OnePlus has decided to poke some fun at Google on Twitter. The company actually did that on both its general OnePlus account, and OnePlus UK one. The former got deleted, but the latter is still live. The company shared a tweet in which it confirms that its (OnePlus 7T) flagships utilize 90Hz refresh rate at all times, regardless of refresh rate. The same cannot be said for the Pixel 4 devices, as they tend to switch to 60Hz refresh rate more often than not.
OnePlus basically listed brightness settings from 10 to 100-percent, 10-percent, 20-percent, and so on. Next to every single one of those brightness settings, it wrote ‘90Hz’. Below all that, the company said ‘Fast and Smooth anytime, anywhere’.
Both Pixel 4 devices ship with 90Hz refresh rate displays, but are quite limited
This is a clear dig at Google’s Pixel 4 phones, without even mentioning them. Both the Pixel 4 and Pixel 4 XL ship with ‘Smooth Displays’ which are capable of running at 90Hz. They, however, will run at 90Hz only if your brightness is over 75-percent.
This is a really odd choice by Google, as it kind of defeats the purpose of having such a display. People’s brightness is way below 75-percent on average, depending on where you are, of course. So, that basically means that they will use a 60Hz refresh rate more often.
Google obviously did this to try and prolong battery life. The company said that the Pixel 4’s display revers to 60Hz based on brightness and ambient conditions, when you want certain content such as video, and when you turn on a battery saver.
The part with a battery saver and watching video makes sense. You do want to save battery life when you turn on a battery saver feature, and 60Hz refresh rate will do that. In case of video content, it’s mostly shot in 24-30fps range, so it doesn’t make sense to keep the display running at 90Hz).
The brightness and ambient conditions are a problem, though. You will definitely notice when the refresh rate drops to 60Hz if you’ve been using 90Hz before that. So using 60Hz refresh rate for most of your day doesn’t make sense.
Displays on the OnePlus 7T series don’t run at 90Hz at all times, but you won’t notice that
Just to be clear, the OnePlus 7T series 90Hz display doesn’t really run at 90Hz all the time. OnePlus reverts to 60Hz when the display is showing static content, for example.
Unlike Google, however, OnePlus won’t do that based on brightness conditions, so when you actually need a 90Hz refresh rate, you’ll get it.
Google has promised that it will tweak the functionality moving forward, but it remains to be seen what will it do. It sounds like the company will simply tweak those settings a bit, and maybe move that level to 50-percent. We doubt that brightness and ambient conditions will be completely removed from the equation.
The Pixel 4 and Pixel 4 XL don’t have large batteries. It is rather odd that Google opted for such small battery packs, especially for the smaller Pixel 4 handset. That unit comes with a 2,800mAh unit which can’t really offer good battery life on a 60Hz display, let alone 90Hz one.
There is a way for you to force your Pixel 4 handset to run at 90Hz, though. All you need to do is open Developer Settings, and flip the switch on a ‘Force 90Hz’ option.
10% brightness: 90 Hz
20% brightness: 90 Hz
30% brightness: 90 Hz
40% brightness: 90 Hz
50% brightness: 90 Hz
60% brightness: 90 Hz
70% brightness: 90 Hz
80% brightness: 90 Hz
90% brightness: 90 Hz
100% brightness: 90 HzFast and Smooth anytime, anywhere.
— OnePlus UK (@OnePlus_UK) October 24, 2019