OnePlus 13R & 12GB RAM in the AI Era: Planned Obsolescence?

Last year, I purchased the OnePlus 12R with 16GB RAM and 256GB of storage, marking my return to OnePlus after the OnePlus One. While the curved display was disappointing, the performance restored my faith in the brand. This year, I pre-ordered the OnePlus 13R expecting an upgrade but found the North American 256GB model capped at 12GB RAM, a seeming downgrade in an AI-driven era where local processing is increasingly important.

Does this signal a trend of planned obsolescence? I’d like to hear your thoughts on whether 12GB is sufficient today and if OnePlus is moving in the wrong direction.

Last year base model has 8GB ram and you could buy 12GB or 16GB ram. This year 13R base model has 12GB ram, and you can buy 16GB ram too. How is that downgrade?

You won’t need 16 or 12 GB of RAM for anything. It’s a gimmick to upsell variants.

Gemini sends stuff to the cloud. Powerful hardware isn’t required.

Vitt said:
You won’t need 16 or 12 GB of RAM for anything. It’s a gimmick to upsell variants.

Gemini sends stuff to the cloud. Powerful hardware isn’t required.

That’s exactly why we need more RAM. Sending data to the cloud is terrible for privacy.

Phones are memory-bound. With 32GB RAM, a Snapdragon 8 Elite phone could handle AI models like Llama3.2 or Qwen locally. This includes LLMs, text-to-speech, or image generation models—no cloud required.

For me, local processing is non-negotiable. Cloud-based AI isn’t worth it.

Vitt said:
You won’t need 16 or 12 GB of RAM for anything. It’s a gimmick to upsell variants.

Gemini sends stuff to the cloud. Powerful hardware isn’t required.

You only need 11GB RAM to run Phi-4 by Microsoft (14B parameters), but other apps and OS eat RAM too. Usable RAM is always less than advertised.

You got 16GB RAM last year, and now want to replace the phone after a year. Why care about longevity if you upgrade annually?

Why care about the RAM needs of AI features I don’t even want? Plenty of phones have more RAM for AI enthusiasts.

Avi said:
Why care about the RAM needs of AI features I don’t even want? Plenty of phones have more RAM for AI enthusiasts.

Exactly. 12GB is fine, especially on a mid-range phone. Even Samsung’s Galaxy S24 base model and Google’s Pixel 9 only use 8GB.

People are being misled by AI hype. Most of the processing is cloud-based anyway.

OnePlus offers $344 trade-in for the 12R, so upgrading costs $100 or less after factoring in freebies like earbuds or watches. Hardly a betrayal.

Who cares about AI anyway?

Riley said:
OnePlus offers $344 trade-in for the 12R, so upgrading costs $100 or less after factoring in freebies like earbuds or watches. Hardly a betrayal.

Who cares about AI anyway?

Exactly. AI on-device needs are overhyped. Most AI is cloud-based, and the few local features don’t need 16GB of RAM.

The 12R had SKUs with 8GB, 12GB, and 16GB. This year’s 13R starts at 12GB. How is that betrayal? If 12GB isn’t enough, skip it.

We’re complaining about 16GB of RAM missing on a mid-range phone now? iPhones still have 8GB on flagships. This AI obsession is ridiculous.