What’s up! Today, we will unbox and review the OnePlus Nord Buds 3 Pro earbuds. I finally got here, and let’s put it that way: I’m excited to jump in and see what these bad boys can do.
These guys come in at ₹3,299. Currently, you can get these on the Oneplus website or Amazon. As far as colorways, you only get two of them. We have a midnight Optus, and you can also get the lunar radiance, which has a brighter color scheme on the earbuds.
OnePlus Nord Buds 3 Pro Specifications
| Category | OnePlus Nord Buds 3 Pro Specifications |
|---|---|
| Battery and Charging | 58mAh (earbuds) / 520mAh (charging case), 6-10 hours (single charge) / 21.5-43 hours (with charging case) |
| Colorways | Midnight Opus, Lunar Radiance |
| Connectivity | Bluetooth Codec LHDC 5.0, AAC, and SBC |
| Features | VPU, and AI algorithms, support Google Fast Pair, have an IP55 rating, 50 dB noise reduction, |
| Weight | 61.13 g |
Regarding specs, the OnePlus Nord Buds 3 Pro features Bluetooth 5.4 with codec support for AAC, SBC, and LHDC 5.0, offering up to 1 Mbps bitrate and 24-bit/192 kHz resolution. If your device supports LHDC, you can fully use that codec. The earbuds also include an adaptive noise-canceling system that blocks up to 50 dB, which is quite decent. We conducted some tests, and you can check the detailed results below.
Battery life depends on noise-canceling settings. With noise canceling off, the earbuds provide up to 10 hours of use, while when turned on, usage drops to 6 hours. Adding the case significantly extends battery life, offering up to 43 hours with noise canceling off and 25.5 hours with it on. The case supports wireless charging, though I need help finding details on fast charging features. Once I locate that information, I’ll update it in the comments.
OnePlus Nord Buds 3 Pro are rated IPX55, so whether you’re at the gym, caught in the rain, or sweating during a workout, you’re good to go. Each earbud includes dual drivers—a 6mm tweeter and an 11mm woofer—custom-designed by Dynaudio. Other features include twin-tailored DACs, spatial audio with head tracking, high-res wireless audio certification, and squeeze-and-slide controls on the stems. The earbuds also support multipoint connectivity, Google Fast Pair, and the HeyMelody app for iOS and Android devices. I’m so excited to try these out!
Build Quality and Design
We dig the new charging case’s build quality and design. It’s got a pebble look with a faux leather texture on both the front and back. Around the edges, it’s matte plastic. Your USB Type-C port is on the bottom, and a well-hidden pairing button is on the right side.
A small LED at the bottom next to the Type-C port and one inside the case indicates battery life and pairing status. We also like that the buds are far easier to remove and return to the case.
You can get these in Midnight Opus and Lunar Radiance—just black and cream. The buds have a metallic look that will depend on your taste. I’m not one for a shiny look; I’ll take my buds matte or maybe translucent, thank you very much.
And damn, these come with a solid IP55 dust and water resistance. The way you control these buds is very Apple-like: squeezing and stroking.
Comfort And Fit
The silicone ear tips you get with these buds are oval-shaped, and four sizes are included in the box, so that’s nice. But we don’t know what it is—we’ve never used OnePlus buds for very long, and that’s because they do not want to stay in our ears.
The fit could be better. OnePlus Nord Buds 3 Pro are super comfortable, don’t get me wrong, and for a desk job, these will do it. But the moment I want to go cycling or running with these in, forget about it. I’m not sure if it’s the shape of the tips, the material OnePlus uses, or the bulky bud, but damn, a severe turnoff.
Regarding fit, I want to be very clear: I’ve had this issue since the first OnePlus Buds I tested. It was the OnePlus Buds Pro, the first generation, and it continued with the OnePlus Buds Pro 2. It continued with the OnePlus Buds 3 (not the Pro), and it continues with this generation of Buds as well. So, we are doing something wrong (which I will find difficult to accept), but do you face this as well?
How well do the OnePlus Nord Buds 3 Pro cancel noise (ANC)?
We will have to start with noise cancellation because there are high expectations for the third version of the Pro model. We rate noise cancellation and transparency on this scale and wanted it to be at least Tier A. Unfortunately, it’s worse than the Google Pixel Buds Pro 2 in that it lets in more of the low-end, like engine noise, and the mids, like voices.
Overall, it does an excellent job at noise reduction; it’s more in line with, for example, the Tozo Golden X1. But for transparency, though? Tier S. A severe upgrade from previous models—very close to not having anything in your ears. The lows, mids, and highs are all let in naturally.
There’s a bit of white noise, but it’s not that noticeable. You can toggle between the two modes with a squeeze and hold on the stems. You can change the gesture cycles in the app—either noise canceling, transparency, or off.
In the app, you get a few modes you can select for noise canceling: high, medium, low, or auto, which will switch between those three modes depending on ambient noise. We prefer to keep it on high. And that’s it—there’s no specific wind noise reduction mode, but it did pretty okay in the wind in transparency mode. But for the best result, you’ll need to put them in noise canceling, along with all the risks that come with it.
OnePlus Nord Buds 3 Pro Microphone Test
What a respectable set of buds for calls! They held their own in both noisy and windy conditions. Of course, when the wind picked up beyond three m/s, and I started whispering, it was hard to hear me. Apart from that, and a slight bit of processing to the voice, these buds are usable for calls in different ambient situations. The functions only get answer, hangup, and volume controls—there’s no muting the mic straight from the buds, but you can change the mode.
What about the Charging And Battery?
Also, there’s no wireless charging—unbelievable for a flagship Pro model, and that too in its third version! The battery life is now advertised at 5 hours with ANC off and on the LHDC codec. We tested that and got 8 hours with ANC off on the LHDC version 5 codec. Nice one, OnePlus—under-promised and over-delivered, just the way we like it. And just a note—the numbers advertised are higher if you use the AAC codec.
OnePlus Nord Buds 3 Pro Sound Quality
Regarding sound, I feel like we’ve talked about OnePlus Buds so much in the past, and it’s clear that these are the category leaders for sound in this price range. The biggest knock I have on these buds is that they only have LHDC as the high-res codec, so you don’t get LDAC or aptX, which are usually the codecs you find on the Googles and Samsungs of this world.
So, if you want the highest codec, you’ll need a Xiaomi phone or one of the Chinese phone manufacturers. But other than that, even on AAC, they sound pretty damn good. The app is impressive because, as I said before, the HeyMelody app lifts these companies. I think they are sharing this app and a lot of the tech. I find the golden sound feature especially interesting.
This app is the tech that scans your ear canal to make a custom sound profile. We’ve seen this in the past from various companies, but I think Oppo and OnePlus have one of the best golden sound features on the market. For me, it is second to the Denon P Pro, and that is top tier. But this is just as good as anything else. As someone with imperfect hearing, I think this is more important than a generically good-sounding set of buds.
You get a bunch of presets—Balanced, Bold, Serenade, etc. We’ve seen this before, and these can be hit or miss. Sometimes, these settings work for certain types of music. But this bass wave is exciting. The one at the bottom can boost your bass, like the Clear Bass slider on Sony earbuds. So again, you’re not short on options; if you don’t like any of these, you always have the good old custom EQ. It’s a five-band, not parametric, but you know what? I don’t care about that.
So, if you’re worried about sound, don’t be—unless you’re really into high-res codecs and don’t have LHDC. In my view, there’s nothing to fault with these regarding sound.
Extra Features & App Support
Now, regarding extra features, we will talk about the HeyMelody app, which we have seen before. Many companies from the same region use this app, which I think is interesting. We know it’s a weird name for an app, but it gives you many options and the ability to configure those squeezes and strokes. You get single, double, and triple squeeze options on the stem. The stroke can be used for either volume or track control, which is excellent, and the squeeze-and-hold is reserved for noise control modes.
You get EQ presets and custom options in the same app, but we’ll get into that in the sound section. Low-latency game mode covers your gamers. The app has multipoint connectivity with a device list. I guess that’s one of the benefits of having a shared app—everybody gets these features.
You can pull-connect from a previously paired device, so if you’ve paired to a device, you can select it in the Bluetooth menu without putting the buds into pairing mode. You can also do an earbud fit test, beep the buds if you can’t find them, and update the firmware. All in all, it’s a good feature set. It’s a shame that although there’s a wear sensor on the buds, there’s no way to turn it off, which is super annoying.
Worth to buy OnePlus Nord Buds 3 Pro?
For ₹3,299, we think OnePlus is competing on all fronts—great sound, transparency, calls, reliable controls, long battery life, a solid IP55 rating, and a feature-rich app. They only dropped the ball in the Tier B ANC and the lack of wireless charging. But the most important reason—and the reason we wouldn’t buy them—is that they don’t fit securely in our ears. Dont worry we got you here are Best Earbuds under ₹3000 you can checkout.
Although we may not look at it, we move occasionally. These buds would do fine if we were stuck at a desk. But we can’t risk going out cycling or running and having them fall out of our ears. OnePlus changed the case design; now they have to change the design of the buds, and then we might have a serious winner.