This year we saw several budget and high-end devices launched from Oppo, one of the fastest rising Chinese mobile companies today. The latest and the more capable is the Oppo F1s which is a selfie-centric Android phone with premium design on decent specs and P13k price ($300 USD). Is the Oppo F1s just a better selfie camera phone or an overall reliable device too? We try to find out in our in-depth review.
Table of Contents
Unboxing the Oppo F1s
The retail box comes in a fancy packaging with the unit wrapped in plastic. Below is a transparent protective case, 2.0A power adapter, stereo earphones, USB 2.0 cable, and set of papers.
Design
The Oppo F1s is wrapped in mixed materials with the back mostly made of metal. The top and bottom are plastic caps that serve as antenna gate for the cellular and wireless connection. Surprisingly, even the rounded frame is made of the same polycarbonate material thus slightly reducing the premium feel.
Perhaps the most noticeable aesthetics of the Oppo mid-ranger is the resemblance to the iPhone 6s series minus the antenna lines on the back. The home button is a bit rounded and the glass up front is subtly curved.
Holding the device in the hands felt a bit cumbersome with its relatively chunky form factor although the weight is substantially comfortable.
Both the power key and volume rocker are clicky and easily accessed by fingers on the right and left the side, respectively. The ports here are standard with microUSB 2.0 at the bottom along with a single speaker and 3.5mm audio jack.
The missing sensor we’ve missed here is a LED light for notifications that are present in almost mid-range devices like the Samsung Galaxy C5 and Zenfone 3. But that’s not a big deal if you’re used checking on the display every minute plus the fingerprint scanner embedded in the button works in an instant.
It’s no excuse that Oppo is trying to imitate the iPhone with their F1s. Whether it’s a bad thing or not, we liked the overall build of the device. It’s solid despite the chunky form of plastic and metal.
Display
The 5.5-inch display with Gorilla Glass 4 proofing curves on edges but hardly noticeable due to the steep decline. In terms of quality, the display is bright and legible even under sunlight.
What’s disappointing, however, is the 720p HD resolution producing unpleasant sharpness every time we inject a high res wallpaper or watch a full HD video. This would be acceptable if the size is 5-inch or smaller or cheaply priced, but not.
Camera
Technically speaking, the 13MP f2.2 main sensor in the back is considerably the secondary camera due to its less skimpy specs compared to the 16MP f2.0 selfie camera.
Photos from the back shooter lack lively and natural colors but with pleasing resolved details for the price. The noise level in low light is also more apparent compared to other mid-rangers we’ve tested.
But the mediocre quality is really not a deal breaker if you’re just planning to snap more selfies than shooting landscapes and still subjects because the front-facing camera does the job well on the latter.
Despite the overbright shots in the beauty mode, the 16MP front-facing camera retains some of the natural colors. The screen flash is also a nifty software feature that helps a little in night selfie shooting.
Both cameras record up to 1080p Full HD videos and the lack of OIS is makes the unwanted movement more apparent. The pale color reproduction is also present in its video mode.
For selfies alone, the F1s is undoubtedly a fine and reliable snapper while we really recommend you gotta need to look elsewhere if you’re planning to use the main camera a lot.
Software
The Oppo F1s runs on Android 5.1 Lollipop with uncertainty whether it’s upgradeable to Marshmallow update. The imitation to iPhone does not stop in design with Color OS 3.0 UI resembling much to iOS in terms of optimization and feel but with just deeper customizations thanks to Android. Again, it’s up for user preference if they prefer the resemblance to iPhone.
Performance and benchmark
Under the hood are a 3GB RAM, 32GB expandable storage, and octa-core MediaTek 6750 chip. The processor is the underclocked version of the Helio P10 in Sony Xperia XA duo.
In terms of actual performance and benchmark, the hardware did not leave us hanging in most tasks while it scored above 40k in Antutu. It smoothly handles graphics intensive games like NBA 2K16 up to moderate graphics settings.
Battery and charging
The 3075mAh non-removable juice last longer than we expected. It easily reached up to the morning of the next day in moderate usage. The screen on time is roughly 5 hours which is above average than the competition.
Charging the F1s is a bit painstakingly slow with 0% to 100% reaching 2 hours and 20 minutes. The Mediatek chipset also lacks fast charging support.
Speaker
Positioned at the bottom, the single loudspeaker outputs averagely loud audio with a bit tinny quality. There is also no built-in high-res upscaling like on the Zenfone 3.
Pricing and verdict
The Oppo F1s retails for P12,990 pesos price or roughly $300 USD which is a bit overpriced with its low res display, mediocre back camera, and dated OS. But if you just wanted to have a decent Android experience on top of solid battery life, premium build, and great selfie camera, this makes the Oppo F1s one of the good choices. Still, we’d love to see the F1s compared against the mid-range Galaxy C series, Xperia XA, and the new Zenfone 3 so stay tuned for that.
Pros and Cons of Oppo F1s
+ Premium design
+ Solid battery life
+ Great selfie shooter
– Dated Android Lollipop OS
– Low-resolution display
– Mediocre back camera
– A bit expensive pricing
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Oppo F1s Official price, Full specs, Release date in the Philippines
- Display: 5.5-inch IPS LCD, 720p HD resolution, 267ppi
- Design: Metal finish, Gorilla Glass 5
- Size: 7.4mm thick, 160g weight
- CPU: Mediatek 6750 octa-core processor, 1.5GHz speed
- GPU: Mali 860MP graphics
- Memory: 3GB RAM, 32GB internal, microSD up to 200GB
- Camera: 13MP f2.2, LED flash, 1080p video
- Selfie: 16MP f2.0
- Connectivity: 4G LTE, Dual-SIM, GPS, WiFi 802.11 n, Bluetooth 4.0
- Port: microUSB 2.0
- Security: Fingerprint scanner
- Audio: standard, mono speaker
- Battery: 3075mAh non-removable
- OS: Android 5.1 Lollipop, Color OS 3.0
- Color: Gold, Rose Gold or Pink, Gray
- Release date: Available in August 12, 2016 in the Philippines
- Price: P12,990 price pesos or $300 USD from Oppo PH
