OPPO F5 First Impressions: The Camera Phone with a Gorgeous 18:9 Display

OPPO took the wraps off their latest mid-range flagship, the F5 in Kenya just the other day and we’ve had some time to play around with the device and experience it first hand. To recap, the highlights of the F5 include a 6-inch Full HD display with an 18:9 aspect ratio that means the phone’s body is kept small despite the screen size being that big. The other highlight of the F5 is the AI beautification mode, which falls in line with OPPO’s marketing strategy as the camera phone. The AI beautification mode will apparently highlight your facial features through machine learning, which we will test intensively.

Other features of the OPPO F5 include a MediaTek Helio P25 Octa-Core processor that is complemented by 4gigz of RAM and 32GB internal storage, which is expandable via MicroSD up to 256GB. The cameras on the OPPO F5 are a combo of a 16MP main camera and a 20MP selfie shooter. There’s a fingerprint reader on the back, that has quite an appealing design and the battery size of the device is 3200mAh, that should ideally last you through your day but we will test that out in our full review.

With the short time that I have spent with the OPPO F5 I must complement its design. The phone is really slim with a thickness of 7.5mm. The display is also a wonder. Like I mentioned earlier, the OPPO F5 takes up the new 18:9 aspect ratio making it one of the few phones available in the market to rock this new aspect ratio. Thanks to this, the phone is easily usable with one hand, something that I am sure most of you will appreciate.

Underneath ColorOS 3.2 is Android 7.1 Nougat but thanks to the heaviness of ColorOS, the device feels more like an iPhone than an Android, whether you’ll love this or not is up to you. The good thing is that this heavy skin does not seem to hinder the performance of the phone. So far, as early as it is, everything is snappy, apps load fast and multi-tasking is a breeze and I expect this not to change, going by my experience with the OPPO A71 a month or so ago.

OPPO has the F5 up for pre-order and you can pre-order one for Ksh.31,990 through Safaricom or at any OPPO brand shops before 27th November. On pre-order, OPPO will be offering several free accessories that will include an Official Barcelona Backpack and have a chance to interact with different celebrities such as; Dj Mo, Hope kid and Tracy Wanjiru.