The OnePlus 6 is a pretty stellar Android flagship smartphone that works on number of levels. It's got a premium all-glass design, a blazing fast performance and some really good cameras as well. It's pricing, while still affordable than most premium flagships, may be questionable now that the Poco F1 is in the scene. But as a standalone product, the OnePlus 6 offers a complete experience that should make you a happy user. Of course, with the OnePlus 6T on its way, I wouldn't recommend buying the OnePlus 6 right now, but if you already own one, you'll be glad to know that Android 9 Pie is on its way.
Software is always the icing on the cake. A good software experience makes a world of a difference when it comes to appreciating a phone and OnePlus has always tried to bring the right kind of software experience at the right time. The OnePlus 6 comes with a largely stock and clean Android Oreo with a very light and useful OxygenOS skin on top out-of-the-box. OnePlus has also been pretty quick with delivering latest software updates, and soon, the OnePlus 6 will get a stable version of Android 9 Pie. We tried out the open beta version of Android Pie for a week and here's what you need to know.
What's new
The first thing one notices after upgrading to Pie is the redesigned UI. Everything is just a little more rounded now, especially the drop-down notification menu. All the icons here are round and enabling them will change the colour as well depending on the accent colour you've chosen in the Display settings. If you have the Dark mode enabled, the icons will become grey while in the light mode you have the option to choose any accent colour you want. So if you choose purple, the toggles and icons will turn purple as well.
The multitasking menu has also been changed as it now shows full cards rather than the deck-like placement. It helps because you can take a quick glance at the entire page of the app you recently closed without having to tap and open it. It also makes it easier to swipe across the apps and open the one you want. The other new change is the volume slider which moves from the top edge to the left side next to where the physical volume buttons are. The new location allows you to reach the slider more easily with one hand.
Android 9 Pie brings a new navigation option in addition to two that were already there. You can now have a little pill-shaped home button instead of a full on-screen navigation bar. Tap on the button to take you to the home screen, swipe the button up to open your recent apps menu or swipe the button to the sides to directly jump into an app. This is kind of a middle ground between on-screen navigation bar and complete gesture navigation. Of course, if you want to go completely gesture-based, OnePlus offers you that option as well. I found the Pie-based gesture quite fast when it comes to bringing up the multitasking menu, but it does take a while getting used to it. Personally, I prefer OnePlus' full-screen gesture option, maybe because I've used that a lot more and I want to make use of the entire display.A welcome new addition in Settings is Do Not Disturb, which allows you to turn off notifications permanently or for a specific amount of time. Within the DND settings, you also get the option to have it enabled automatically when you sleep. It's a surprise DND was not a feature until now, but we're happy to see it with Pie.
Adaptive Battery is another major Pie feature that comes to the OnePlus 6. When enabled, Adaptive Battery will limit the amount of battery that is consumed by apps that are used less frequently than others. The feature requires some time to learn your usage habits, and I started noticing some improvements to battery life after about 4 days. It's probably a marginal improvement since the OnePlus 6 already comes with a pretty great battery life, but it's a feature that should help in the long run.
Android 9 Pie on the OnePlus 6 has been a pretty smooth experience and I haven't noticed any major bugs or issues during my time with the open beta version. There are still some Pie features that haven't made it with the first two Open Beta builds like Digital Wellbeing. This is arguably one the biggest new features to look forwards to and we expect to see it on the OnePlus 6 with the stable version of Pie.
The general UI looks more streamlined, although I would have like all the app icons to be rounded as well. OnePlus sticks to its guns and makes sure OxygenOS is light with Pie. You won't get any unnecessary add-ons and bloatware, leaving you with an almost stock experience of Android 9 Pie.
How to download Android 9 Pie Open Beta 2
The first two beta builds for the OnePlus 6 doesn't bring all of Pie's features but they are pretty stable updates and are worth downloading if you want to see what's new. The latest Open Beta 2 can be downloaded via OnePlus' official downloads page. Once the file is downloaded, you will need to move it from the downloads folder into the root directory. After this, head over to System Update section in Setting and tap the settings icon on the top right corner to open local upgrade option where you should see the open beta file. Tap on the file and the download process will begin.When downloading beta updates, no matter how stable we say it is, it's always best to make sure your data is backed up. Once the phone is rebooted, you will be on the latest Android 9 Pie version. Note that any new Open Beta update in the future will reach via OTA. While you're on beta, you will not receive regular stable OTA updates. Reverting back to the official OTA path will require a full install which will wipe your data.
Software is always the icing on the cake. A good software experience makes a world of a difference when it comes to appreciating a phone and OnePlus has always tried to bring the right kind of software experience at the right time. The OnePlus 6 comes with a largely stock and clean Android Oreo with a very light and useful OxygenOS skin on top out-of-the-box. OnePlus has also been pretty quick with delivering latest software updates, and soon, the OnePlus 6 will get a stable version of Android 9 Pie. We tried out the open beta version of Android Pie for a week and here's what you need to know.
What's new
The first thing one notices after upgrading to Pie is the redesigned UI. Everything is just a little more rounded now, especially the drop-down notification menu. All the icons here are round and enabling them will change the colour as well depending on the accent colour you've chosen in the Display settings. If you have the Dark mode enabled, the icons will become grey while in the light mode you have the option to choose any accent colour you want. So if you choose purple, the toggles and icons will turn purple as well.
The multitasking menu has also been changed as it now shows full cards rather than the deck-like placement. It helps because you can take a quick glance at the entire page of the app you recently closed without having to tap and open it. It also makes it easier to swipe across the apps and open the one you want. The other new change is the volume slider which moves from the top edge to the left side next to where the physical volume buttons are. The new location allows you to reach the slider more easily with one hand.
Android 9 Pie brings a new navigation option in addition to two that were already there. You can now have a little pill-shaped home button instead of a full on-screen navigation bar. Tap on the button to take you to the home screen, swipe the button up to open your recent apps menu or swipe the button to the sides to directly jump into an app. This is kind of a middle ground between on-screen navigation bar and complete gesture navigation. Of course, if you want to go completely gesture-based, OnePlus offers you that option as well. I found the Pie-based gesture quite fast when it comes to bringing up the multitasking menu, but it does take a while getting used to it. Personally, I prefer OnePlus' full-screen gesture option, maybe because I've used that a lot more and I want to make use of the entire display.A welcome new addition in Settings is Do Not Disturb, which allows you to turn off notifications permanently or for a specific amount of time. Within the DND settings, you also get the option to have it enabled automatically when you sleep. It's a surprise DND was not a feature until now, but we're happy to see it with Pie.
Adaptive Battery is another major Pie feature that comes to the OnePlus 6. When enabled, Adaptive Battery will limit the amount of battery that is consumed by apps that are used less frequently than others. The feature requires some time to learn your usage habits, and I started noticing some improvements to battery life after about 4 days. It's probably a marginal improvement since the OnePlus 6 already comes with a pretty great battery life, but it's a feature that should help in the long run.
Android 9 Pie on the OnePlus 6 has been a pretty smooth experience and I haven't noticed any major bugs or issues during my time with the open beta version. There are still some Pie features that haven't made it with the first two Open Beta builds like Digital Wellbeing. This is arguably one the biggest new features to look forwards to and we expect to see it on the OnePlus 6 with the stable version of Pie.
The general UI looks more streamlined, although I would have like all the app icons to be rounded as well. OnePlus sticks to its guns and makes sure OxygenOS is light with Pie. You won't get any unnecessary add-ons and bloatware, leaving you with an almost stock experience of Android 9 Pie.
How to download Android 9 Pie Open Beta 2
The first two beta builds for the OnePlus 6 doesn't bring all of Pie's features but they are pretty stable updates and are worth downloading if you want to see what's new. The latest Open Beta 2 can be downloaded via OnePlus' official downloads page. Once the file is downloaded, you will need to move it from the downloads folder into the root directory. After this, head over to System Update section in Setting and tap the settings icon on the top right corner to open local upgrade option where you should see the open beta file. Tap on the file and the download process will begin.When downloading beta updates, no matter how stable we say it is, it's always best to make sure your data is backed up. Once the phone is rebooted, you will be on the latest Android 9 Pie version. Note that any new Open Beta update in the future will reach via OTA. While you're on beta, you will not receive regular stable OTA updates. Reverting back to the official OTA path will require a full install which will wipe your data.
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