OnePlus 16 pricing may change everything the phone maker has been about until now

The next OnePlus 16 smartphone looks set to come with a spec jump, but alongside a price hike too.

This could be the most expensive OnePlus flagship device yet, placing it firmly in the top-end premium flagship smartphone end of the market.

OnePlus started out as an alternative to the bigger brands, offering impressive specs for a far lower price. Now it looks like it may shift with the OnePlus 16, to compete more directly at the top end of the price and premium phone world.

According to a post from a Weibo tipster, the next OnePlus 16 will get a starting price – in China – of around $725/£545 for the base model.

When you consider that the OnePlus 15, for it starting level model, was priced – in China at least – at around $580/£435 – this represents quite a big jump up.

To be clear, this isn't going to offer ground-breaking tech like the folding OnePlus Open. In fact the jump might not be massive, but that price change could be down to the rising cost of components right now.

The jump in silicone is one part of that, with a single 2nm wafer from TSMC costing as much as 20% more than the current 3nm wafer. Memory, like LPDDR5X RAM are also getting higher price tags.

What's new in the OnePlus 16?

Fortunately that bump will also come with some upgrades that are rumoured to arrive on the latest OnePlus 16 flagship handset.

A major camera upgrade is expected with a whopping 200MP sensor on the rear. That chipset should also be top-end with the next-gen flagship CPU from Qualcomm likely powering the phone. There is also expected to be an improved display and larger battery to support all that.

The OnePlus 16 is still at the rumour stage right now but expect more to come to light ahead of the expected announcement in the back end of this year.