The sun is bright. So bright, in fact, that at 93 million miles away, we can look at it from Earth and still be blinded by it without proper eyewear. Smartphone displays are not brighter than the sun. We can all agree on these basic facts, but OnePlus is trying to change that last note with the upcomingOnePlus 12. Back in October, we reported on a leak that saidthe phone was rumored to feature a BOE X1 OLED display with a peak brightness of over 2,600 nits, which would have made it the brightest smartphone screen ever. OnePlus just confirmed its actual brightness, and it’s a much higher number than 2,600.
Li Jie, the president of OnePlus, unveiled on the Chinese social media platform known as Weibo that theOnePlus 12 will have a peak brightness of 4,500 nits(via@ishanagarwal24). He also said, in a rough translation to English, that the phone’s display will be more efficient and that under the same brightness, the screen will consume less energy than most standard phones. The official unveiling of the OnePlus 12 will take place on December 5 at 1:30 a.m. EST that same day.
The brightest smartphone ever recorded is the Pixel 8 Pro with a peak brightness of 2,400 nits. If the OnePlus 12’s 4,500-nit reading is correct, then it will be almost two times as bright as the current-brightest phone on the market. That’s pretty insane, but it won’t beat out the sun’s average brightness of 1.6 billion nits. Disappointing, we know.
Some may be asking if it’s really necessary for a smartphone to be that bright. When it comes to fighting off the sunshine during the day, it has the potential to be beneficial. Other companies, like Google andSamsung, have touted their achievements in OLED panel brightness recently. Samsung even launched its Vision Booster feature in recent flagship phones, which amplifies its brightness and vibrancy in specific use-cases.
The OnePlus 12 will be a powerhouse of a phone when it releases imminently in China and then a number of weeks later globally. It will come powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip, up to 24GB of RAM, and 1TB of storage. It will come with four rear camera lenses, and one of those lenses will be a 3x periscope camera. Very few phones have specs that can hold a candle (hah) next to it.
We’ve been keeping an eye onall things related to the upcoming device. We’re expecting it to come with four OS updates after it launches, and it’s presumably shipping with the Android 14-clone, OxygenOS 14. Importantly, if this phone comes with 4,500 nits of peak brightness, Android gives you the choice of adapting its brightness levels to the current lighting situation or letting you set it yourself. We think that the OS’ Adaptive Brightness feature is annoying, quite frankly, so we’ve made sure you knowhow to reset it on your phone.
