The OnePlus 16's coolest feature is also its most embarrassing

Just as I started to get over the near-uselessness of HiLight on the new Pixel 11 Pro models, I got hit across the face with OnePlus’ curious little decision with the upcoming OnePlus 16. The phone is still a few weeks away, but the company has already revealed quite a lot about it, in typical OnePlus fashion.

One detail that stood out about the handset, which I believe would also be its marquee feature, is a glowing LED light array on the phone’s back. It particularly stands out because I believe it’s the feature that will embarrass OnePlus the most, too.

It’s a bird! It’s a plane!

No, it’s just good-ol’ disappointment in the shape of orange LED lights.

Glancing at the leaks and official photos OnePlus has been sharing on Weibo, it’s hard to tell if you are looking at the OnePlus 15 or its successor; the similarity is so uncanny. From what we know so far, the OnePlus 16 is going to be your run-of-the-mill incremental upgrade, bringing the latest Snapdragon top-end chip and a tweaked camera setup — nothing groundbreaking. I did expect this year’s OnePlus flagship to deliver more meaningful upgrades, since the OnePlus 15 turned out to be an utter disappointment, but all we are getting are some glowing lights.

The move smells more like desperation than a meaningful feature addition, almost as if OnePlus has nothing else to offer. Mind you, it’s the same company that differentiated itself with hardware innovations like the Alert Slider, which I would’ve liked every Android maker to copy, and software ingenuity like off-screen gestures and app cloning. Fast forward to today, and it has to resort to such attention-grabbing tactics just to hype up its new phone.

I would have been a lot more forgiving had the implementation been more tasteful, but they appear anything but. At this point, I feel bad for pointing fingers at Google — at least it didn’t make HiLight on the Pixel 11 Pro look as tacky as the OnePlus 16’s glowing lights.

Nothing hilarious to see here

Carl Pei was one of the founding members of OnePlus and left the Chinese giant to create Nothing, a brand that owns its design language, which it knows stands out from the crowd. One of Nothing’s most unique features of late is a low-res rear LED panel that can display anything from notifications to your face. It’s just so poetically ironic that OnePlus is now copying Nothing — and doing a much shabbier job even at that.

For starters, the glowing LEDs on the OnePlus 16 give off gaming-phone energy that doesn’t match its personality one bit. The light pattern appears to occupy three major sections of the phone’s back. I really hope OnePlus gives us a better explanation at the launch event, but I simply can’t comprehend the reason for having a big, bold number 16 glowing alongside some gibberish typography that looks nonsensical and completely uncalled for.

Besides those two, there is a small X symbol next to the camera — this will likely double up as the notification indicator. And this is exactly why I call it an embarrassment. Because if OnePlus went all this way to make the back panel almost entirely backlit with random characters, only to use a small, pulsating X for notification indication, I don’t have another word to describe it.

I’m not a product designer, but I can think of a hundred ways off the top of my head to make the implementation better. Heck, if OnePlus had actually copied Nothing’s homework word for word, it would’ve been greatly improved. Still embarrassing, but at least the indicator would be functional.

The only saving grace is that it’s optional

The pre-orders page that went live in China suggests that those horrendous glowing LED lights would be exclusive only to one of the color variants, so at least OnePlus isn’t shoving the feature down your throat. If the OnePlus 16 turns out to be a solid, reliable phone otherwise, you thankfully won’t have to lug it around, facing secondhand embarrassment or feeling the need to cover the back with an opaque case.

I wouldn’t want to indulge in this thought a lot because it would mean I’d spend another 1,000 words pondering the dire state of OnePlus. But if OnePlus 16’s standout feature itself is optional, what exactly is making the handset stand out? Maybe the LED lights aren’t what OnePlus needs to get back to its former glory, but some more foundational changes, though I doubt they’re even on its priority list.

Having said that, it doesn’t affect many of you reading this in the United States anymore, as OnePlus formally withdrew from the country not too long ago. Lights or no lights, the OnePlus 16 isn’t coming to US shores at all. Perhaps it’s a blessing in disguise that you’ll never get to see the abomination with your own eyes. Everything has a silver lining, right?