REVIEW: Oppo’s Find X2 Pro takes on the top phones

Oppo has released its Find X2 premium smartphone range, offering consumers three models to fit their budget and needs.

The Oppo Find X2 Pro smartphone. Picture: Supplied

Oppo has released its Find X2 premium smartphone range, offering consumers three models to fit their budget and needs.

The Guangdong-headquartered phone maker is renowned for churning out quality Android phones at a cheap price, and has become a darling among consumers seeking a handset that looks and behaves like a higher end phone, but is reasonably priced.

You may remember that Oppo’s original phones resembled iPhones albeit they ran Google’s Android operating system.

Oppos are not so cheap now, especially this Find X2 premium range of three. There’s the Find X2 Pro ($1599), Find X2 Neo ($999) and Find X2 Lite ($749).

The premium X2 Pro model cost is not only a hike when compared to the 2018 Find X at $1099, it’s more expensive than the Samsung Galaxy S20+ ($1299) and iPhone 11 ($1199).

Ceramic black & vegan leather orange options.

I believe Oppo is selling a $1599 phone as it sees an opening in the high end Android market due to the loss of market share by Huawei, following the Trump administration’s ban on companies transacting with the China company.

Huawei phones can’t use Google apps or official versions of Google’s Android operating system, only open source ones, which means they are less attractive to consumers.

However the Oppo Find X2 Pro will need to be damned good to compete against the premium competition.

The Find X2 range offers 5G, which renders them attractive if your aim is to buy a 5G phone.

The X2 Pro is Oppo’s most sophisticated phone to date. It’s stylish with glass front and back. The screen occupies nearly the entire front and has curved edges; there’s a 90.9 per cent screen-to-body ratio.

The three camera lenses on the back are oriented vertically, however the lens array protrudes so the phone doesn't sit flush on a table.

Sydney Park, Alexandria. Taken with the Oppo Find X2 Pro.

The Find X2 Pro offers password, facial and fingerprint authentication. You press the screen about 15 per cent from the bottom for fingerprint unlocking.

Operation is fast thanks to the Qualcomm SM8250 Snapdragon 865 processor which Oppo says promises a 25 per cent speed bump from 2019. This chip set is already used on phones such as the Samsung Galaxy S20 range, ZTE Axon 10s Pro and Sony Xperia 1 II. You are getting the current smartphone architecture.

The 865 supports the fast and stable Wi-Fi 6 standard which means better Wi-fi. There’s also improvements in Bluetooth.

I used the standard AnTuTu benchmark to test the phone’s operation

and it scored 604533 – higher than the highest AnTuTu Android score as at May 2020, and faster than Apple iPhone 11 models. It was beaten only by Apple iPad Pro models.

The Find X2 Pro is the biggest of the three models. It has a screen size of 6.7-inches compared to the Neo (6.5 inches) and Lite (6.4 inches).

Grasslands at Sydney Park, Alexandria.

The Pro has the highest density display – 2K at 513 pixels per inch with HDR10+ for better image definition when watching video, a fast 120 Hertz refresh rate for 2K gaming, and support for more than one billion colours. High resolution movies look great on the display which also offers up to 1200 nits of brightness. It’s bright.

The phone has 12GB of RAM memory and 512GB of internal storage, but no support for a microSD card for extending storage. The Find X2 Pro supports 65W fast charging with Oppo’s SuperVOOC2.0 charging technology which it says supports charging from 0 to 100 per cent in 38 minutes.

The phone is powered with a large 4260 milliampere hour battery. There are stereo speakers but no 3.5mm audio jack for a microphone or headphones.

The Find X2 Pro has a highly specced camera system with 48MP wide-angle and ultra wide-angle lenses and a 13MP telephoto lens on the back. It has a high resolution 32MP selfie camera at front.

Taken at sunset using night option.

The phone has a customised Sony IMX689 sensor.

I snapped photos with the X2 Pro near nightfall in our local park, and detail in the low light including the grasses were excellent although I thought the colour wasn’t so great in low light, with a pinkish tinge in one shot.

The phone has a 10x hybrid zoom and up to 60x digital zoom. Optical zoom photos maintained great detail. Pics I took with the ultra macro mode also were excellent.

The main camera shoots 4K video at both 30 and 60 frames per second and 1080p video.

Oppo Find X2 Pro smartphone.

There are plenty of shooting options including portrait mode, night mode, panorama and time-lapse.

The Find X2 Pro took good portrait shots with the selfie camera.

The X2 Pro camera held its own and retained detail in shots thanks to contrast not being overblown.

Oppo may not have the experience of Huawei building high end phone cameras but this model holds its own, although I question a little colour accuracy in low life.

If you’re an Oppo user you’ll like the Find X2 Pro. If you’re an existing Huawei, Samsung, LG or Google premium Android phone user, the Find X2 Pro offers you a new alternative at the top end of the market.

Handsets are available in “ceramic black” and “vegan leather orange” from Telstra, Optus, JB Hi-Fi, Woolworths Mobile, Mobileciti, Catch of The Day, Kogan, Officeworks online and Bing Lee.