Putting a Qualcomm SoC inside of this new OPPO midrange phone for it's under 10k price caught our attention to it and OPPO Philippines was also consistent to us to allow us to borrow their units on it's first few days. Can the OPPO A71 2018 a mighty contender at Php 7,990
First off is the body which is the design, I already saw it in some of the previous F series releases but it does not mean that is bad. The typical OPPO curves are still there on the A71 2018. Display is a-ok even with it's 16:9 HD display. As the official retail box does not have a protective case, somehow it managed to us without a scratch in my usual placings of my phone to my jean's pocket to my workstation.
The UI has almost no difference with our current main driver OPPO F5 with ColorOS 3.2 based on Android 7.1.2 Nougat. There are some slight changes like if you will gonna watch a video in landscape mode, the pulldown menu can only appear in a old-fashioned way from the right edge of the screen to the left. I already expected it with it's limited 2 GB RAM as after a number of running apps in the background (let's say around six), there will be some instances that restart of apps will happen. The multi tasking tool is also different too.
Like most of the midrange Snapdragon phones that I reviewed, the OPPO A71 2018 was good too on the connectivity department. Name it from calls, texts, mobile data, WiFi, GPS and OTG.
Battery life with it's small 5.2 inch HD display and a power-efficient 14 nm made Snapdragon 450 equals 18 hours and 15 minutes in our video battery rundown test. In over a week that I used it as my main driver with heavy usage, I can consistently get 2 days of battery life. What more for those who will only gonna use it only for social media and calls/texts.
Here are the benchmarks as A71 2018 hit over 70k on Antutu. Seven working sensors were present inside the handset.
On camera, obviously it will be easily beat out by OPPO F5 but like on the previous under 10k OPPO phones that I reviewed (Neo 5 is still one of my faves), A71 2018 has done quite good shots on the rear camera. On the front cam, it is also good but not at all in mixed and low light scenarios
OPPO A71 rear camera samples
OPPO A71 front camera samples
Php 7,990, the A71 2018 is surefire one of the best-priced OPPO phones that I have seen so far since they entered the country last 2014. The processor is the main headliner here as well as a-ok camera performance for the price, UI and battery life. The obvious disadvantage is their choice of 2 GB RAM/16 GB ROM configuration which I understand that if they will gonna do it at 3 GB RAM/32 GB ROM, it might gonna hit the sales of their similarly-powered OPPO A83 (although it has a bigger 5.7 inch 18:9 display). I will gonna give 4.25 out of 5 for the OPPO A71 2018