If you’re looking for a new favorite phone with a good quality camera, strong performance, and a good display, the OPPO Reno8 Pro is one to consider. Better still, this is a phone that will not break the bank, offering top end features for a mid-range price.

What Are OPPO Phones?

If you’re like me and tend to be attracted to big name smartphone manufacturers like Samsung and Apple and Sony, you may not be aware of OPPO. A Chinese company that has been manufacturing smartphones since the mid-2000s, its phones have been increasing in popularity in the UK, Europe, and Australia—although they’re rarely seen in North America.

This is probably more to do with the smartphone brand’s country of origin than anything else. Which is a shame, because they’re good-looking phones that tend to benchmark well. But how does the OPPO Reno8 Pro measure up?

What Do You Get With the OPPO Reno8 Pro?

In the box, the OPPO Reno8 Pro is accompanied by a USB-C cable, power adapter, and SIM card removal tool. It also ships with a basic rubber case, which is useful as the finish is a little slippery at times.

The phone also features a post-assembly screen protector. It’s not a sturdy reinforced glass style protector, however, more of a standard plastic film. It will do the job but if you’re particularly butter-fingered or regularly visit a busy, bustling environments, a tougher screen protector and case are advised.

OPPO Reno8 Pro Specification

The 6.7-inch AMOLED Full HD (2412 × 1080) display works out at 394PPI. It has a maximum 120Hz refresh rate, and can achieve 950 nits of brightness.

Measuring 16.12x7.42x0.74cm and weighing around 183 grams, the OPPO Reno8 Pro features a single USB Type-C port with USB OTG. However, this does not feature HDMI transport support. There is no 3.5mm audio port.

The phone features a MediaTek Dimensity 8100-MAX chip, which wields an octa-core CPU and Arm Mali-G610 GPU, backed up by 12GB of LPDDR5 RAM and 256GB onboard storage.Everything is wrapped in a smart unibody design, the product of an 800℃ hot forging process, with Corning Gorilla Glass 5.

Power comes from the 4500mAh 80W SuperVOOC battery. With superfast charging, this can jumpstart the battery to 50% in just 11 minutes of charging, with a five-minute charge providing up to two hours of gaming. The battery has up to 1600 charging cycles, which means it could run reliably for over four years assuming a daily charge.

The OPPO Reno8 Pro is a dual SIM 5G phone. Due to the large onboard storage, there is no slot for a microSD card.

Finally, the screen-to-body ratio is 93.4%, and the phone comes in a choice of “Glazed Black” and “Glazed Green” finishes. Our review device, pictured here, has the Glazed Black finish.

The OPPO Reno8 Pro’s Key Features

Aside from being a nice looking phone that is easy to use, the OPPO Reno8 Pro is packed full of slick features. Most of these concern the camera, which we’ll look at in more detail below, which heavily relies on the MariSilicon X NPU, an ultra-clear imaging processor.

Everything about this phone is wrapped up in ColorOS, the OPPO version of Android. It’s not quite Android One, but is a good enough variant. I’d put it on a par with Samsung’s One UI, although integration with native apps isn’t quite as good. It’s certainly recognizable as being Android, with all the usual gestures and settings, along with a few others unique to OPPO and this particular phone.

For everyday use, the AI system booster is included which optimizes performance based on how you use your phone, aiming to deliver a smooth experience.

Benchmarking the OPPO Reno8 Pro’s Performance

After a few days of using the phone, I remained seriously impressed. The usual “new phone” feel has typically worn off by this point, but that hadn’t happened. Perhaps a dose of reality would be a look at the OPPO Reno8 Pro’s benchmarks?

Checking the device with the PCMark benchmarking tool for Android, the basic Work 3.0 performance test returned a score of 11930. For context, at the time of writing, the phone that benchmarks highest is the Motorola Edge S30, at 18520.

So, not a top-performing phone, but certainly no slouch. The OPPO Reno8 Pro can be compared favorably with the Xiaomi Redmi K40 (11915) and Xiaomi Civi (11991).

The phone features an “ultra-conductive” cooling system, with five types of cooling material including Ultra-Conductive Graphite.

A Look at the OPPO Reno8 Pro’s Camera

Although easy to hold and use and unlikely to give you any performance issues, the OPPO Reno8 Pro’s real strength is the camera. Having been restricted to reviews of rugged phones over the past few years, I’ve simply seen nothing as good as this.

The Reno8 Pro uses Sony IMX709 and Sony IMX766 sensors for the front and rear cameras. These are considered flagship-level sensors, and the results seem impressive.

For selfies, the front camera’s Sony IMX709 32MP sensor has autofocus, HDR, and uses the OPPO RGBW sensor for improved light sensitivity, allowing 60% more light with a 35% reduction in noise. The intended result is improved low-light photography.

Around the back, the OPPO Reno8 Pro Sony IMX766 has a 50MP camera, with autofocus and 86 degree field of view (FOV). There is also an ultrawide option with 112 degree FOV, and a macro lens.

The rear camera supports additional shooting modes, notably the 4K Ultra Night Video. The three main rear lenses produce images like these (zoom, standard, ultrawide):

You'll also find an AI-enhanced slow-motion mode, time-lapse, panoramic, macro photography, and even dual-view, which uses front and back cameras simultaneously. Some templates are also included, courtesy of integration with Soloop, which will appeal to younger smartphone users as they’re ideal for TikTok.

If smartphone photography is a passion, the OPPO Reno8 Pro includes a pro mode for stills and film mode for videos. There is also an AI-managed portrait mode if you prefer simpler but effective photos.

The movie mode is particularly impressive, ramping up the quality to the full widescreen ratio. Impressively, the 4K night mode works with all video types, including movie mode, although this results in a rare hit to the Reno8 Pro's battery, so both should be used with care.

The default camera app unsurprisingly features all the now-usual features, such as tap to lock focus, show palm to take a selfie, and others, but the real magic is achieved with OPPO’s MariSillicon X AI technology which delivers improved photos and videos, in 4K, in dark areas and at night, along with the HDR feature.

This doesn’t only work with the default app, either. MariSillicon X enhancements are available to third party apps, too.

Using the OPPO Reno8 Pro

Whether you want some mobile gaming, productivity, social networking, or simply a decent smartphone camera, the OPPO Reno8 Pro seems to fulfill all of those needs.

It’s light and while a little slippery, the included rubber case makes it easier to hold. The thumbprint scanner makes unlocking the phone fast, and while there is no 3.5mm audio port, the OPPO Reno8 Pro has surprisingly good speakers and audio over Bluetooth is good.

Since I started testing, the OPPO Reno8 Pro has effortlessly replaced and overtaken my “main” phone. It easily handles productivity tools like Slack and Asana, calendar management, link sharing, media streaming, and online shopping–not to mention the odd bit of video uploading–all without a hint of slowing down or locking up or any form of performance drop.

Importantly, the phone never appears to get hot, even with intensive filming and while using the enclosed case.

Some days, the battery is still over 50% when I go to bed. Better battery life of course means less charging, which is great for extending the lifespan of the device

I Love This Phone!

Finding a new phone that you really feel at home with can be difficult. It might be too large in your hand, too heavy, a little too wide; there may be features you don’t like; the camera might suck; it could be way too expensive for the experience you’re getting.

The OPPO Reno8 Pro is a mid-range phone with a stunning top-end camera, it runs the Android 12-based ColorOS, and is the most enjoyable smartphone experience I have had in years. Recently my main phone has been a Nokia XR20, but the OPPO Reno8 Pro has effortlessly usurped the Nokia without me even realizing.

A phone that does everything you could need it to do, the OPPO Reno8 Pro is the phone to choose if you can’t afford top-end prices.