Let me be clear: the iPhone 17e is a genuinely good phone. MagSafe, 256GB storage as standard, and deep integration with the Apple ecosystem — it’s everything last year’s iPhone 16e should have been, and it makes total sense if your family, your friends, and your life are already Apple-shaped.
But I review phones for a living. I’m also, for better or worse, an Apple obsessive. And after a week with the OnePlus 15R, I’d be doing you a disservice if I didn’t tell you what your money can actually buy right now.
The OnePlus 15R costs $699. It has a 7,400mAh battery. I’ve been getting two full days of use before reaching for a charger.
I’ve spent years automatically toggling Low Power Mode on my iPhone 16 during heavy days — it’s just become muscle memory. Using the OnePlus 15R reminded me that this is not a universal smartphone experience. It’s an Apple-specific compromise I’d stopped questioning.
Battery life aside, the OnePlus 15R earns its price in other ways: a 165Hz display, a 6.83-inch screen, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 chipset, and OxygenOS that’s as clean and intuitive as Android gets. Side-by-side multitasking, heavy app switching, gaming — no hesitation, no hiccups. Oh, and the Mint Green colorway is so good I refuse to put a case on it. With IP66, IP68, IP69, and IP69K certifications, it doesn’t need one anyway.
The OnePlus 15R is the most dramatic example, but it’s not alone.
The Samsung Galaxy S25 FE surprised me. Built on the same Exynos 2400 chipset that powered the once-flagship Galaxy S24, it delivered a full day’s battery without concern and a 6.7-inch display vivid enough to make Netflix feel like an event. Not a compromise phone — a capable one.
Then there’s the Nothing Phone (4a) Pro, which I tested before launch and came away genuinely impressed. Its design makes most flagship phones look conservative, and Nothing’s OS is as considered as its hardware. It has a triple-camera array including a 3x telephoto lens. It costs $100 less than the iPhone 17e, which ships with a single rear camera.
Let that sit for a moment.
If you’re standing at the crossroads of a mid-range upgrade and you haven’t looked at what Android offers in 2026 – you’re making a decision without the full picture.
The iPhone 17e is a great iPhone. Whether it’s a great phone for the money is a different question entirely.
Luiza Mosneagu is Reviews Editor at Droid Tools. A psychologist by training and tech writer by passion, she has tested over 60 Android devices since 2020 - always for a minimum of two weeks before writing a word. Her focus is camera quality, everyday usability, and cutting through marketing claims to tell you what a device is actually like to live with.
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