There has been a lot of discussion online to where you should buy your OnePlus One from. Basically it comes down to either getting and invite and buying from OnePlus or buying from a Chinese reseller. Here are my views based on personal experience.
If you have been following the news, hype, reviews and scandals, you are probably chomping at the bit to get your hands on the OnePlus One, and as you all already know it isn’t as simple as just ordering the phone online.
For those of you outside of China the OnePlus One can only be bought officially from OnePlus after receiving an invitation. Just getting an invite takes months so it is not surprising to see fans order directly from China.
For your information I have been fortunate enough to order the OnePlus One with an invitation and also from a Chinese reseller. My views, opinions and experience of both are below.
Buying the OnePlus One from OnePlus with invitation
First step to buying the OnePlus One officially through OnePlus was to get an invitation. I was lucky enough to receive an invite from a fan of GizChina.it.
With the invite all I had to do was log in to my OnePlus Account and buy the phone. For me the step was a little simpler as I already had an account. Once logged in I wanted to order the OPO from within the UK but have it sent to Spain (as I was traveling). This caused a problem as the OnePlus system checks which IP you are signed in from and will only allow you to set up payment and shipping to that same country. To get around this I simply logged out, turned on my VPN and logged back in with Spanish IP.
Once the order was complete and all paid for all I had to do was wait. Wait I did until I, and many other customers, received the email saying that due to design choices on the rear of the Oneplus One the phone would be delayed for 2 weeks as customs wouldn’t release them. To apologise for the delay OnePlus offered us a free case, this still hasn’t arrived.
The customs issue was fixed and I had a message saying my OPO was on the way to be delivered! Great! I also received another email from OnePlus warning me that DHL were asking customers to pay customs tax on their orders even though the customs had already been paid. The advice given was to tell DHL this and hope they wouldn’t want the tax, or pay the tax and receive a refund.
Not wanting to wait any longer I paid the 50 Euros tax and sent the receipts to OnePlus who said they would refund me soon. That was 2 weeks ago and still nothing.
At least I had my phone right? Yes, but why was my OnePlus set up in French Canadian when it arrived? Why didn’t I get the normal set up screen on first boot? This suggests to me I am not the only person to have receive this phone….
Gizchina News of the week
OnePlus One Global version unboxing
Buying the OnePlus One from a Chinese reseller
Choosing a reseller to buy from was quite easy. Lenteen.fr (they also run sites in a number of European languages) contacted me saying they had stock, and so I decided to use them.
No invitation was needed to buy from Lenteen, and once I added the phone to my shopping basket I paid for the phone and shipping and waited. The next day I received an email with order confirmation and the tracking number, again using DHL.
One week passed and an SMS to my phone indicated I had to pay customs on my phone. I was still in the UK and the customs cost was just £3. The next day I had the Chinese version of the OnePlus One in my hands.
Lenteen even offered to install CM11S for me at no extra charge, and were kind enough to send instructions to me on how to do it when I told them I would install the ROM myself.
Buying a OnePlus One from a reseller vs. officially my experience – Conclusion
In my own personal experience, ordering the OnePlus One directly from China was simpler, faster, cheaper and generally a more enjoyable experience. On the other hand I am still waiting for my free cover from OnePlus Global and also my customs refund. Not to mention the mystery as to why my phone seemed to have already been used.
Perhaps I was extremely unlucky and this was a random one off. I will be very interested to hear from OnePlus owners who have bought their phones officially with invitation and through Chinese resellers to hear your views and opinions on the process. Your comments could help future OnePlus buyers with a difficult choice to make.
Thanks Andi for your experience ! I got an invite and ordered from oneplus/fr… It was straitforward too (already had an account too). So now, I’m waiting for mine from DHL too, but I have no idea about where it is sent from: EU, China ? Considering the price in €, i would say EU… Anyway, i’ll share the final chapter with GizChina followers asap:)
Will i get invites afterward ? If so, i’ll let you know. 😉
If you post your query on their forum, all they do is lock down and delete.
They’re really tyrant-like about covering up their goof ups so people outside wouldn’t come to know.
Trust me when I tell you I have the phone and when I’m an old time forum member.
You are lucky enough to pay only £3 for Customs. Is the Oneplus One CE certified?
The £3 was for the Chinese version which I think is very cheap. The offiicial global model cost me 50 Euros tax and that was from OnePlus not a reseller.
How come you guys are paying tax where you shouldn’t be. There was some misunderstanding for a while and they resolved it. And I can vouch for this as I am an early member, bought OPO from them got shipped it to EU and never paid any extra money.
If you guys in EU are paying 20 % VAT and OPO is covering that cost, that’s like giving you a 20% discount on the price of the phone. Great for people in EU but not so good for other countries that have no VAT
Obviously still unresolved
It depends on the value declared by the shipper.
lol They have been closing and blocking threads the last 30 minutes on flashing the Chinese model with Cyanogen one of the mods closed the discussion saying people will be upset to know their not the same identical build as the international
I guess they think people are stupid or something lol pretty sad they lock everything that someone has a voice or i think this phone is not the right choice for anyone who wants customer service it’s dead with this phone
https://forums.oneplus.net/threads/opo-buying-experience-invitation-vs-reseller.56389/#post-2579668
I’d like to have a OnePlus One really, but i am not sure if the chinese reseller are trustful… so i will wait for an invite. It needs time… a lot of time and i also have to have patience. Hopefully anybody share an invite with me.
At this point I am beyond aggravated with the way OPO does business. I will wait till the new flagships are released (all with better specs) and pay a little extra rather than give such a shady company my money. The Mi4 perhaps?
Fully agree
My journey USA:
1. Received invite
2. Try to order – out of stock
3. Write to support – 5 minutes – problem solved
4. Order phone
5. Next day received track number
6. Two more days – phone on hands.
my Journey ITA :
1. Received invite
2. Didn’t see it
3. Expired Invite
4. No Oneplus One
Thanks Andi for your experience ! I got an invite and ordered from oneplus/fr… It was straitforward too (already had an account too). So now, I’m waiting for mine from DHL too, but I have no idea about where it is sent from: EU, China ? Considering the price in €, i would say EU… Anyway, i’ll share the final chapter with GizChina followers asap:)
Will i get invites afterward ? If so, i’ll let you know. 😉
If you post your query on their forum, all they do is lock down and delete.
They’re really tyrant-like about covering up their goof ups so people outside wouldn’t come to know.
Trust me when I tell you I have the phone and when I’m an old time forum member.
You are lucky enough to pay only £3 for Customs. Is the Oneplus One CE certified?
The £3 was for the Chinese version which I think is very cheap. The offiicial global model cost me 50 Euros tax and that was from OnePlus not a reseller.
How come you guys are paying tax where you shouldn’t be. There was some misunderstanding for a while and they resolved it. And I can vouch for this as I am an early member, bought OPO from them got shipped it to EU and never paid any extra money.
If you guys in EU are paying 20 % VAT and OPO is covering that cost, that’s like giving you a 20% discount on the price of the phone. Great for people in EU but not so good for other countries that have no VAT
It depends on the value declared by the shipper.
Obviously still unresolved
lol They have been closing and blocking threads the last 30 minutes on flashing the Chinese model with Cyanogen one of the mods closed the discussion saying people will be upset to know their not the same identical build as the international
I guess they think people are stupid or something lol pretty sad they lock everything that someone has a voice or i think this phone is not the right choice for anyone who wants customer service it’s dead with this phone
https://forums.oneplus.net/threads/opo-buying-experience-invitation-vs-reseller.56389/#post-2579668
I’d like to have a OnePlus One really, but i am not sure if the chinese reseller are trustful… so i will wait for an invite. It needs time… a lot of time and i also have to have patience. Hopefully anybody share an invite with me.
At this point I am beyond aggravated with the way OPO does business. I will wait till the new flagships are released (all with better specs) and pay a little extra rather than give such a shady company my money. The Mi4 perhaps?
Fully agree
My journey USA:
1. Received invite
2. Try to order – out of stock
3. Write to support – 5 minutes – problem solved
4. Order phone
5. Next day received track number
6. Two more days – phone on hands.
my Journey ITA :
1. Received invite
2. Didn’t see it
3. Expired Invite
4. No Oneplus One
anyone interested in purchasing invite. please contact me. I have one Invite for New Cyanogen11s OnePlus One phone 64 GB Sandstone Black. email: cklalit@yahoo.co.in
anyone interested in purchasing invite. please contact me. I have one Invite for New Cyanogen11s OnePlus One phone 64 GB Sandstone Black. email: cklalit@yahoo.co.in
Every time he said “cyogenmod”, I died a little inside.
I received my early supporter invite on 8th of July, ordered it the same afternoon and got it in my mail on friday, 11th. All went great, all I got is the Google Play-Service Bug, but there is no yellow tint and the device is just perfect.
Think it’s not a difficult choice at all.
If you live in country which is officially supported, I see no reason to buy from China reseller because 1. Costs 80 to 100$ more 2. Long waiting, damages to packages 3. Customs 4. LTE frequencies 5. Needs expertise to flash CM11
My workaround.
Register in USA site with USA proxy and adress of postforwarding service.
Visit, log in to forums once a week.
After two months, yesterday got my invite
Important, enter before buy and pay process under USA proxy.
It your IP adress not USA, you cannot access your cart to pay and checkout.
Bought 64GB black for 360.99$ very happy to replace my Nexus5, to be sold soon
To celebrate victory I bought a Coolpad 7236 for 71$
Every time he said “cyogenmod”, I died a little inside.
I received my early supporter invite on 8th of July, ordered it the same afternoon and got it in my mail on friday, 11th. All went great, all I got is the Google Play-Service Bug, but there is no yellow tint and the device is just perfect.
Think it’s not a difficult choice at all.
If you live in country which is officially supported, I see no reason to buy from China reseller because 1. Costs 80 to 100$ more 2. Long waiting, damages to packages 3. Customs 4. LTE frequencies 5. Needs expertise to flash CM11
My workaround.
Register in USA site with USA proxy and adress of postforwarding service.
Visit, log in to forums once a week.
After two months, yesterday got my invite
Important, enter before buy and pay process under USA proxy.
It your IP adress not USA, you cannot access your cart to pay and checkout.
Bought 64GB black for 360.99$ very happy to replace my Nexus5, to be sold soon
To celebrate victory I bought a Coolpad 7236 for 71$