When it comes down to it, these days our phones are our digital lifelines. They know our daily lives as well, if not better than we do. They travel with us, help us pay for things, stay in touch with our social circles, share ideas, and hold moments in memory. They are more than phones, and I debate the accuracy of the label ‘smartphone’ these days. They really are what the term ‘personal digital assistant’ was meant to mean. with that in mind, performance is still a driving factor in our decision on which of the many offerings available is the right one for us. When phones are released in a family of 3, the high-end unit is always the star of the show, while the Lite variant is usually the one most likely to be seen as the best value because they usually carry an affordable-but-premium impression. It’s the middle variant that is often skipped over in the battle between price vs premium. In this case, that would be a big mistake, because this is not really a middle child – it sits closer to the Pro than it does the Lite, and as such may prove to be better than just another balancing act between those two motivators.
When it first arrived and I went through the setup, I found myself genuinely taken with all of the charm, and many of the features, of the Pro that it carried. It doesn’t have the same glass back panel of the Pro, but that was actually a huge plus for me, as the matte finish on this unit is amazingly resistant to fingerprints. This provides you with a reassuring amount of grip in your hands – an important factor in a phone that still rides in above the $1,000 mark. Because I take my phone on travel trips, and will often need to have it in-hand while I’m doing activities such as ziplining, hot air ballooning, or parasailing over Lake Taupo, a phone that feels secure in my hand is something I prize highly. Comparing this unit to the Pro, one could be forgiven for mixing them up until you start to notice small details. The camera cutout on the back carries a slight ridge around its edge where it meets the curved back plate, whereas the Pro version does not. Apart from that, the only other external difference is the Pro is a few millimetres longer and wider… but you would be very hard-pressed to spot that without having both units in your hand.
The real differences lie inside – however rather than fill this review with a face-to-face comparison, I instead want to focus on what this unit does well, and leave the comparison to you.
The phone is definitely designed for right-hand usage by preference, with the power button on the right and the volume controls sitting neatly under your index and middle fingers on the left edge. With the under-screen fingerprint reader being positioned almost exactly where your thumb would land if you wrap it over while holding it one-handed, it was comfortable to use without straining. Even using the pop-up keypad to enter the unlock PIN – which the phone requires you to do if you have only used the thumbprint or facial recognition unlock for more than 72 hours – one-handed was comfortable, with all the buttons within easy reach. Once trained, the thumbprint scanner worked perfectly, and I rarely had to reposition my thumb for a second-try scan. Though the facial recognition worked really well at the start, I did have to retrain it after I decided to shave my beard all the way down to stubble – apparently, that was enough of a difference that I was no longer recognisable. Not a big thing, but worth noting for males who proudly wear the face forest, but not always in the same style.
Even with the older SnapDragon 888 processor installed – the same one that drove the Find X3 Pro – this is a zippy beast, able to keep up with a good pace all day and not let you down. The built-in Game Mode helps a lot, closing off unnecessary notifications, background services, and anything else that doesn’t need to be running while you are playing. This, and the powerful combination of lower power demands from the CPU, advanced optimisations in the latest iteration of ColorOS and a 4,800MAh battery mean that for moderate users, charging every second day may be more the rule than the exception. With the SuperVOOC 80W charger supplied, it is possible to go from 20% to full power in a little over half an hour. If you prefer wireless charging, this unit is Qi-compatible and with AirVOOC 30W max charging, putting the unit on the charge plate overnight is more than sufficient to give you a full tank to start the day. Suitable charge plates are readily available through third-party online sellers for under $50 and will probably become your go-to charging solution very quickly. If you have your phone in a case, you may want to watch the heat, but if you prefer to keep your phone “bare” then heat dissipates quickly thanks to the design of the case.
This device is ready to run when the 5G network fully rolls out in New Zealand, however at the moment the telco’s only supply SIMs that work on the 3G and 4G networks, so the fact that this phone can handle so much more is more about future-proofing than taking advantage of the extra bandwidth right away. However, even on 4G I found the data transfers to be smooth and as fast as is needed right now. I don’t upload directly to the cloud from the phone because I have a bad habit of blowing through my accumulated data when I go travelling and find it easier to migrate all the big files direct to the workstation via WiFi or Bluetooth. Still, if you find yourself needing Google Maps suddenly, and you have at least 3 bars, you won’t be standing there tapping your toes waiting for directions to your next destination. Streamed movies played well, and browsing YouTube or picking up the stream from the VR headset proved to be free from buffer-lag. However, I did find that the onboard speakers left a little to be desired, for the simple fact that trying to get true deep bass out of the tiny thin box like this is almost trying to break the laws of physics. They did as well as could be expected, but you’ll certainly want to connect to a Bluetooth speaker if you want to party or get lost in the game.
The screen really is the star of the phone, able to display 1080x2400pixels thanks to its subtle wrap around the left and right sides. Not always ideal if you use apps that place controls down the sides, it still allowed the screen to have some extra real estate without making the whole phone wider and still keep the smoother feel the rounded edges provide. The combination of OPPO’s 1-billion-colour display and 120Hz refresh rate really shines here, especially if you are gaming or watching video with a lot of fast action. The crispness and rapid refresh mean that movement looks more natural and less like a bad outtake from The Flash. In particular, this technology comes to the fore when you switch into the camera app and start shooting video. Even still images benefit from this, with the AI enhancements really making photos pop and come to life. But the real jaw-dropper is the night mode – the photo attached to this review is a great example – to my eyes, the night was nearly pitch black with the lights twinkling across the bay, but as you can see, the Find X5 found clouds above, waves in the water below, and even the small details of driftwood on the beach – none of which I could see until I was almost standing on them. You don’t even need to select modes, in most cases, with the phone simply setting itself to the most appropriate mode to make the best out of whatever situation it finds itself in.
Get really close to an object, and macro mode is automatically activated, bringing those tiny details into sharp relief. Activate the camera in low-light conditions and night mode is automatically configured to find the best image in the darkness. And joy of joys, the long-exposure mode is here – the one set of modes I have been missing since I switched to OPPO. All the fun of writing with sparklers, seeing turbulent streams become silky ribbons of foggy glass, watching as car headlights and tail lights leave glowing neon streaks in the air as they zoom past. Taking time and warping it to suit your image needs has become simplicity itself. The AI enhancer brings colour and clarity, image stabilisation and HDR to the palm of your hand, and the partnership with Hasselblad has also brought new advancements. I found that older phones would have different colour casts depending on whether I was using the macro, regular or wide-angle cameras, but Hasselblad’s Natural Colour Calibration technology goes a very long way to evening out the tones, making your photos look consistent no matter which of the cameras you use.
While the camera boasts 20x zoom, it’s important to note that what you actually get is 2x optical zoom and the rest is just digital expansion – made a lot better by having 50MP images to work from as a base. That said, I was impressed at how good the images were at 5x zoom – I struggled to find any significant digital artefacts. As expected, the images did degrade as the zoom climbed, but even at 20x zoom the images were fairly clear and quite recognisable. More so than I would have thought, so there’s some serious number-crunching going on under the hood. That will be down to OPPO’s own MariSilicon X neural-processing chip – a hardware enhancement system that pushes this range ahead of its peers in many regards. It also did an astounding job with panoramic shots, providing seamless stitching and consistent colour across the sweep. This is most obvious taking sunrise/sunset panoramas, where the intensity and saturation can vary wildly as you pan across the vista in front of you.
One of the modes I tend to use a lot is Macro, and I am used to swiping across the options list to find it, however, I discovered that it’s no longer a selectable option, but is now an automatic mode that the camera software will switch on or off depending on how close you are to a subject. This can prove a blessing to those who sometimes want to capture that perfect moment in a bumblebee’s flight or a preying mantic cleaning its forelegs but forget to change modes first. However, there are situations where that’s more a hindrance than a help, and I found myself having to compromise the composition in order to avoid the camera flipping macro mode on and off seemingly at random. Having the ability to manually force macro on or off would be a good item to return, and should be simply a software patch – worth considering. There are many other modes available – a surprising number actually – and I won’t go into them all. Suffice it to say, OPPO have always had a focus on photography, and the partnership with Hasselblad was a stroke of genius. It has set the bar extremely high, and I can’t wait to see where the next step up from here will be. If you use your phone as your primary camera, it’s an exciting future to contemplate.
Overall, if you prefer to stick with an Android-based platform and have a high degree of interest in a phone’s photographic capabilities, then this is certainly worth considering. While a little higher priced than its competitors, there’s something about this device that will appeal, and the software is definitely more focused on digital creatives. ColorOS 12 has so many aesthetic customisation capabilities that you will have no trouble quickly making this phone your own. Setting theme colours automatically based on your chosen wallpaper, reshaping icons, changing placements and layouts, setting audio themes to match your style, and so much more. It still suffers a little from pre-installed bloatware, but most of it can be uninstalled completely, while the rest can easily be hidden from sight. While there are undoubtedly reasons to jump up to the Pro model, this is definitely not a “compromise” design.
Rating:
Posted in partnership with: KIWIreviews.nz
Disclosure Statement: This unit was supplied by OPPO expressly for the purposes of review. No fee was offered or accepted for this impartial review.
Key Features:
– 5G connectivity
– Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 processor
– 6.55 inch FHD AMOLED display
– 120Hz refresh rate
– Triple rear-camera setup (50MP wide-angle + 50MP ultra-wide + 13MP telephoto) with MariSilicon X Imaging NPU and Hasselblad – Experience for Mobile
– 32MP front-facing camera
– 4,800mAh
– 8GB RAM
– 256GB storage
– Fingerprint and facial recognition unlocking
– ColorOS 12.1 based on Android 12
– Black and White colourways
– Cabled Charging: 80W (SuperVOOC – 40 minutes to full)
– Wireless Charging: 30W (AirVOOC / Qi-compatible)
You can read the original press release [-here-]