Unified OnePlus and Oppo smartphone software sounds like it's still on the menu for later this year

Once Android 13 comes around

It's been some time now since OnePlus and Oppo announced that they would both finally stop pretending they're totally different things. OnePlus is now essentially acting as a sub-brand of Oppo, and those worried about what would become of OxygenOS were treated to a potentially concerning piece of news — it's going to be merged with ColorOS, with the resulting operating system being used on future phones. The OxygenOS 12 update we've seen roll out on the OnePlus 9 and 9 Pro already took heavy inspiration from ColorOS, but this fully merged operating system is still in the pipeline. We might have to wait a bit before it launches, though, and the latest rumor suggests it could land sometime in the latter half of 2022.

A new report by MySmartPrice, citing tipster Yogesh Brar, claims that this unified OS (which at least some people believe could be called H₂OOS) will be launching with Android 13. As we don't even have an Android 13 beta yet, it's going to be some time before this is ready to break cover, and we're probably looking at the second half of this year at the earliest.

The OnePlus 10 Pro in China runs straight-up ColorOS 12.1, and when it makes its way to the global market, it's expected to ship with OxygenOS 12 — and if that's anything like what we've seen already roll out to existing OnePlus 9 phones, it's going to be pretty much ColorOS anyway. At one point, we were expecting that the 10 series would be running the unified software out of the gate, but it's looking increasingly likely that this won't happen.

The OnePlus 10 Pro should land on global store shelves within the next few weeks, and while it's probably not right to expect a software miracle by this point, it should still make for one pretty compelling flagship.

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