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Who makes the fastest phone of 2018? We tested the best, side by side

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In today’s world, speed is of the essence. That’s why David Cogen of TheUnlockr recently put six phones to the test to see which is the fastest cell phone around. In order to ensure the most accurate results, each phone was connected to the same Wi-Fi network and made to open the same set of apps and games. All open apps were closed before each round, and videos of the phones were lined up see which device was faster.

Cogen picked the fastest phones he could think of — including the Essential Phone, iPhone X, Huawei Mate 10 Pro, Galaxy Note 8, OnePlus 5T, and Pixel 2 XL — to see how they compared with one another when it comes to performance. Each phone was awarded a place depending on how quickly they opened an app compared to their competitors, with the No. 1 slot going to the quickest device. The winner was whichever phone had the lowest score based on the number value of their places throughout the experiment.

The winner? The OnePlus 5T.

fastest cell phone OnePlus 5T
Image used with permission by copyright holder

With just 18 points, it seems as though OnePlus’ latest offering is the fastest phone of 2018. It finished first in two of the rounds, and never placed lower than fourth in the others. The Note 8 came in second (21 points), followed by the Pixel 2 XL (22 points), iPhone X/Essential (both with 27 points), and finally the Mate 10 Pro (31 points).

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This experiment only took into account the speed in which these six phones could launch apps, however, and did not look at, for example, how quickly one could navigate each phone’s user interface.

Smartphone: Essential iPhoneX Huawei Mate 10 Pro Galaxy Note 8 OnePlus 5T Pixel 2 XL
Total (lower is better): 27 27 31 21 18 22

As a result, the places were widely varied. The iPhone X finished in last, or close to last, in the first four examples, but when it came to games, suddenly began placing first or second. The Essential Phone was in the middle of the pack throughout, but ended up scoring as much as the iPhone X.

The bottom line: All of these phones are fast. The rankings were also very close, with an average of only 1 to 5 points separating each device from the next. Whether or not limited UI (in the case of the 5T) actually makes a phone faster or not is difficult to tell at this point. But there’s one thing we can be sure of; today’s smartphones are fast, and are only going to get faster as we move into 2018.

David Cogen — a regular contributor here at Digital Trends — runs TheUnlockr, a popular tech blog that focuses on tech news, tips and tricks, and the latest tech. You can also find him on Twitter discussing the latest tech trends.

David Cogen
David Cogen
Former Digital Trends Contributor
After always being the person my friends and family came to for help with their tech (see: resident nerd) and realizing how…
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