OnePlus 6T: OnePlus Is Giving Up On A Beloved Feature


For years, OnePlus has prided itself as a smartphone maker that makes the best bang-for-your-buck devices with all the bells and whistles a user expects from a flagship smartphone almost twice its price. OnePlus devices have always been incredibly strong despite being marketed as mid-range handsets, and they have kept useful features like the 3.5 mm headphone jack. Seemingly staying true to its “Never Settle” mantra, OnePlus had opted to stubbornly keep the headphone jack alive due to the fact that it’s something that users still used on a frequent basis.

That is, however, until now. In a recent interview with TechRadar, OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei has confirmed that the next OnePlus device, widely speculated to be the OnePlus 6T, would not feature a headphone jack anymore. For the OnePlus co-founder, it was just a matter of finding the right timing.

According to Pei, a survey of its users this year has revealed that 59 percent of OnePlus owners now own wireless headphones and that was before the company launched the well-received and affordable Bullet Wireless headphones, which are among the best ones available in the market today. Pei also noted that the decision to finally retire the headphone jack was not one that the company took lightly.

“It [removing the headphone jack] was a very controversial decision. We’re not doing it for the sake of doing it and because everyone else is. We believe now is the right time, as it’ll benefit the majority of our users while keeping the downside low. We knew this was an option for a very long time, we were just waiting for the right time,” Pei said, according to a TechRadar report.

So what exactly will the OnePlus 6T get in place of the retired headphone jack? Just one of the most-requested features for the smartphone, according to Pei. By freeing up the space being taken by the 3.5mm headphone jack, Pei noted that the smartphone marker could include new technologies in the handset. One of these could be an on-screen fingerprint scanner, or even something practical like a bigger battery pack.

With this decision, OnePlus appears to have finally settled and followed a trend in the smartphone market. As noted by Forbes, this could still cause some inconvenience for users, considering that the presence of wireless headphones don’t really affect the need for a headphone jack when the need arises. That being said, the retirement of the headphone jack in the OnePlus 6T could very well boost the sales of the company’s Bullet Wireless headphones.

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