OnePlus Y1S Pro (43in) review

The OnePlus Y1S Pro only comes in the 43in model as of now. OnePlus says the 50in model will come soon but till that arrives, your good options for 4K tellies under ₹30K are limited to OnePlus and Vu.

The 43in has minimal bezels and very little chin. It's got a metal back and plastic bits in the front. The TV stand is very plasticky as well. It shows signs of cost cutting, but build quality is barely any problem with tellies. There’s no mounting bracket in the box, so if you’re planning to prop it on the wall, make sure to pick up a mounting bracket separately.

You also have three HDMI ports with one with eARC, one ethernet, two USB Type-A, headphone jack and Optical out.

Much of the Y1S Pro’s smart features and functions remain the same as the Y1S Edge. Even the audio quality is very similar. It's got a loud and airy sound quality with commendable definition in the mid-range. The Dolby Audio is definitely a bit lacklustre because there’s barely any dynamic range. Even the mid and low range are squished together. Many dialogues sound muted unless you turn the volume up considerably but any switch to booming action scenes can really throw you off in these instances.

Hans Zimmer’s unconventional orchestral tunes and battle horns from Dune on Amazon Prime Video sounds open and energetic. It lacks bass obviously but everything else in the movie that is favouring zingy highs and meaty lows are fairly reproduced for a ₹30K telly.  Even the ceremonious theme with bagpipes is not too sharp like other budget tellies.

This UHD telly is very sharp. Sharp enough to bring out Timothée Chalamet lushious locks the way the director intended. In pitch dark scenes there is a bit of backlight bleeding but in our testing we haven’t found a budget TV under ₹30K that does blacks better than the Y1S Pro. That said, the Y1S Pro is also a bit contrast heavy.

The deeper blacks are not coincidence, the Y1S Pro also has more boosted colours. Viewing angles are terrible. Like the Vu tellies we tested previously which offered 4K under ₹30K, the OnePlus Y1S Pro too has poor off-axis viewing angles. The image is washed out if you’re moving away from the centre.

You will have to dive into the picture settings and tune the thing to your liking as well. Reducing sharpness and adaptive contrast can reap really great results. Digital Noise Reduction and Ultra Smooth Motion is way too aggressive so we tend to keep those things off in these modern budget tellies.

Pretty much all the OnePlus ecosystem features are here like the Y1S Edge. You can control the telly with your smartwatch or smartphone. Listen to audio on your OnePlus wireless headphones directly as well. It’s all done very well. The Android TV also has chromecast and Miracast with the option to cast two smartphones together. We found this a bit challenging to use and even the UI at times would stutter or lag.

Apps like Netflix and Prime Video lag a bit while changing volume and scrubbing through movie timelines. The UI also indicates that the telly is muted even when it’s not. It usually happens when you keep changing the volume a bit too much, but all these gripes should be patched in a few software updates. It’s still a smarter UI than most budget tellies.

The remote is as barebones as it can get, although you do get a Hotstar hotkey on the remote along with Netflix and Prime Video.

The OnePlus Y1S Pro is one of the smartest and pocket-friendly 4K tellies you can buy right now. The aggressive pricing puts OnePlus’ own Y1S Edge out of business.

It's got great colours and crispy audio. There are a few things which can be better, but maybe you can’t have it all under ₹30K. Although if you’re an existing OnePlus user, the pay off with ecosystem compatibility is bar none.