OnePlus 12 could be partly made from trees

The OnePlus 12 leaks continue as we near the China launch event on 4 December (a global release is expected in January), and the latest suggests a natural material may be involved.

An image posted by leaker Digital Chat Station - who has a relatively good track record with this kind of thing - shows a hand holding a device bearing a OnePlus logo - but the rear appears to be made from wood.

The auto-translated (by Alibaba Cloud) wording which appears alongside the image reads "OnePlus 12 this time has a classic wood grain shell" - which doesn't exactly make it clear if the wooden finish is the actual rear plate of the handset, or just a case option which will be made available alongside the phone.

Haven’t we seen this before?

This is far from the first time we've seen OnePlus experiment with wood-effect finish for its cases. Go all the way back to 2014 and a bamboo style case was offered alongside the original OnePlus One - so perhaps this move is a nod to its first device as the company prepares to celebrate its tenth anniversary.

It's more likely the image shows a case with a wood-effect finish rather than the actual rear of the OnePlus 12, and we wouldn't be surprised if it’s actually a different material made to look like wood grain. Although, we have seen manufacturers experiment with materials for the rear of handsets - who can forget the leather-clad LG G4? So we're not ruling out a real-wood finish entirely.

OnePlus even experimented with a different material for a special edition of the OnePlus 11. Known as the Jupiter Rock edition in China, and Marble Odyssey in India, the rear finish was made from 3D microcrystalline rock - a material which OnePlus claimed had a 25% lower manufacturing efficiency, and 50% less yield than glass.

The OnePlus 12 is shaping up to be one of the best Android phones for 2024 with a powerful 64MP camera, 100W wired charging, 50W wireless charging, a super-bright 2600 nits screen, and Qualcomm's new Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset all touted to feature in the flagship device.

It may not arrive alone either, with a 'series' of phones rumoured for launch and talk of a OnePlus 12R has been swirling online. With the China launch for the OnePlus 12 now a little over a week away, we'll soon find out how this intriguing wooden finish is incorporated.