Oppo Reno8 5G: stunning design, standout performance and super-fast charging
The Oppo Reno8 in Shimmer Black colourway — in certain light you can see a tint of navy. Picture: Noel Campion.
While flagship smartphones continue to get more expensive, the mid-range market has never been so popular and competitive. The Oppo Reno8 has a lot of premium features and performance for those who are looking for a more affordable handset.
The Oppo Reno8 inherits its design from the Reno8 Pro and is available in Shimmer Gold and Shimmer Black. My review unit was the latter with a streamlined unibody design and although the back is plastic, it still feels premium in the hand. Plastic is more practical too since it doesn’t shatter like glass if dropped. The black version doesn’t show fingerprints thanks to the textured finish so there are fewer reasons to put a case on it. When viewed at certain angles the black appears to be two-tone with a tint of navy — an elegant look for sure.
The camera module has unapologetic large circles that surround the two main cameras. While not as large as the Reno8 Pro, it does protrude on the top left-hand side but is seamlessly bevelled with a rounded corner that nicely matches the four corners of the phone.
At 7.67mm thick and 179g in weight, the Reno8 feels slim and sleek in the hand. On the bottom edge is a USB-C port for charging along with the dual SIM tray (SIM 1 5G, SIM 2 4G), which doesn’t include support for a microSD card.
Around the front, you’ll find a small punch-hole for the selfie camera in the top left corner of the display. Oppo includes a preinstalled screen protector, which is always welcome. The screen is protected by Gorilla Glass 5.
The Reno8 uses face identification and an optical under-display fingerprint sensor for authentication and both worked well during my testing.
The 6.4-inch FHD AMOLED display has a 90Hz refresh rate, which adds a noticeable boost in smoothness when scrolling and swiping through the UI. While some phones in this price range offer 120Hz, I find the jump less noticeable from 90Hz to 120Hz than I do from 60Hz to 90Hz. The refresh rate isn’t variable — you can only lock it at 60Hz or 90Hz.
The large screen is relatively bright at 430 nits typical and up to 800 nits peak. Colours are accurate or vibrant depending on which colour profile you choose in the display settings. And of course, you get those nice inky blacks with amazing contrast. For those that care, the Reno8 doesn’t support HDR, but all of the content I watched on it still looked great.
The Reno8 comes with dual stereo speakers – one is bottom-firing on the bottom edge while the other doubles as the loudspeaker on the top of the screen. The sound quality is only mediocre but can get loud with decent bass.
The Reno8 comes with 8GB of RAM (LPDDR4x) and 256GB of storage (UFS3.1), which is impressive for a handset in this price range. The MediaTek Dimensity 1300 chipset isn’t a powerhouse by flagship standards but still manages to make the Reno8 feel snappy and smooth for everyday tasks including scrolling through social feeds and web browsing.
The Reno8 is more than capable of gaming but don’t expect a great user experience on more demanding titles.
The Reno8 has a 4500mAh battery that should see a lot of users through two days of medium use. Oppo includes a USB-C cable and an 80W SuperVooC fast charger in the box, which is great for a quick top-up. Just 11 minutes on the charger will fill the battery to 50% and 30 minutes should bring you most of the way to full. Unfortunately, there’s no wireless charging option which is a pity.
The rear camera module comprises a main 50MP Sony IMX766 1/1.56” sensor, f/1.8, an 8MP ultra-angle lens f/2.2 and a 2Mp macro lens. The good news is the main camera is the same as the one found on the Reno8 Pro. The bad news is that it doesn’t have the same Marisilicon X NPU hardware that helps to enhance both photos and video.
In general, the main camera takes good photos, especially in good lighting. I was also impressed with indoor photos taken with less-than-ideal lighting conditions. Images were clean with good noise reduction and detail enhancements. The HDR was a bit hit-and-miss and sometimes colours were a little unnatural, but for the most part, the results were decent.
The 5MP wide-angle shooter is fine as long as the lighting is good, but the resolution doesn’t allow for a lot of detail, the dynamic range is limited and colours are not as good as the main camera.
The 2MP camera offers macro abilities with focusing as close as 4cm. The results are good but at only 2MP you can’t expect amazing detail.
Oppo packs a lot of excellent modes and features into their camera app including a Pro mode, Focus lock, a built-in level, Portrait distortion correction and Night mode.
The front selfie shooter has a 32MP Sony IMX709 sensor that produces good but not class-leading results.
Both 4K and 1080p videos can be recorded at frame rates up to 30 and 60, respectively. Although the 1080p ultra-steady setting reduces handshake, I thought the overall effect was unnatural.
The Reno8 comes with the latest Bluetooth 5.3 (SBC, AAC, aptX HD and LDAC), 5G and WiFi 6 (802.11ax).
The Oppo Reno8 offers a lot for a phone at a mid-range price. The sleek and stylish design makes it feel and look premium. The super fast charging tech is not only impressive but game-changing for those who are used to slow chargers. Performance is solid and 256GB of storage is a generous amount considering many others in this class offer half that. The main camera is excellent overall, but the others are nothing special and there’s no optical zoom only up to 20x digital.
Oppo Reno8 5G – Tesco Mobile €530 on prepay.
CONNECT WITH US TODAY
Be the first to know the latest news and updates
