I've reviewed many handhelds from OneXPlayer, and while the hardware is generally solid, each time I test a device I run into far more issues than I'd like. I'd given up on reviewing them, but something about the OneXFly F1 Pro called to me when it came across my inbox, and I decided to go ahead with it. To my surprise, I ended up really enjoying using this machine, and I could see myself picking it up more often in the future.

The OneXFly F1 Pro is probably the best gaming handheld I've ever used, and it's a big step up from anything the company has done before. The hardware design feels more polished than ever, the performance is fantastic, and the OLED screen is gorgeous. For most of the games I tested, this was the best I've ever seen them look on such a small device. This is a handheld console I can recommend — but only if you have obscene amounts of money to spend on it.

I also saved myself some frustrations by just using the device as it was shipped to me, rather than try to reset it and start fresh, which may have helped somewhat. The device is set to use a local account out of the box, and a lot of the typical Microsoft bloatware wasn't there, which frankly made for a better experience in the long run.

Pricing and availability

The OneXFly F1 Pro launched in November 2024 for pre-order through the company's official website, and it's been available ever since.

It starts at $1,099 (currently discounted to $959) for an AMD Ryzen 7 8840U, 32GB of RAM, and 1TB of storage. The review unit I got has an AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370, and costs $1,499 (currently $1,339), and there are other configuration options taking the price further up.

AMD Ryzen AI is fantastic for gaming

At this point, you can play basically anything

First things first, let's talk performance, because that's one of the things that drew me to this device. It's the first gaming handheld I had seen with AMD's Ryzen AI HX 300 series processors, and I was very curious to see what these new processors could enable for gaming handhelds. My unit came with a Ryzen AI 9 HX 370, along with 32GB of RAM and a 2TB SSD, so it's a fairly powerful configuration. It's worth noting that the entry level for this device actually starts with a Ryzen 7 8840U, and your experience will be significantly worse there.

That being said, the unit I got performed extremely well in gaming. I tested a lot of games running at 1080p (the screen's native resolution), and the handheld did very well across the board. Here's a quick roundup of the average framerates I saw in the games I tested. For clarity, I played these games for at least 10 minutes (usually much longer) and grabbed the average framerate captured by MSI Afterburner at the end:

As you can see, the handheld performed admirably even in more demanding games like Elden Ring and Cyberpunk. I included Bioshock Remastered because I'm used to throwing these handhelds a softball due to their relatively weak hardware, but as you can see, this machine is more than powerful enough for it. One thing I found weird was that this game actually ran worse at 30W and became nearly unplayable for some reason. While the average FPS was still high, there was a lot of stuttering, which was alleviated when running the game at a lower power setting. For Shadow Generations, it's worth mentioning that levels are relatively short and there are menus in between, so the transitions affected the average framerate a bit. Still, the game runs very smoothly in either power setting.

I also ran the usual suite of benchmarks so you have some more hard numbers to look at. Here's how it performed when set to 30W:

All in all, I was very impressed with how capable this handheld was, particularly when I was actually playing games. The relatively small 48.5Whr battery lasted about as long as you can expect considering the specs. I ran multiple test while playing the 3D games mentioned above, and when the power was set to 30W, the battery lasted between 66 minutes and 78 minutes. At 15W, that range was more between 103 minutes and 108 minutes. That means if you're playing demanding 3D games, battery life will almost certainly be below two hours, which is... alright, but not amazing. I did want to try something simpler, though, so I also played Vampire Survivors at 15W, and in that case, the battery lasted 3 hours, 43 minutes, and 49 seconds. It's definitely not the best battry life out there, but it's decent.

This OLED display is gorgeous

And just the right size, too

One of the best parts of the OneXFly F1 Pro is definitely the OLED display. This is a 7-inch 1080p panel, which is just right for the kind of handheld this is, and it looks beautiful. Like I mentioned at the top, most of the games I played during these tests have never looked this good on a handheld to me. Colors pop, blacks are deep, and the 144Hz refresh rate helps everything look extremely smooth. Games like Elden Ring and Apex Legends really stood out to me as a big jump over previous handhelds I've tried from OneXPlayer.

OneXPlayer touts brightness up to 800 nits and over 100% coverage of DCI-P3, which definitely helps explain why everything looks so great here. Of course, I did put those claims to the test with my colorimeter, so here's what the color coverage and tone response look like:

And here's the brightness and contrast at different brightness levels:

Of course, because it's an OLED display, contrast is virtually infinite since blacks are pure black. Because the screen is so small, I suspect some light bleed could be affecting the measurements for blacks with all the screen elements being so close to each other. Also, brightness doesn't hit the advertised maximum of 800 nits because this is the HDR brightness, which the SpyderX Pro sensor can't measure reliably. This is still one of the highest SDR brightness values I've seen on an OLED panel.

The most refined design from OneXPlayer yet

It feels great

I've tested out a bunch of OneXPlayer handhelds, and for the most part, the design has ranged from below average to just fine overall, but the OneXFly was the first time I actually enjoyed just looking at this device. Everything is polished up really nicely and it looks good. The shoulder buttons, D-pad, and the bar along the top where the ports are have a subtle blue sheen to them when the light hits them at the right angle, and it helps give the design this sense that it was made with care to look good. The RGB lighting also looks nice, with a ring light under both analog sticks and some bits of text showing the product's name also lighting up with RGB.

It feels very comfortable, too. The 7-inch display is still, in my opinion, the sweet spot for a handheld to feel comfortable and not too big, and it really allows for a great experience here. The soft curves all around the device's chassis make it very pleasant to hold, especially with the soft-touch finish on the plastic, and everything is designed just right for my hands to naturally grip around the handheld. OneXPLayer has really polished up the entire chassis with soft curves, so you can pick it up at any angle and it will still feel nice to hold.

Otherwise, the controls are about what you'd expect, but that's not a bad thing. All the buttons feel good to press, including the D-Pad, which can be hard to do sometimes. It has a soft, yet firm feel so you can press it confidently but without the discomfort of an overly clicky D-Pad.

There are a lot of buttons here that you might not recognize since they're exclusive to OneXPlayer, but they all do sort of useful things. One opens the OneXConsole overlay with power settings, RGB customization, and more. Another opens a dedicated on-screen keyboard that actually overlays anything you're doing, which is nice to have in some games. You can also hold this one down to enable mouse mode so you can use the analog stick as a mouse. Then there's a button on the left that takes you directly to the desktop, and a couple of extra buttons next to the shoulder buttons, which you can remap to anything. The volume rocker at the top is also very prominent and clicky, a definite upgrade over previous handhelds from the company.

Everything just comes together really well in this design, and I really enjoyed using this handheld. It doesn't ahve a fancy modular system like the Ayaneo 3, but it's still great.

Windows is still not made for this

But Steam helps

One thing that's interesting about the OneXFly F1 Pro is that it comes set up in a way that removes a lot of Microsoft's own apps from Windows 11, and I think it's an attempt to make the experience better. I didn't have to sign in with a Microsoft account during setup, which definitely made things less frustrating. My unit also came with Steam and the Epic Games Store installed out of the box, but Xbox was removed, interestingly enough. I believe this is actually meant to enhance the experience, though.

See, the extra shoulder button on the right side seems to be configured to be an Xbox button, which would usually open Game Bar. But with this app removed, the button will actually open Steam if it's running in the background, and once it's open, pressing it again enters Big Picture mode, which provides a very good handheld experience. Usually I like setting my PCs up from scratch with my Microsoft account, but the way this is set up feels very intentional to steer you towards Steam, which is the best gaming handheld experience you can get anyway, so I just rolled with it, and I liked it a lot. In my experience, once I was in Steam Big Picture Mode, Windows didn't get in the way all that much, so it was great to browse my library and choose the games to play that way.

Still, it's a bit weird, since this makes options like Xbox and the Epic Games Store second-class citizens, and using them forces you to deal with the clunk of Windows 11 on this kind of device. I suspect that's fine for most people, but the OneXConsole software has its own game launcher, so I'm wondering why OneXPlayer didn't just build an experience around it that can bring all your games together more seamlessly across different platforms. This is where things fall short compared to bigger companies like Asus or Lenovo, which can build more fully-fledged software experiences. Of course, Windows 11 should be providing this functionality at a native level, but the workaround OneXPlayer came up with could be a bit better.

Should you buy the OneXFly F1 Pro?

Ultimately, this handheld is still a hard one to recommend, but it's not for any fault of the hardware. This is easily the best handheld OneXPlayer has ever made, and likely one of the best handhelds in general. It's powerful, it has a stunning display, and the design is polished and comfortable, making it a joy to play.

The problem is the price. My configuration of the OneXFly F1 Pro is currently listed at $1,339, discounted from $1,499. Even at this discounted price, this is more than three times more expensive than the Steam Deck. More than 50% more expensive than the ROG Ally X or Lenovo Legion Go. Sure, those devices aren't quite as performant, but in the end, the experience overall isn't that different, and you're buying from a brand that will have more trouble providing support in Western markets.

It's simply incredibly hard to justify the prices OneXPlayer charges for this hardware when you can get very similar experiences, often with better software, for a much lower price. If you have the money to spend, it's worth a shot, but for most people, it's just too much.

You should buy the OneXFly F1 Pro if:

• You want some of the best performance in a gaming handheld
• You want one of the best displays around
• You have a lot of money to spend on it

You should NOT buy the OneXFly F1 Pro if:

• You're looking for the best value experience
• You're not comfortable with relying on overseas support
• You don't want to deal with Windows 11 on such a small screen