OnePlus on Monday announced a three-year partnership with camera manufacturer Hasselblad to co-develop the next generation of smartphone camera systems. OnePlus 9 series to come with Hasselblad branding.
It is official. OnePlus on Monday confirmed in its “moonshot announcement” that it is going to launch the OnePlus 9 and the OnePlus 9 Pro on March 23. It is possible that even an OnePlus 9 Lite or the OnePlus 9R is coming on the same day, although none of these names have been confirmed by the company. In its official announcement, OnePlus only talks of the OnePlus 9 Series, along with the company’s work with camera powerhouse Hassselblad that is helping OnePlus fine-tune the hardware and software of the OnePlus 9 phones.
The company on Monday confirmed that the OnePlus 9 series would use a custom Sony IMX789 sensor for the primary camera. OnePlus says it will be the “most advanced main camera sensor” ever on an OnePlus device.
With 12-bit RAW, the company says the new sensor will be 64-times, better at capturing colours and details compared to its previous cameras and will deliver better results. It also revealed that the Hasselblad Camera for Mobile would offer improved HDR video recording and support for capturing 4K videos at 120fps and 8K videos at 30fps.
The OnePlus 9 series will be announced at a virtual event on March 23 at 8:30 pm IST and can be streamed on its website.
What about the “moonshot announcement”? Well, that hints at the presence of a long-zoom lens in the OnePlus 9 phones, at least in the OnePlus 9 Pro of late, we have seen companies like Samsung and Huawei putting lenses with up to 10X optical zoom in their cameras. It is likely that with the OnePlus 9 series, OnePlus wants to at least match them in this area, if not surpass them.
OnePlus has announced a long-term partnership with Hasselblad to co-develop next-gen phone cameras. “Now, through close R&D collaboration, OnePlus and Hasselblad will work together to deliver vastly improved camera systems on future OnePlus smartphones, including the upcoming OnePlus 9 Series,” the company said in a statement.
The company has confirmed a $150 million strategic investment for advanced mobile photography. The three-year partnership with Hasselblad will mean that the next few generations of OnePlus flagships will sport the legendary camera branding.
Announcing the launch date for the OnePlus 9 series and partnership reveal, OnePlus CEO Pete Lau said, “With OnePlus’ top-of-the-line hardware and computational photography and Hasselblad’s rich aesthetic knowledge in traditional photography, I am confident that the OnePlus 9 Series will be a major leap forward in our ability to deliver a premium, flagship camera.”
How about the specs of the OnePlus 9 and the OnePlus 9 Pro. For now, nothing has been confirmed. But there have been leaks, rumours and speculations, and they provide a lot of information. It is almost certain that the OnePlus 9 Pro will use Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 processor and will come with an OLED screen, fast charging, and up to 12GB RAM along with 256GB storage. The OnePlus 9, meanwhile, is likely to use either the Snapdragon 888 chipset or the Snapdragon 870 processors.
The OnePlus 9 and the OnePlus 9 Pro are likely to launch on the same day as their global launch, which is March 23. They are also likely to go on sale in India around the same time. As far as price is concerned, both the OnePlus 9 and the OnePlus 9 Pro are likely to cost around Rs 50,000 or a little higher. Though they will be cheaper than the recently-launched Samsung Galaxy S21 phones.
