Global OnePlus smartphones are slated to hang on to OxygenOS following OPPO merger

OnePlus has just announced new OxygenOS 11 Open Betas for the 8, 8 Pro and 8T. These advance preview builds may have some owners of these phones, not to mention those of the 9 or Nord series, wondering if their days are numbered following an announcement from the company's CEO, Pete Lau, that it was to merge more completely with fellow BBK Electronics subsidiary OPPO.

This news has been foreshadowed by similar moves by the OEMs' division in their native China, which saw OnePlus-branded devices lose their own HydrogenOS (OxygenOS' (OOS) analog that had been specific to that market) switch to ColorOS (OPPO's skin for Android) instead.

This may have been a worrying sign that OOS was next, particularly as the migration to "ColorOS for OnePlus" was initially dismissed and denied on Chinese social media. However, MySmartPrice now claims to have obtained confirmation directly from OnePlus that the popular Android skin would still be installed on its brand's global-variant devices "out of the box".

This, then, might be a sign that both stable and beta channels for OOS will remain open in the future. As for these latest Open Betas for the 8 series and 8T (which are now up to versions 11 and 6 respectively), they contain June 2021 security patches, as well as a new experimental Screenshot feature for their Always-on Display (AOD) modes.

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