OnePlus phones to use Oppo ColorOS in China, says official announcement - Android

The “Oppofication” of OnePlus has been evident since the last few launches. OnePlus and Oppo share their R&D efforts and as a result, their phones appear similar. OnePlus had previously clarified that its software experience would be different than that of Oppo’s, despite the sharing of resources. In China, however, OnePlus might ditch its long-running […]

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The “Oppofication” of OnePlus has been evident since the last few launches. OnePlus and Oppo share their R&D efforts and as a result, their phones appear similar. OnePlus had previously clarified that its software experience would be different than that of Oppo’s, despite the sharing of resources. In China, however, OnePlus might ditch its long-running Hydrogen OS in favour of Oppo’s ColorOS. This comes from an official OnePlus announcement.

Based on a report from XDA Developers, OnePlus has announced its plans to shut developments on HydrogenOS. The announcement on the official QQ group suggests that the official website for HydrogenOS will shut down on March 24. The OTA servers will shut down on April 1. OnePlus devices will switch over to Oppo’s ColorOS in the Chinese region. New OnePlus products will be eventually sold via Oppo stores.

OnePlus HydrogenOS shutting down permanently

Those worried about the future of OxygenOS for global OnePlus devices need not fret as OnePlus has given out an official statement to XDA’s report. “We don’t have any updates about HydrogenOS to share at the moment, but we can confirm that OxygenOS remains our operating system for all global devices,” said a OnePlus spokesperson.

Image: ColorOS 11 Oppo Find X2

Hence, it seems that global variants of OnePlus devices will continue on OxygenOS for the foreseeable future. OxygenOS is one of the key selling point for OnePlus globally and it would not make sense for OnePlus to ditch that in favour of Oppo’s ColorOS.

That said, Oppo has improved its software development efforts in the last few years. In fact, Oppo has ensured a faster and more stable rollout of its Android 11-based ColorOS 11 when compared to OnePlus’ OxygenOS 11. Moreover, ColorOS 11 proved its worth with more customisation features and a unified user experience.

Based on the several Chinese forum discussions, there’s a high possibility that the upcoming OnePlus 9 series could debut in China with ColorOS 11 instead of HydrogenOS. In the meantime, OnePlus could move older devices on HydrogenOS to ColorOS over the next few months. Some discussions also talk about the possibility of HydrogenOS’ minimalist UI as a theme option in ColorOS on OnePlus devices.

OnePlus is joining hands with Hasselblad for the cameras on the OnePlus 9 series this year. The teasers have so far hinted at improved camera performance over last year’s OnePlus 8 series. It remains to be seen whether that Hasselblad partnership applies to the Chinese units.