OnePlus 9 Benchmarks Deleted From Geekbench Over Cheating Allegations

Popular benchmark site Geekbench has removed OnePlus 9 benchmarks from its charts due to allegations that the company designed Oxygen OS optimization tools in such a way that they could be viewed as cheating. Android Authority reports: Yesterday, AnandTech posted some information about "weird behavior" it spotted with the OnePlus 9 Pro. According to the team's research, Oxygen OS apparently limits the performance of some popular Android apps -- but none of those apps are benchmark suites. Geekbench, one of the more popular benchmarking sites, took these allegations seriously. After conducting its own investigation, Geekbench recently announced that it has removed all OnePlus 9 benchmarks from its charts. Geekbench, one of the more popular benchmarking sites, took these allegations seriously. After conducting its own investigation, Geekbench recently announced that it has removed all OnePlus 9 benchmarks from its charts. Geekbench called Oxygen OS's behavior a form of "benchmark manipulation." OnePlus has yet to issue a statement on the matter. In some of our own testing, we found that AnandTech's data is on the mark. We found that the OnePlus 9 series limits the performance of Google Chrome while older OnePlus phones do not. OnePlus issued a statement to Android Authority addressing the matter: "Our top priority is always delivering a great user experience with our products, based in part on acting quickly on important user feedback. Following the launch of the OnePlus 9 and 9 Pro in March, some users told us about some areas where we could improve the devices' battery life and heat management. As a result of this feedback, our R&D team has been working over the past few months to optimize the devices' performance when using many of the most popular apps, including Chrome, by matching the app's processor requirements with the most appropriate power. This has helped to provide a smooth experience while reducing power consumption. While this may impact the devices' performance in some benchmarking apps, our focus as always is to do what we can to improve the performance of the device for our users."

This is reminiscent of when the company was caught pushing the OnePlus 5's performance capabilities when the OS detected a benchmark app. This resulted in artificially inflated scores that users would not see during real-world usage.

VW engineers

[Anonymous Coward]

Did OnePlus hire VW engineers???

Not sure what to think

[Xenx]

Because OnePlus' reason is logical, I would give them the benefit of the doubt. Optimizing performance IS something manufacturers are doing. That said, I don't know what to think about the results as they pertain to benchmarks. Largely, benchmark results mean very little. Further, it sounds like OnePlus isn't targeting the benchmark software but merely optimizing certain uses that the benchmark software emulates.

The problem then comes down to the fact that the results of the benchmark would be valid, as any actions that meet the specific criteria would see the boost. But, it also means that the benchmark results would be even less relevant.

Re:

[tlhIngan]

Because OnePlus' reason is logical, I would give them the benefit of the doubt. Optimizing performance IS something manufacturers are doing. That said, I don't know what to think about the results as they pertain to benchmarks. Largely, benchmark results mean very little. Further, it sounds like OnePlus isn't targeting the benchmark software but merely optimizing certain uses that the benchmark software emulates.

The problem then comes down to the fact that the results of the benchmark would be valid, as any

Re:Not sure what to think

[Xenx]

I agree that making it an option for the user is optimal. Short of that, optimizing for performance or battery based on when it matters most makes sense. I'm not giving OnePlus an automatic pass. I'm just saying there needs to be evidence of intentional abuse before I'll agree with Geekbench. Unless it can be shown that the optimizations were placed with the intent of gaming the benchmark, or only work with the benchmark, then it's not benchmark manipulation. It becomes a discussion about whether they should/shouldn't be optimizing, not a discussion about whether they're trying to cheat at benchmarks.,

Re:

[I've Got Three Cats]

I agree that intent is the key issue here. But I also think that OnePlus has to be careful about how they let users take control of balancing power and battery life. Most consumers of electronics are notoriously uninterested in learning about the product they just bought. They're interested in their expectations being met. I think OnePlus would need to be concerned about the few people who max performance on a game or some other app and then go on SM to complain vociferously about how shitty the phone's bat

Re:

[Xenx]

To be fair, playing games tends to drain the battery rather quick regardless. There is the OnePlus Games. It's been a couple years for me, so not sure what all is included in there. But, it does allow for config options on a per game basis. So, really, the settings are already there to adjust performance. I just don't know if it allows to adjust to the full max power or not.

Re:

[jellomizer]

You are not a jury in a court of law on this.
There isn't any real need to be non-bias about OnePlus intentions on abuse. It comes down to you as someone who may buy one of their products or not. If their benchmarks scores cannot be trusted for real world comparison with its competitors would you buy the product or not?

Cell phones while rather inexpensive for the value they provide you in general, are still not cheap, and if you are going to get a new device, their price point is often high enough to not

Re:

[Xenx]

I agree with what they're doing, but not necessarily how they present(or don't) it to the user.

Re:

[sabbede]

That doesn't quite sound like what's happening though. They aren't boosting performance for the benchmark, they're throttling performance on some common programs to extend battery life. So the benchmark results are accurate in regards to the capabilities of the phone, but don't reflect the performance of Chrome, which still runs fast enough so that you won't notice it has been throttled. Which is fine, so long as they don't throttle applications that need all the power they can be given, like games and A

Re: Not sure what to think

[beelsebob]

Itâ(TM)s âoelogicalâ in that itâ(TM)s a marketing speak way of saying âoethe device canâ(TM)t maintain the amount of power draw we allow in benchmarks, so we âoptimisedâ(TM) the power draw to a sustainable level in the apps we think users will use for a long time.â

Re:

[Xenx]

Well, it's about balancing performance and battery draw. Having it be a user option is ideal, but short of that.. restricting performance where it's less noticeable to the user to save battery makes sense.

Re:

[The MAZZTer]

This sounds a lot like when Apple was caught optimizing battery life for older iPhones by limiting performance to ensure the battery lasted a day. I personally think many people would have gone for that option over having a battery that won't last the day, even though they decried Apple for planned obsolescence. The reason for it makes a lot of sense and it's easy to see how a performance dip from this feature would have the unforeseen consequence of pushing customers to new hardware (the question remains w

Re:

[jellomizer]

Like a lot of things in life, It isn't what you do, your intentions, or the rightness of the ideology, but how you do it.

Reducing performance to extend battery life is a good thing, but you should let us know that it is happening, so we can choose to get a new battery, vs thinking our device is just getting slow.

Having the device speed up on the apps that request extra speed is a good thing too, but we need to know that is happening and if it may tradeoff battery life or overall life of the product, as well

Re:

[jellomizer]

At work we have a ticket tracking system. Upper management runs reports on it as general benchmarks on the activity and effectiveness of the IT Departments (granted it isn't the only one, but it is a factor). We one of the metrics is how long does it take for us to work on a case. We had found one department had installed a secondary ticket tracking system, and they used that instead of the official one, so what they would do is when a ticket comes in they would close it on the official system, and open

Autoduping

[Anonymous Coward]

Geekbench, one of the more popular benchmarking sites, took these allegations seriously. After conducting its own investigation, Geekbench recently announced that it has removed all OnePlus 9 benchmarks from its charts.

Geekbench, one of the more popular benchmarking sites, took these allegations seriously. After conducting its own investigation, Geekbench recently announced that it has removed all OnePlus 9 benchmarks from its charts.

Geekbench, one of the more popular benchmarking sites, took these allegations seriously. After conducting its own investigation, Geekbench recently announced that it has removed all OnePlus 9 benchmarks from its charts.

Re:

[Falos]

OnePlus has yet to issue a statement on the matter

OnePlus issued a statement to Android Authority addressing the matter

Slashdot herppyssue derpy durpadatement hurpa derrmatturrrr

Re:

[Bu11etmagnet]

I repeat myself when under stress
I repeat myself when under stress
I repeat myself when under stress
I repeat myself when under stress
I repeat-
                        -- King Crimson, Indiscipline

https://genius.com/King-crimso... [genius.com]

Hmmm.

[msauve]

>Android Authority reports:"After conducting its own investigation, Geekbench recently announced that it has removed all OnePlus 9 benchmarks from its charts. Geekbench, one of the more popular benchmarking sites, took these allegations seriously. After conducting its own investigation, Geekbench recently announced that it has removed all OnePlus 9 benchmarks from its charts."

So, do Android Authority authors get paid by the word?

Re:

[Krishnoid]

Nah, it's probably a glitch in the matrix [youtu.be].

Yet they let iPhone to remain?

[Kitkoan]

So they are removing the OnePlus 9 for gaming the numbers, yet allowed the iPhone to stay even though it was caught gaming the numbers by overclocking their chips for 2.5-3 minutes to make them appear much faster than they really are? (and then the iPhone has to slow down to run at its realistic running speeds, which it can really handle for more then a short burst)
Fair and honest..

Re:Yet they let iPhone to remain?

[Bert64]

Most processors throttle up for a short time, and then throttle back when they get too hot. Intel for instance call this "turbo boost".
In many cases, applications which have high processor demands are bursty so the temporary overclocking allows those actions requiring more resources to complete quicker.

ULPT

[UnixUnix]

>This is reminiscent of when the company was caught pushing the OnePlus 5's performance capabilities when the OS detected a benchmark app. This resulted in artificially inflated scores that users would not see during real-world usage.

1. Install benchmark

2. Keep it forever

3. Profit!!