xiaomi 11T
  77
• OnePlus Nord 2
  75
• Motorola Edge 20
  57
• Realme GT Master
  56
• OnePlus Nord CE 2 5G
  40
• OnePlus Nord N20 5G
  35
• Honor Magic4 Lite
  35
• Poco X4 Pro 5G
  34
• OnePlus Nord N10 5G
  26

3DMark SSE ES 3.1 (offscreen 1440p)

Higher is better

• Realme GT Master
  4988
• OnePlus Nord CE 2 5G
  3722
• OnePlus Nord N20 5G
  2917
• Honor Magic4 Lite
  2899
• Samsung Galaxy A32 5G
  2638
• OnePlus Nord N10 5G
  2166

3DMark SSE Vulkan 1.0 (offscreen 1440p)

Higher is better

• Realme GT Master
  4020
• OnePlus Nord CE 2 5G
  3661
• Honor Magic4 Lite
  2746
• OnePlus Nord N20 5G
  2744
• Samsung Galaxy A32 5G
  2509
• OnePlus Nord N10 5G
  2012

CPU performance in single-core and multi-threaded tasks was great. We saw performance in CPU-intensive tasks fall somewhere between the MediaTek Dimensity 900 5G and the Dimensity 720 5G. Even on combined tasks, the Nord N20 consistently fell short of the Nord CE 2's Dimensity 900.

GPU-intensive tests show the Nord N20 keeps up with both the Nord CE 2 and the Samsung Galaxy A53 5G. The Adreno 619 is a good match with the Exynos 1280's Mali-G68 and the Dimensity 900's Mali G78.

The bump in performance over the Snapdragon 690 isn't too substantial in test scores, the real benefits are in the more efficient manufacturing process of the new chipset, thus translating to better power consumption.

Sustained performance

We don't expect the Snapdragon 695's sustained performance to be an issue. This is especially true of modern mid-range chipsets and the efficient manufacturing process of the 695 should yield nice results on this front. It's not to say that the CPU doesn't generate heat, but let's check if the chip's implementation was properly done.

CPU throttle test: 30 min • 60 min

We're happy to say that sustained performance is outstanding. We see normal fluctuation above 90% in the first 10 minutes, then we see some deeper valleys into the 80s appear during the first half hour, but it stayed consistently this way for the entire hour. Performance never throttled down below the 80% range and peak performance consistently fluctuated towards full capacity.

In addition to the steady performance, the surface temperature of the device was low and not anything to cause concern.