
Shimul Sood / Android Authority
Smartphone battery capacities have long gone throughout the stratosphere in recent years. Take the OnePlus Nord 6, as an example — boasting a large 9,000mAh silicon-carbon battery that right away grabs your consideration. It does sound reassuring, virtually such as you received’t must take into accounts charging in any respect. However I’ve discovered to not take those figures at face worth. What in reality issues is how that battery behaves whilst you use the telephone the way in which you usually would. That’s the place optimization makes all of the distinction.
And that distinction turns into much more glaring whilst you get started gaming. Graphically extensive video games don’t precisely pass simple on a telephone — they push efficiency, stay the gadget repeatedly running, and of course put extra drive at the battery. So, I determined to spend 3 hours directly gaming at the Nord 6 to look the way it actually plays beneath drive. I’ll admit, I wasn’t moderately ready for what I discovered.
Would you purchase a smartphone only for a 9,000mAh battery?
219 votes
The foundations I set sooner than letting the Nord 6 run wild

Shimul Sood / Android Authority
Sooner than I am getting into the effects, I feel it’s simplest truthful to first stroll you via how I approached this check. As a result of with one thing like battery efficiency, the setup issues simply up to the result.
I picked 4 titles to stay issues numerous however constantly hard: Genshin Have an effect on, Hitman: Absolution, Tomb Raider, and Name of Responsibility: Cellular. Every ran for 45 mins back-to-back and not using a breaks between classes. Listed below are a couple of key issues I saved in take a look at:
- I began the check at 96% rate.
- I saved the telephone’s brightness locked at 70% with auto-brightness off, and had each Bluetooth and Location Services and products became off all over.
- Each and every quarter-hour, I famous the battery proportion.
- Each and every 45 mins, proper after every consultation ended, I pulled out a temperature gun and logged readings of the again panel and the show.
- No exterior elements, equivalent to air con, hampered this check, and my room temperature remained stable at 28°C.
- The Nord 6 used to be additionally on its newest tool sooner than I began.
Those have been the bottom laws I set sooner than the gaming consultation started. The objective used to be to stay issues as constant and impartial as imaginable, so the effects actually replicate how the telephone plays beneath drive.
This telephone’s battery doesn’t care how laborious you push it

Shimul Sood / Android Authority
I began with Genshin Have an effect on to actually stress-test the telephone’s features. You’re dropped into a large open international and not using a loading monitors between spaces — textures, environments, lighting fixtures, all streaming in actual time. It’s an speedy pressure check for each the CPU and GPU, and for those who’ve performed it sooner than, you already are aware of it’s now not sort to battery existence or thermals both. I set the graphics to the best possible preset and locked the body charge to 60 fps.
After I in reality were given into the consultation, although, the revel in felt extra managed than I anticipated. Whilst the sport saved moving moods with a mixture of struggle, there wasn’t a unmarried second the place the gameplay felt uneven or risky. To come up with a clearer image of ways that translated into battery utilization through the years, I’ve damaged down the drop each and every quarter-hour within the desk underneath, along side the overall drain via the top of the consultation.
| Genshin Have an effect on | After quarter-hour | After half-hour | After 45 mins | Overall drop |
| Began at 96% | 93% | 90% | 86% | 10% |
In truth, seeing only a 10% drop in 45 mins felt lovely spectacular. With a heavy recreation like this working at the telephone, I used to be frankly anticipating a miles sharper dip. Alternatively, the tale wasn’t moderately as calm when it got here to temperatures. After I completed the consultation and took the readings, the telephone used to be actually heat to touch — the again panel reached 39.9°C, and the show settled round 39.6°C.
As soon as the readings have been completed, I went directly into the following name, Hitman: Absolution, and persevered the check for some other 45 mins. This can be a extra structured, linear recreation in comparison to Genshin Have an effect on, but it surely nonetheless places an even quantity of load at the telephone via its cinematic storytelling, stealth mechanics, and action-heavy sequences. I saved the graphics preset on Efficiency, which caps the body charge at 60 fps.

Shimul Sood / Android Authority
That is the place I began noticing a shift within the Nord 6’s conduct. Not like the former consultation, issues didn’t keep completely easy this time. There have been noticeable lags and stutters all the way through gameplay. The warmth showed what my palms have been already telling me. Through the top of the 45 mins, the again panel reached 44.5°C and the show 42.8°C. That used to be actually uncomfortable to carry. For a stretch there, I believed the check used to be about to fall aside.
However regardless of all that warmth and chaos, the battery simplest dropped 2% greater than Genshin Have an effect on, and I if truth be told didn’t know whether or not to be relieved or suspicious.
| Hitman: Absolution | After quarter-hour | After half-hour | After 45 mins | Overall drop |
| Began at 86% | 85% | 81% | 74% | 12% |
At the 3rd lap, with Tomb Raider, the telephone after all settled down once more. This can be a PC port of the vintage recreation, the place you’re repeatedly transferring via unhealthy ruins, dodging traps, and fixing puzzles simply to stay progressing. Visually, too, it’s moderately hard, with console-like graphics, detailed textures, and well-optimized lighting fixtures that assists in keeping converting as you progress via other environments. For Tomb Raider, I caught with the Efficiency preset, although right here it caps the body charge at 40 fps.
The gameplay used to be easy, responsive, and truthfully simply relaxing, with none noticeable lag.
However apparently, that is the place the revel in at the Nord 6 began to really feel extra acquainted to my preliminary Genshin Have an effect on check. Gameplay used to be easy, responsive, and truthfully simply relaxing, with none noticeable lag. Thermals additionally started to go back to commonplace. After peaking at 44.5°C within the previous spherical, the again panel dropped to 38.7°C via the top of this consultation. The show confirmed a extra pronounced drop, settling at 36°C, a lower of round 6°C.

Shimul Sood / Android Authority
On best of that, the battery have an effect on used to be additionally somewhat lighter this time. In comparison to each Genshin Have an effect on and Hitman: Absolution, Tomb Raider ate up simply 8% all the way through the 45-minute consultation. I’ve damaged down the main points underneath for a clearer glance.
| Tomb Raider | After quarter-hour | After half-hour | After 45 mins | Overall drop |
| Began at 74% | 72% | 68% | 66% | 8% |
In any case, I wrapped issues up with Name of Responsibility: Cellular, and truthfully, for me, no battery check ever feels entire with out this one. I spent all the 45 mins leaping between Staff Deathmatches, and it by no means actually gave me a second to take into accounts anything.

Dhruv Bhutani / Android Authority
And that’s when it hit me. Of the 4 video games, this one used the least battery all the way through the check — simply 5%. As on the subject of not anything as you’re going to get in a three-hour gaming consultation.
| Name of Responsibility: Cellular | After quarter-hour | After half-hour | After 45 mins | Overall drop |
| Began at 66% | 65% | 63% | 61% | 5% |
And, virtually as though the consultation itself used to be cooling off, the thermals additionally got here down noticeably. Through the top, the again panel settled at 36.3°C and the show at 36.4°C — a transparent drop from the sooner peaks, and a a lot more at ease really feel in hand.
After a complete 3-hour consultation, the Nord 6 used to be left with 61% battery. That implies the 9,000 mAh battery, which began at 96%, nonetheless had sufficient juice to with ease lift me via all the day, and much more. And this used to be beneath severely heavy, hard gameplay, which simplest makes something transparent — with informal or lighter video games, the staying power right here will stretch considerably additional. That’s precisely the place the Nord 6 units itself aside. It didn’t simply cross the check — it made me really feel actually silly for doubting it.
Don’t need to pass over the most efficient from Android Authority?


Thanks for being a part of our group. Learn our Remark Coverage sooner than posting.



