OnePlus Nord sub-US$500 smartphone with 5G and 90Hz display launches first in Hong Kong, India and Europe

The first mid-range smartphone from OnePlus in five years is set to launch in two weeks… but not for everyone. Hong Kong and India are among the few places outside Europe where it will officially be available.

Despite its budget-friendly starting price of HK$3,298 (US$425), the OnePlus Nord packs most of the features you can find on the OnePlus 8, the cheaper phone in the brand’s flagship series this year.

Just like the OnePlus 8, the new Nord sports an AMOLED display with a resolution of 2,400x1,080 pixels and a 90Hz refresh rate. This should provide a fairly sharp and smooth screen experience on par with better phones on the market. It also includes an in-screen fingerprint sensor.

Both phones also use the same 48-megapixel Sony sensor on the main camera. The Nord even carries an extra depth lens on the back and an ultra wide-angle lens on the front. What’s more, both support 5G and OnePlus’s WarpCharge 30T fast charging standard that’s based on SuperVOOC from sister company Oppo.

Still, for a savings of HK$2,700 (US$348) from the OnePlus 8, Nord owners will have to give up on a few things.

The Nord’s 6.44-inch screen is around one-tenth of an inch smaller than what you get on the OnePlus 8. The battery is also slightly smaller at 4,115 mAh compared with 4,300 mAh. More importantly, the Nord runs on the slower Qualcomm Snapdragon 765G processor rather than the 8’s leading Snapdragon 865.

OnePlus already launched a few rounds of limited orders for the Nord earlier this month. The phone is getting a wider release on August 4, starting in Europe and India. The website indicates that it will also be available in Hong Kong on the same day.

But fans in North America aren’t completely out of luck. OnePlus says it’s recruiting beta trial users in the US and Canada in preparation for a potential launch there at a later date.