OnePlus continues its impressive Android 13 rollout
Last year’s Android 12-based OxygenOS 12 rollout was a disaster for OnePlus. The initial build for the OnePlus 9 and 9 Pro was so buggy that it was pulled within days of release. Worse, the company took months to fix all the issues and release the OS to its other devices. This year though, the story has been different, with OnePlus beating Samsung in updating its 2022 flagship phone to Android 13. Since then, the OnePlus 10T and OnePlus 9 series have also been updated to the latest Android build. And now, it is the turn of the budget-oriented Nord CE 2 Lite to taste Android 13.
This makes the CE 2 Lite the first phone in OnePlus’s Nord lineup to receive the stable Android 13 build. BBK-owned OnePlus has not made an official announcement about the rollout, but there are multiple reports from Nord CE 2 Lite owners about the stable OxygenOS 13 update showing up for download. The stable release comes a month after OnePlus seeded the Android 13 Open Beta for the phone. Besides the latest version of Android, the 4.5GB update packs the December 2022 security patch.
OnePlus’s latest skin brings an Aquamorphic design and an upgraded animation engine for smoother effects. There are also performance optimizations and usability improvements, including more markup tools for screenshot editing, a Sidebar Toolbox, automatic pixelation of chat screenshots, and more. You also get all the new Android 13 goodies like a new permission model, a more privacy-friendly photo picker, per-app language picker, and improved Material You integration.
For now, the OxygenOS 13 update for the Nord CE 2 Lite is only live in India. It is also being rolled out in stages, so it might not show up on your device immediately. A wider rollout should happen from next week. If you can’t wait, consider grabbing the OTA package from XDA and manually installing the update on your device.
