OxygenOS 15 brings advanced customisation, Open Canvas multitasking to OnePlus 12 on October 30

We recently got a good look at the upcoming OnePlus 13 via an unboxing video published by the brand's Chinese division, and today, OnePlus has unveiled the updated OxygenOS 15 Android skin that will ship with the OnePlus 13. In a very Apple-esque YouTube premiere, titled "Speed Meets AI," OnePlus revealed its AI-laden OxygenOS 15 update, which has some nifty UI changes and a healthy helping of AI. 

OxygenOS 15 UI changes

OnePlus is leaning into its "Fast and Smooth" OxygenOS branding, claiming that navigating the new Android ROM is more responsive than previous versions, and even showing a direct comparison with what appears to be Samsung's One UI to prove its point.

As for more concrete improvements over OxygenOS 14, OnePlus said that OxygenOS 15: 

• Removes redundant features "for upcoming flagship phones."
• Uses 20% less storage than its predecessor.
• Introduces Open Canvas multitasking for regular candy-bar phones.
• Adds seamless file sharing to iPhones with no compression.
• Introduces new animations, including a new SuperVOOC charging animation, as well as new home screen and lock screen ripple and shimmer effects and parabolic icon bounce. 
• Expands the OnePlus Shelf with more widgets and an improved layout. 

The company also explained that it has reworked how animations and touch response interact, parallelising the processes in what it calls an industry first, so that animations don't exhibit micro-stutters when touch input is registered. 

OxygenOS 15 new features and customisation

OnePlus is also amping up customisation with OxygenOS 15, adding more lock screen layout and options, which are strikingly similar to what Apple did with its iOS 16 lock screen personalisation. OxygenOS seemingly expands on this, though, with more versatile colour choices and image effects directly in the lock screen customisation menus. 

OnePlus OneTake

OneTake is a customisation feature coming to OxygenOS 15 that allows you to use your own photos in different ways on your always-on display, home screen, and lock screen wallpapers. It allows you to cut out people, animals, and objects, and choose how the cutout interacts with the rest of the content on the displays where it appears.  

OnePlus AI

Not one to miss out on the hype train, OnePlus also announced OnePlus AI for OxygenOS 15. The new headline feature for OnePlus AI is AI Unblur, which OnePlus is billing as a tool to help parents take photos of particularly energetic children and pets without making things look unnatural. It is also adding AI Reflection Eraser to clear up photos taken through glass panes, while AI Detail Boost will supposedly upscale images and remove pixelation from close crops after the fact. 

OnePlus AI isn't all about photography, though, and the brand announced a partnership with Google's Gemini AI for productivity-based AI workflows, adding a host of AI dictation. writing, and note-taking features to OxygenOS, including AI tone tweaking, summaries, elaborations, and clean-up. These are again similar features that are available from competitors like Samsung, Google, and even Apple in many cases. Google's Circle to Search will also be added to OxygenOS 15. Lastly, Gemini-powered Intelligent Search is a device-wide search feature that searches through all on-device files and documents, including notes, word documents, spreadsheets, PDFs, and slideshows, for requested information with a single-question, single-answer approach. 

OnePlus didn't specify whether any of these AI features would be restricted to certain models, but it confirmed that the roll-out would start on October 30, 2024 with the OnePlus 12. 

Check out the OnePlus 12 (curr. $802.58 on Amazon)to be the first to get OxygenOS when it rolls out a the end of this month.