This underrated OnePlus 13 feature came very well on my vacation

I realize that having three phones on you at all times is a little overkill for the average person, but I use each one quite a bit every day for something, whether it’s snapping a picture, taking a screen or acting as a hotspot for my other devices.

Recently I took an 11-day cruise through the Canary Islands and surrounding areas. During this trip I was very happy that I had OnePlus 13, especially with me in my luggage. A little known feature on the phone came in really handy: the infrared (IR) blaster.

An IR blast is not a common feature of even the best Android phones these days. A decade ago many phones had one but just as with MicroSD card track and HeadphoneIR Blasters was phased out. I actually think OnePlus 13 and its Central Tier siblings, OnePlus 13rare the only two phones from the past year with an IR blast that you can buy in the United States.

Having the opportunity to send and receive IR signals on your smartphone is incredibly useful for many reasons. For me, on a cruise, what came very well about it, its ability to blast signals to Samsung -TV in my room. By downloading a Universal Remote Control app from the Play Store, I could use OnePlus 13 as a TV remote control, so I can bypass some of the limitations set on the TV with the cruise line.

For those of you who are not aware of the TVs in the room in some cruise ships and hotels tend to have customized software on the TVs that limit you to just use them to watch hotel-sanctioned content. For example, I couldn’t use the TV remote control (or even the TV) to switch entrances in the living room of the ship. This prevented me from connecting my laptop to watch movies from my Plex server, play video games, etc.

With a universal external app on OnePlus 13, I could bypass this restriction. Once I had set up everything, I could switch inputs, change the channel, turn up the volume up/down and much more using the phone. This saved the day on a rainy, on Seventh Day where the family and I bored. We have all stacked into my state and looked at CasablancaWhich would be impossible without OnePlus 13.

Although I was so glad that OnePlus 13 had an IR blaster for cruise, I can’t help but wonder how much longer the phones come with this often–iced feature. That said, very few phones in the United States have an IR blast, and it also becomes less popular in other parts of the world. If you are watching This list of all phones launched in 2024 and later with an IR blastYou will see many brand names, such as Samsung, Google, Apple, Motorola and Sony. It looks like BBK brands (Vivo, Oppo, OnePlus and Realme) and Xiaomi brands (Xiaomi, Redmi and Poco) are mostly keeping the light for IR Blasters right now.

I have no idea how many people actually use the IR blaster, but I can’t imagine there are too many, considering everyone with a galaxy phone or iPhone (most people in the US) don’t have one. Without that mass of people to keep the function alive, IR blasters are not long for this world – at least in the US market.

Still, I was glad that OnePlus 13 had one on a cruise. Now I know to always hold a phone equipped with an IR blaster in the luggage for trips. You never know when it can come in handy!

Do you trust an IR blaster in your smartphone, or do you use another device for it, such as a flipper zero? Do you want your phone to have an IR blaster? Let me know in the comments and be sure to respond to our vote at the beginning of this article!