OnePlus launched its first Android tablet last year, which was received pretty well in what is not a very thriving segment for Android for a while. The new OnePlus Pad 2 is the company’s new premium Android tablet that is aimed for both work and play.

Priced at Rs. 39,999 for the base model and Rs. 42,999 in the higher variant, let us see if it can justify the pricing:

The OnePlus Pad 2 features curved sides except for the top where you can attach the Stylo Pen. The metal back carries the OnePlus logo and rear camera setup with nothing else on it. When in landscape mode, the top left corner has the volume buttons; while the power/lock key sits next to its adjoining left edge.

The six-speakers setup is spread across both left and right; the right side also houses the USB type C port. The curved bottom only features the pogo pins for attaching the keyboard.

The tablet has a 12.1-inch (7:5) aspect ratio display with symmetrical bezels around it. Weighing 584grams, this tablet it a little heavier than the original OnePlus Pad. The tablet is slim (6.5mm thick), big and it feels sturdy—you may not always feel it’s comfortable to hold with one hand for extended hours when, say, watching something on it, or taking notes, but it’s not too different from any other tablet this size. It would have been nice had OnePlus added a fingerprint reader to unlock the device, something that was missing from the predecessor, too.

The tablet features a 12.1-inch 3k (3000×2120) LCD display that supports up to 144Hz high refresh rates. This is a bright and sharp display that’s usable outdoors if you want to under direct sunlight. It has decent viewing angles and handles high resolution videos well in terms of colour reproduction. With Dolby Vision content, the display doesn’t struggle to handle dark scenes and throws sufficient punchy contrast and brightness to go with it.

The front-facing 8MP (f/2.0) camera is okay for video calling and maybe once one a while selfie shot but it’s not too great for anything else. Similarly, the rear camera – a 13MP (f/2.2)– is okay for an odd photo if you really want, considering how odd you may appear taking a photo with such a big device in both your hands.

The camera app, though, is quick and quite straightforward to navigate through various options.

The Pad 2 is equipped with Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset (up to 3.3Ghz octa core processor, Adreno 750 GPU and x75 5G modem), 12GB LPDDR5X RAM along with 256GB (or 8GB + 128GB) UFS 3.1 internal storage (no 4G or 5G variant). This is running on OxygenOS 14.1 based on Android 14 with the July security patch in place.

You get a horizontal bar at the bottom with your most used and recent app shortcuts. You can drag an app icon from there to open two or three apps side by side, and then come back and open them again at once with a single tap as a shortcut with those apps gets created automatically. This helps in reading stuff and maybe checking something alongside, or messaging and watching something YouTube side by side.

The tablet didn’t have any issues in this process, nor did it slow down when scrolling inside apps or moving from one to another the conventional way.

Itt handled an intensive game like CoD: Mobile without any stuttering and didn’t show any heating issues either. The speakers on the tablet are loud and have enough depth that you wouldn’t mind using it for watching movies or TV show or even for playing games.

It really makes for the multimedia experience to be a strength for it, which is one of the most vital parts when considering any tablet.

The new Smart Keyboard (priced at Rs. 8,499) from OnePlus not has a separate back panel (plus the angled stand) rather than permanently attached. You can attach it magnetically or over Bluetooth. The keyboard and trackpad are now significantly bigger and the keys are decent but not the best when it comes to typing with a keyboard on a tablet; still it’s not that bad for writing long documents if you don’t have a choice.

The new Stylo 2 (priced at Rs. 5,499) has an 80mAh battery of its own and has material that feels and looks a little bit like leather though it’s not actually the case. You can draw and take notes. You can also swipe on the Stylo 2’s touchpad to do various things such as swiping or accessing annotation tools or bring up laser pointer for presentations.

There are some AI-related features such AI Toolbox and AI Speak that are slated to be available on the tablet with updates in the coming months but for now you’ve things like AI Eraser and Recording Summary (supports Hindi, English and Chinese) and both worked but weren’t flawless on the first try.

Powered by a 9,510 mAh battery unit, the tablet lasted me around 11-12 hours on a full charge when watching movies for a couple of hours, browsing the Web or social media apps for two hours or so with screen brightness set at 40 per cent most of the time. The bundled 67 watts SuperVooc charger can charge the device from 1 per cent to full in around 1.5 hours.

All in all, the Pad 2 comes across as a well-built Android tablet that has a really nice display and speakers for multimedia usage, battery life suitable for working on the go and the added accessories, especially the keyboard, are not too bad either.

It’s a pricey but a good option if want to run multiple apps side by side, or work and write on the go and don’t want to take a full-fledged laptop with you. And there certain misses, as mentioned – still no fingerprint reader and some hardware nerds may be put off by the use of UFS 3.1 instead of UFS 4.0 for a premium tablet.