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OnePlus Watch 3 launches in the UK with a £50 discount – here’s our review

OnePlus impresses again with a classic design, enormous battery life and accurate, dual-frequency GPS

Steve Hogarty
Tech writer
Friday 11 April 2025 18:02 BST
At £269, the OnePlus Watch 3 is great value versus rivals the Galaxy Watch and Pixel Watch
At £269, the OnePlus Watch 3 is great value versus rivals the Galaxy Watch and Pixel Watch (The Independent)

Originally set to launch in February, the OnePlus Watch 3 was delayed because of an unfortunate ‘Meda in China’ typo on the backplate.

The two-month wait turns out to have been worth it for UK customers. Not only has OnePlus nailed the spelling this time around, but the OnePlus Watch 3 launches with a £50 discount at the official OnePlus store. You also get a free pair of OnePlus Nord Buds 3 Pro as a thank-you for being so patient.

Those in the US haven’t been so fortunate. The OnePlus Watch 3 has had a staggering price hike in America, going from $330 to $500. The Chinese brand hasn’t given an official reason for the increase, though it’s almost certainly related to the Trump administration’s spiralling tariffs on goods made (or is that meda?) in China.

Setting aside the escalating trade war, the new OnePlus Watch 3 is a brilliant Android smartwatch. It offers a whopping five-day battery life, a refined titanium-ringed design, improved GPS and enhanced health features that make it a strong contender in an Android smartwatch arena dominated by Samsung and Pixel.

Building on the best aspects of the excellent OnePlus Watch 2, the new smartwatch boasts some impressive specs, particularly its battery life. This isn’t just a marginal upgrade either – the OnePlus Watch 3 doubles down on what made the previous version so great, offering improvements where you'll notice.

OnePlus faces stiff competition in the form of the Samsung Galaxy Watch 7 and Pixel Watch 3, which are slightly more expensive and count among the best Android smartwatches in 2025. Wisely enough, OnePlus doesn’t even attempt to square off with the Apple Watch on its own turf – the OnePlus Watch 3 isn’t compatible with iOS devices at launch.

How I tested

The OnePlus Watch 3 has bolstered its health-tracking arsenal this year.
The OnePlus Watch 3 has bolstered its health-tracking arsenal this year. (Steve Hogarty)

I’ve been wearing the OnePlus Watch 3 since it was first announced back in January. During that time, I’ve tested it during my regular morning run, while working out at home, and when in the office. I’ve also used it to track my sleep.

Why you can trust IndyBest reviews

IndyBest thoroughly tests every product we feature to bring you unbiased reviews you can trust. Our verdicts are reached through real-world testing, and we only recommend products we think you’ll love. I’m a tech writer with more than a decade of experience testing smartwatches. My reviews focus on everyday wearability, workout tracking and overall value, so you can be sure my verdict is authentic, honest and based on experience.

OnePlus Watch 3

oneplus watch 3
  • Watch size: 37mm
  • Display size: 1.5in AMOLED
  • Platform: WearOS 5, Snapdragon W5
  • Features: Sleep tracking, SPO2, heart rate, 120+ sports modes, ECG (in future update)
  • Why we love it
    • Great classic design
    • Enormous battery life
    • Full suite of health tracking features
    • Excellent value
  • Take note
    • Only one size available

Design and software

The OnePlus Watch 3 retains the same basic design as the Watch 2 but with some subtle improvements. Defaulting to an analogue display and with a stainless steel case and classic, thick lugs, it’s still aiming to look like a regular timepiece first and a techy wearable second.

The 1.5in OLED display is bright, and the impressive 2,200 nits peak brightness keeps the screen readable in even the sunniest of morning runs. While still only available in just the one 47mm size – which is a smidge too chunky for my thin wrists – there’s now a premium titanium bezel running around the dial.

The addition of the functional rotating crown addresses one glaring omission from the Watch 2. You can now use it to scroll through menus and screens, offering the same tactile and intuitive navigation found on competitor watches.

Running on Wear OS5 – the Google-built operating system found on most Android smartwatches – means you get the smart wearable features you’d expect: NFC card payments via Google Wallet, on-wrist notifications and messaging, and turn-by-turn directions using Google Maps.

Health and fitness tracking

OnePlus has bolstered its health-tracking arsenal this year, most notably adding a sensor to gauge the skin temperature of your wrist. Improved optical heart rate sensors and SpO2 detection give you greater insights into workout intensity and blood oxygen levels while exercising. You get a glut of health monitoring features, including the new “vascular stiffness” measurement – unique among watches I’ve tested but dubiously useful information for the average user. The ECG function and a 60-second health check are unavailable at launch, pending medical approval.

The updated sleep tracking now analyses your snoring to better assess your breathing overnight, at the expense of battery life. An overall “wellness” score pulls in data from your heart rate variability, resting heart rate and activity levels to slap a number (and an emoji) on your supposed physical and mental state.

oneplus watch 3
Using the same new silicon tech found in the OnePlus 13, the watch boasts up to five days’ battery life in "smart mode" (Steve Hogarty)

The data is nice to have, but I can’t say that I found the results particularly enlightening – it mostly tells me that I’m sad when I take a nap, when the opposite is true. Also odd is the helpful reminder to get up and move around if you’ve been sitting still for too long, which includes a slightly alarmist reference to your chance of developing type 2 diabetes if you ignore it.

For better or worse, the OnePlus Watch 3 gives you mountains of health information to pore over, as well as the simpler rings system used to stay on top of your daily activities. Workout tracking and sleep detection were accurate, particularly the improved heart rate monitoring, which closely correlates to a chest-strap I use to benchmark wrist-based heart rate sensors on runs. The OHealth phone app looks great, displays your stats clearly and without clutter, and integrates with Strava to sync your runs and workouts.

The dual-frequency GPS tracking is a major upgrade, too, locking on to a signal in a fraction of the time it takes my dawdling Pixel Watch 3 to detect one. Designed to deal with interference caused by tall buildings, the GPS on the OnePlus Watch 3 returns more accurate results during segments of my run through built-up areas of London.

Battery life

Across its phones and wearables range, OnePlus has always prioritized battery life. The OnePlus Watch 3 is no exception. Using the same new silicon tech found in the OnePlus 13, the watch boasts up to five days’ battery life in "smart mode". That drops to about three days with the always-on display enabled.

The extended battery life is down to the larger 631mAh cell, up from 500mAh on the previous model. The more efficient Snapdragon W5 chip and WearOS 5 help stretch the juice even further. In testing, those 120-hour battery promises without the always-on display were easily achieved.

If you’re anything like me, you’ll want to keep the display on – I find classic smartwatches look weird without something visible on the screen – but even then, the OnePlus Watch 3 offers double the battery life of my regular watch, the Pixel Watch 3.

Fast-charging is impressive, too, with a 10-minute zap delivering enough power for a full day of use. The watch comes with a charging dock and a separate USB-A to USB-C cable, which gives you more flexibility when it comes to topping up the battery versus the fully integrated USB-C charging cables of Samsung and Pixel watches.

Back to top

The verdict: OnePlus Watch 3

The OnePlus Watch 3 builds on the strengths of its already-great predecessor. Material design, health technology improvements and an increasingly impressive suite of health tracking sensors mark this smartwatch out as one of the best wearables for Android users, particularly at this price.

Looking for more recommendations? Read our tried and tested review of the best fitness trackers in 2025

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