Samsung Galaxy S21 gets SMOKED by OnePlus 9 secret weapon

(Image credit: OnePlus)

last updated 8 December 2020

OnePlus is having a year that any smartphone manufacturer dreams of, with its latest OnePlus 8T, OnePlus 8 Pro, and OnePlus Nord handsets all proving to be major success stories.

Nevertheless, interest in upcoming OnePlus handsets continues to grow, and, thanks to a leaked benchmark, we may now have some idea as to what kind of hardware and performance we can expect from the upcoming OnePlus 9.

As reported by Twitter leaker TechDroider, a Geekbench 5 benchmark for the LuBan LE2117 (a model number, reported earlier by TechDroider, that corresponds to the OnePlus 9) was posted earlier this week.

The benchmark provides some key insights into the OnePlus 9's system specifications, and reveals that the smartphone will house Qualcomm's as-yet-unannounced Snapdragon 875 processor.

Digital Chat Station, a leaker on Chinese social media site Weibo, has said that we can expect to see five devices launching in Q1 2020 with this chipset and the game-changing 100W fast-charging its supports (via GSMArena). We expect Xiaomi and Oppo handsets to be amongst them, but the Samsung Galaxy S21 is expected to stick with its 45W charging, so the OnePlus 9 could give it a run for its money in this area if it's one of the five.

The rest of the listing reveals that the phone is set to have an octa-core processor, as well as a total 8GB of RAM, with 7GB usable and another 1GB system reserved. The benchmark lists the phone's operating system as Android 11 but this is almost certainly an Android 11 based version of OnePlus's own OxygenOS launcher.

Its single core score of 1122 places it well above the current best Android benchmark on Geekbench, OnePlus's own OnePlus 8, which scored 888. Strangely, its multi-core score of 2733 places it below both the OnePlus 8 and OnePlus 8 Pro. However, both of these scores are subject to change as optimisations to the OnePlus 9 are made.

These specifications and scores are promising, and should fit nicely into the radical new design for the OnePlus 9, handily powering its rumoured 6.55-inch 120Hz display.

While the phone's 8GB of RAM may initially appear to be a potential red flag, it is likely that OnePlus will release both an 8GB and 12GB variant of the OnePlus 9 as it did previously with the OnePlus 8.

We won't have long to wait to see just how powerful the OnePlus 9 family of devices truly are, with insiders claiming that OnePlus has moved the release date for its upcoming handsets forward!

While we wait for next year's smartphones, you can find a Black Friday deals bargain in our best phone deals for Black Friday roundup!