The Beginning of OnePlus: Oneplus is a company that has seen a rise and then a fall and now a rise is also going to come in its story.
Yes, Oneplus was a company that started in 2013 by Pete Lau and Carl Pei. And in the early days, he thought that he would enter the US market with this company and made Oneplus One.
He gave Cyanogen OS here and when he found out that his sales were not exactly in the US but in India.
Then he came to know that people are importing phones in India and then he came to know that he will have to take his entry in India.
And he understood that India is a very big key and an important market.
The Early Success
After that, from 2015, this company was growing very well in India. In 2015, Oneplus 2 came, it did not work so well, then Oneplus 3 came, Oneplus 5 series came, Oneplus 6 series came.
These were some of their amazing phones that came out later. It had such a big impact that the company literally started competing with Apple and Samsung and started selling more phones than them.
The Rise
In 2018, 6 out of 60 such big successful products were proven that Oneplus had become the number one company in the premium segment of India. Even Samsung’s phones were a little behind here and Oneplus got a lot of support for this.
But what was the reason for the success of Oneplus behind this? The pricing was good, the performance was good, the hardware was good, the software Oxygen OS was very good.
In which, as people used to call stock Android on steroids at that time, this thing proved to be a very good and successful thing of Oneplus.
In 2019, when Oneplus 7 Pro comes out, it comes out as a futuristic phone. And when you look at it, it feels like this is a pack of smartphones. Today’s Oneplus 7 Pro looks more futuristic than today’s majority of phones.
The Fall
But if you look at it, 2019 ends as soon as 2020 starts. After that, one by one, the downfall of Oneplus starts here. The first shock here is when Carl Pei quits the company.
That too when Carl Pei himself brings the Nord of Oneplus here. And Nord becomes such a lineup from where Oneplus decides that it has to go into the premium category.
Look here, I think what happened was that Oneplus started as a sub-brand and gradually gave it an individual identity.
But then what happened later, when the child started moving ahead of the father, then the father thinks that stay under me and work my way.
After that, I think something happened between them here. Carl Pei might have to work openly and he couldn’t do it. That’s why he got separated and opened nothing. And he’s doing a lot of good in nothing.
Personally, I feel that nothing is making the product right, it’s working. And if it continues, it will also enter the top 10 in India. It will also give a big clash to Oneplus. This can happen in the next 3-4 years if Oneplus does not improve its situation.
But if I go back to Oneplus, the first thing that happened to Nord was that their value was diluted. Where they used to consider Oneplus as premium and aspirational, now it is stuck between budget and premium.
However, Nord phones are also sold to them and they have gained a lot of success from Nord in terms of sales volume. And those who couldn’t support Oneplus came after Nord.
The Merger with Oppo
But after this, the biggest shock you get is when the merger happens with Oppo. And this thing is not at all liked by the original fans of Oneplus.
Let Oneplus be independent, you merged them at a global level, this was the problem. After this, that merger was also fine.
After this, OxygenOS merged with ColorOS. That is, OxygenOS was not the one that people liked. And even today, OxygenOS is the same as ColorOS, only the name has changed. Even Realme’s Realme UI is ColorOS, Oppo’s is also ColorOS.
Here, ColorOS comes in Oneplus too. You get to see the same ColorOS. And the old uniqueness is gone here.
Green Line Issues and Trust Breakdown
After this, Oneplus gets another big shock. From 2020 to 2022, all the phones they released, the majority had issues with the green line.
This was the time when Oneplus sold its phones in quantity. And when the issue of the green line went beyond a limit, Oneplus could not control it.
Then Oneplus started free replacement phones and many other programs here. With which people’s trust could be won. But this was not so good.
Once people lost trust, it was going to be very difficult to count again. Because of which, Oneplus kept losing its customers. And this happened in 2024.
All its old customers started upgrading to other companies’ phones. In which the primary examples were Trolla, iQoo, some people went to Vivo, some people went to Samsung.
Even the premium buyers thought, let’s go to Apple. They went to Apple’s iPhone.
Because of which, Oneplus as a brand came straight to the 10th position here. Even in a retailer side, they got backlash. Where 4,500 stores boycotted Oneplus, that they will not sell Oneplus phones. These were all big shocks.
The Comeback
But in 2025, Oneplus decided that enough is enough. Now whatever was, is gone. Now the coming era is ours. Now as much as we could fall, we have fallen. Now whatever has to go from here, has to go up.
According to this, Oneplus tried a few things. First, in the last 3 years, they are going to invest around 2000 crores in their project Starlight.
Because of which, the problems that we faced, we will solve those problems. First of all, there is no problem of green line in the phone.
So we will solve it there, we will give lifetime warranty. And we will make the product like this and we will also test the display in such a way that there is no issue of green line.
However, if we talk about it, Oneplus was not the only company that had an issue of green line.
It came in Samsung phones, it came in Motorola, you have also seen it in Vivo. And if you look at it, even in Apple’s iPhone 13, people have seen the problem of green line.
It is a fact, it was an industry-wide experience that everyone got to see. But in this, Oneplus was hurt a lot.
Improving After-Sales and New Strategies
Along with this, the biggest thing is that Oneplus will improve its after-sales service experience in today’s time.
They will open exclusive service centers, exclusive stores. And they will bring 50% more service centers in tier-2 and tier-3 cities.
So that if anyone is buying a Oneplus phone in any city, they can get proper and good service.
Along with this, they will also implement India First features. In fact, they have already brought 5.5G in their Oneplus 13 by partnering with Jio.
They will give futuristic technologies in which they can do good work. Even they will ditch their alert slider and integrate the proper AI button. And they will also work on AI features.
Better Phones Ahead
Along with this, let me tell you something about Oneplus. This company will launch a lot of phones here, but this time it will focus on premium.
One more phone that can make a lot of hype for them is Oneplus 13. Which can come in India’s phone market in 1-2 months. And this phone can be very powerful.
With this, Oneplus has made its own place in the premium category. And those who wanted to buy a Oneplus phone in the range of Rs 40,000-50,000 were not getting a good option. For them, they gave another solid option here.
As the competition is increasing in the market. Like other companies like iQOO is moving forward very fast. Motorola is moving forward. How Oneplus should fight with them, we will talk about this.
Along with this, what Oneplus should do here is to refine the Nord strategy. And in Nord, take out a phone to a limit.
Because still, the series of Lite is not that good. And there are better phones in the market than that.
So there they can discontinue this thing. And where they are performing well, they can double down there. And they can bring back the old uniqueness.
OxygenOS
Along with this, even though OxygenOS has become like ColorOS. But even today they have the opportunity to give it an old look and feel.
It’s a little clean and stock Android look and feel like Google Pixel. And they took uniqueness from there and moved forward. Along with this, the user experience can be focused.
Performance can be focused on their product. And the product of Oneplus can be such that it is in the market and makes a lot of noise.
Foldables and Beyond
Because for 2023 and 2024, Oneplus had a lot of downward Foldable trend. Even Oneplus had brought its open in 2023. That too went to some extent in the market. It had built up some hype. But Oneplus openly cancelled Open 2. Now they are not bringing so much on foldable. Oppo will bring foldable here.
And in my opinion, there was no need to jump on the foldable. The phones that are coming in Oneplus current, they kept doing a little better here.
OnePlus in Other Areas
Along with this, when I saw Oneplus, it had expanded a lot of things. It had brought smartwatches for a lot of people.
But it didn’t do much. It had brought its earphones etc. They also performed well here. The TV business was really good. But they ended the TV category. So if you see, the story of Oneplus was up and down. On one side, I saw rise. On the other side, I saw fall.
Conclusion: The Future of OnePlus vs Nothing
Now if you see, Oneplus has not failed completely. Oneplus still has a lot of power. It can still do a lot of good. And we can see a big comeback here with 13T. Apart from this, there will be more phones when Oneplus will focus. It will bring out more premium. That will be a thing to see. And this will also be a thing to see.
In the future, Oneplus and Nothing will meet each other at some point. And when Oneplus and Nothing will clash. That will be a thing to see who comes forward. Because I am seeing a lot of potential in Nothing. There was a lot of potential in 3A series. CMF phone 2 Pro is coming. So that is a thing to see what they do there.
