OnePlus Open 2: Four things I want to see

After months of leaks, the OnePlus Open is now official, and there's a lot to like. The hardware is among the best of any foldable; you get a sleek design, smooth hinge with no visible crease, excellent internal hardware, a larger battery than the Galaxy Z Fold 5, 67W charging, and terrific cameras.

That said, I ran into plenty of software bugs while using the device, and the software needs an update or two before it's polished. Then there are the omissions — as good as the Open is, it misses out in a few key areas, and here's what I want to see in the Open 2.

OnePlus needs to add wireless charging

I don't know who signed off on not including wireless charging on the OnePlus Open, but it is the biggest limitation on the device. Sure, the phone was designed in conjunction with OPPO, and the Chinese manufacturer doesn't offer wireless charging on its own devices — so you don't get one here.

However, the Open is sold in a lot of global markets, and with OnePlus positioning it as the ideal alternative to Samsung in North America, it needed to nail the table stakes features. While the battery life itself is much better than Samsung's foldables, the fact that it is limited to wired charging — no matter how fast — makes it a little less enticing.

With the Open 2, OnePlus has to rectify this particular issue and offer wireless charging out of the box. While it's okay for a device like the OnePlus 11 to miss out on it, the Open costs nearly thrice as much at $1,699, and not having the ability to charge wirelessly is a shortsighted move.

Polished software out of the box

This is a regular complaint with all OnePlus phones, but I want to see better software out of the box with the Open 2, not a few months down the line. Yes, the ColorOS integration made things that much more difficult, but it's been two years now, and that cannot be the excuse to deliver shoddy software on every new phone.

OnePlus has shown that it can deliver; the OnePlus 11 was devoid of any major bugs, and it was optimized for the hardware. I know achieving the same on a foldable is twice as hard as there are two screens to deal with and numerous scaling issues, but the Open 2 has to do better. And while we're at it, can I get a 5x5 grid? I still don't understand why that isn't available on the Open.

IPX8 water resistance

The OnePlus Open has IPX4 water resistance, and that means that it can withstand an occasional splash of water. OnePlus says that the hinge automatically ejects any dust that manages to get in, and even though it isn't tested, it should do a decent job with any dust ingress as well.

That said, I'd like to see IPX8 water resistance on the Open 2. That would make the foldable that much more resilient to the elements, and bring it to parity with Samsung's foldables.

Stylus integration would be nice to have

This is another one of those features that feels motivated by OPPO. As the brand doesn't pay particular attention to global markets, adding stylus integration wasn't a priority, and the Open misses out on it. I'm not saying the foldable should have come with a stylus in the box — even Samsung isn't that generous — but the ability to use a stylus with the inner screen makes the foldable that much more useful.

Even if OnePlus decides it doesn't want to bother making its own stylus, there are plenty of aftermarket styli that do a great job with note-taking and doodling. I have a half-dozen styli in the house, and while I don't really use them as much as I should, having the option to do so on the Open 2 would go a long way.

Opening a new dimension

Although the Open 2 is at least a year away, OnePlus is bound to be laying the groundwork for the device. Manufacturers lock in deals with chip vendors several months in advance, and it isn't hard to assume that the Open 2 will include Qualcomm's next-gen chipset, possibly the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3.

There isn't much that needs changing on the hardware side of things, because OnePlus got quite a lot right in this area already. The one thing I'd like to see is software refinement — if the brand manages to nail that, it can make tangible inroads into Samsung's foldable dominion.