A few months ago, the announcement of extended software support – even if only for some models – beginning in 2023 rekindled hope for OnePlus’ redemption in terms of updates, but the Chinese manufacturer didn’t take long to fall back into old – bad – habits: many users who own the top-of-the-line OnePlus 10 Pro are on a war footing because, just under six months after its announcement, they are still waiting for the update to Android 13.0.
About six months have passed since Google’s official release of Android 13 for Pixel series smartphones; to that announcement, OnePlus responded very quickly: the rollout of the major update, which included the new version of Android and OxygenOS 13, for the top-of-the-line OnePlus 10 Pro had already begun before the end of September 2022. Unfortunately, the declarations were not followed by facts: many owners of the described model are still waiting (somewhat) patiently for the aforementioned upgrade, according to countless reports that swarm online.
When OnePlus announced the rollout on September 21, 2022, it immediately clarified that the first customers to receive the upgrade will be those engaged in the exclusive beta program, with the others receiving the update gradually. In this case, the Chinese producer seemed to have taken it easy.
The matter was thoroughly investigated in a discussion opened on the Chinese house’s official forum, where it is also able to read a detailed timeline of the various events surrounding the introduction of Android 13 with OxygenOS 13 for the OnePlus 10 Pro. The source of the problem appears to be OnePlus’s problematic release schedule: just a few days after the initial release of the OxygenOS 13, the company updated the OxygenOS 12.
Those who had installed the most recent update on their handset, however, never saw Android 13 appear. Many further upgrades were given by the manufacturer in the months that followed, but there were some caveats to their availability: while some customers were timely upgraded to the latest software version, many others were trapped and ended up with security fixes that were several months old.
To irritate OnePlus 10 Pro owners, even more, is the manufacturer’s silence on the subject: the latest position expressed by the manufacturer speaks of two paths available to users: the first is to immediately switch to Android 13, while the second is linked to the user’s choice to continue using Android 12. The official statement is as follows:
“ This is completely normal. The launch of OOS 13 is an incremental release and during this time the team will continue to release new builds of OOS 12 to users. This is done in order to ensure system security and the user experience of the devices of users still using OOS 12 ”.
The outlined scenario could clearly be interpreted as temporary; however, nearly six months have passed and several buyers of a smartphone with an official price list of just under 1,000 euros are still waiting for an answer: the devices are stuck at dated software versions, and there are no clear indications from the manufacturer on how to resolve the situation. As if that weren’t enough, it appears that the case of the OnePlus 10 Pro is the most notable – given the device’s orientation -, but not the only one: other OnePlus-branded devices are also in a similar scenario.