The one thing you could not fault OnePlus for this year was its lack of range: it sold phones to impress and sold even more of them to respect the buyer's budget. But there was a clearly-defined gap between the Nord series and the OnePlus 8 entries this year that could be filled. Indeed, we heard earlier that the company intends to fill that gap in 2021 and are now learning more about how it will be filled.

What turned out to be the original Nord phone began its life at the rumor mills more or less as the "OnePlus 8 Lite." But it may be the case, Android Central reports, that there will be a OnePlus 9 Lite that will be released and marketed alongside the OnePlus 9 and 9 Pro next quarter. It will also tow the current-gen Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 as its powerhouse against the latter two's Snapdragon 888. Other hardware details are guesswork at the moment, but they include 65W wired charging and the same cameras to the OnePlus 8T.

Likewise at this moment, OnePlus stands as a company out of sorts with episodic downsizing, executive turnover, and, possibly very related to the turnover, a cohesive void in its product strategy. Of course, the OnePlus 9 comes at a time when consumer demand may be wiped out in a post-holiday pandemic economy — that, in itself, has led to plenty of financial uncertainty for businesses — with no clear path of recovery moving forward.