While 2020’s OnePlus 8 Pro managed to stay below the dreaded $1,000 mark, 2021’s OnePlus 9 Pro breached this barrier for the first time in the brand’s history. Now that the OnePlus 10 Pro is around, the base price has been taken down to $900, which is better, but still on the higher end of the spectrum. How fast the smartphone market changes; it wasn’t that long ago that the OnePlus 6 was controversial for being the company’s first flagship over the $500 mark, while the starting point for the whole series was a lean and mean $299 back in 2014.
OnePlus followed its initial “flagship killer” ambitions with talk about performance and speed, taking careful steps to cut corners while making fans happy. But more recently, the company has shifted its aim and decided to go for premium flagships options, while still keeping pricing just shy of rivals.