In terms of affordable smartphones, OPPO 16 is known for offering some of the most well-packaged smartphones in the market today. But given how fierce the competition has become recently, brands do have to step up their game to capture the market’s attention.
Today, we’re checking out another affordable smartphone from OPPO – the A60. On paper, it’s nothing too special. You get a decent but dated chipset, a dual-rear camera, and a nice design. Then we go to the price – starting at PHP 9,999, it is relatively affordable.
What the OPPO A60 does have going for it is military-grade shock resistance, which is not something you’d normally find on a budget smartphone. Still, the question remains – is the OPPO A60 worth picking over other budget smartphones priced under PHP 10,000 because it’s tougher?
Well to find out, I suggest you read on.
Table of Contents
Design & Construction
In terms of design, there is nothing too special about the OPPO A60 that helps it stand out from its competitors. It features a typical brick design with a nice colorful back panel. The back panel itself looks nice, especially in the Ripple Blue colorway of our review unit. There is also a more stealthier Midnight Purple color.
The camera island is quite small and simple located on the upper left corner of the back panel. It houses the dual-camera system despite having what looks like three lenses, which we’ll talk more about later. The back panel itself is made out of plastic, and it doesn’t feel that strong. You can easily bend if you press hard on certain places. As for the frame, that does feel very sturdy.
Despite that, OPPO says the A60 comes with an IP54 rating for dust and water. At the same time, the company says it has military-grade shock resistance. As much as I wanted to throw this phone on the floor to test it out, I did feel bad for it.
Still, I ended up dropping it a few times accidentally (sorry OPPO), and it still works well. There are no visible dings, dents, or scratches. OPPO Philippines did cut open cochinillo using it too. But of course, try to be careful with your smartphone. It is only military-grade shock resistant, not indestructible nor is it rated for salt or chlorinated water.
The button layout is nice on your hands with the power button and volume rocker found on the right side. At the bottom, you’ll find a 3.5mm audio port, a USB-C port, and a loudspeaker, while the dual-sim/microSD slot is on the right side of the phone. At the top, you do get another loudspeaker too.
Overall, it’s a decent-looking and sturdy smartphone. Nothing bad about it, both in terms of design and construction. It’s relatively light and slim too for something that is very sturdy, weighing just 186 grams and measuring 7.68mm thick.
Display and Multimedia
Flip the phone over, and you’re greeted by a 6.67-inch IPS LCD display. It’s not the most vivid panel in the market, but it is quite decent for the price point. There are relatively thick borders all around too, with the bottom portion being a bit thicker. It’s not the most high-resolution panel too, with only 1604 x 720 pixels.
Unfortunately, gamers won’t be too fond of this display since it only comes with a 90Hz refresh rate. It’s not the brightest too, but it does get the job done with only 950 nits of peak brightness. When it’s really bright outside, you might find the brightness a bit lacking especially during this time of the year.
What I do like is that it comes with stereo loudspeakers. It lacks a bit of clarity, especially when the volume is maxed out. However, the fact that it comes with stereo speakers is already a nice addition from OPPO. Some more expensive smartphones don’t even come with stereo speakers.
If you are not fond of the speakers, you do have a 3.5mm audio port. So just plug in your favorite pair of earphones or headphones, and you are good to go. If you want something wireless, pair it with Bluetooth.
Overall, for the price, I can’t complain. The display and speakers are more than adequate for watching videos and playing light and easy games (if you don’t need the refresh rate).
Interestingly, OPPO used an unfamiliar KK6 Glass Protection while the body comes with military-grade shock resistance.
Cameras
On the OPPO A60, you get a dual-rear camera. The layout may look like a triple camera setup, especially at first glance, but the last one at the bottom is actually a flash. So don’t be fooled by the rear camera layout.
The main shooter uses a 50MP (f/1.8) sensor which comes with PDAF, and it is paired with a 2MP (f/2.4) depth sensor. There’s nothing to write home about the camera quality, but it is relatively decent when you’re shooting in well lit environments. You can get some slight bokeh too even without having to use portrait mode.
At night or in low-light conditions, however, the image quality does drop drastically. You lose a lot of details, and unfortunately, Night Mode doesn’t really help. When using Night Mode, the photos end up looking heavily edited and smoothened out. It does help with the grain, but the trade-off is the reduction in clarity and detail.
For selfies, you get an 8MP front shooter. It is relatively decent, but it does look too filtered for my liking. Just like the rear camera, it isn’t the best when shooting in low light. But if you’re not too OC, then it should be okay.
In terms of video, you can record up to 1080P @ 30fps for both the front and rear cameras. Like the photos, you do get decent quality when you are shooting in the day or in well-lit environments.
At night or in low light, the video quality does become very grainy, and the clarity drops a lot. There is no night mode to help you too, and when there is zero light you can barely make out the subject at all.
For the price of the phone, the camera is not too bad, although I wish it could be better. Still, just make sure you take photos in well-lit areas, and you should be fine.
To give you a better idea, check out the gallery below.
OS, Apps, and UI
As with all OPPO phones, the A60 runs on ColorOS. Specifically, it uses ColorOS 14 which is based on Android 14. If you have ever used an OPPO phone, you will definitely feel right at home.
There aren’t too many special features to work with, but you do get the usual split screen and floating windows, which I find is enough. This is great for those who plan on multitasking or when you need to type notes with another opening.
What isn’t great is the load of bloatware that comes pre-installed with the A60. There are so many apps that are useless to me, and I eventually ended up deleting them. I do wish OPPO toned it down with the bloatware since the last thing most people want is a brand new phone pre-installed with apps they won’t use.
Once I got rid of the bloatware, the OPPO A60 was great to use. There are a few personalization options to choose from that allow users to customize the design, theme, and layout to their liking.
Performance and Benchmarks
Under the hood, the OPPO A60 is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 680 chipset. It’s not the most powerful chipset on the market, nor the most recent. It’s not even a 5G chipset, so you are limited to 4G.
Our unit comes with 8GB of RAM, which can be extended by an additional 8GB, and 256GB of internal storage. If you find the storage lacking, you can expand it further via a microSD card slot.
For your usual day-to-day tasks, the OPPO A60 can handle it well despite having an older chipset and only 8GB of RAM. Even if you leave multiple apps running in the background, I never experienced any lag when browsing social media, watching videos, or even with the simple multitasking features.
In terms of games, it did run the usual light games such as Mobile Legends and Asphalt 9 without any issues. What surprised me was that it could also run graphic-intensive titles like Genshin Impact. I did have to set most of the graphics settings to low in order to have a more enjoyable gameplay experience, but it is still an impressive feat nonetheless.
That said, the phone did heat up after around 30 minutes of playing Genshin Impact. When the phone heated up, it did slightly affect gameplay with occasional stutters and framerate drops. Still, this isn’t exactly a gaming smartphone, and being able to run Genshin is a nice feat in itself.
For those who want to check out the benchmark numbers, we’ve listed them down below.
Antutu Benchmark V10: 310,993
Antutu Storage Test:
Read Speed: 887MB/s
Write Speed: 593MB/s
Random Read Speed: 81MB/s
Random Write Speed: 279MB/s
3D Mark: Wild Life – 603
Geekbench 6 CPU: 412 (Single), 1,406 (Multi)
Geekbench 6 GPU: 353 (OpenCL), (Vulkan test not working)
PC Mark Work 3.0 Performance – 9,700
Battery and Connectivity
Powering the OPPO A60 is a 5,000mAh battery pack, which is typical of what you would expect of a smartphone in this category. With that, it does last quite a relatively long time. It did last me an entire day even though I ran several benchmarks, played Genshin, and even browsed the net.
Our PCMark Battery test crashed on multiple occasions so we’re not able to get any results from there. However, in our video loop test, and it lasted 26 hours and 27 minutes playing a full HD movie. These tests were done with 50% brightness, airplane mode, and zero volume.
When you need to recharge, you do have 45W fast charging when using the supplied power brick and cable. According to OPPO, it can recharge the phone to 50% in 30 mins.
In terms of connectivity, you are limited to just 4G LTE since the phone does not support 5G. However, you do get dual-band Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 5.0, and GPS.
Conclusion
Overall, nothing really that stands out too much about the OPPO A60. It looks decent, performs well for day-to-day use, and packs a relatively long-lasting battery. In fact, the only thing it has going for it is military-grade shock protection.
This makes it perfect for businesses needing a tough and durable smartphone that will surely last but isn’t high spec or expensive. It’s also great for kids or users with butter fingers who might find themselves dropping their phones often.
But outside of that, the budget smartphone market has become more competitive in 2024 alone. There are certainly better-equipped phones now in the same price range. So if you want to get the most out of your money, the OPPO A60 isn’t it.
However, if you just want a tough and durable smartphone at an affordable, and don’t really care about the specs then this phone might just fit the bill. With a starting price of PHP 9,999 for the 8+128GB variant and PHP 11,999 for the 8+256GB variant, it’s hard to find another smartphone as durable as this one in its price range.
What we liked about it:
* Tough exterior
* Long battery life
* Decent performance
What we didn’t like:
* Lack of 5G connectivity
* Lots of bloatware and pop-up ads!
OPPO A60 specs:
6.67-inches LTPS/A-Si LCD HD+ @ 1604x720pixels, 264ppi, 950nits
90/60Hz Refresh Rate
KK6 Glass Protection
Qualcomm Snapdragon 680
Adreno 610@1115MHz
8GB RAM
128GB, 256GB internal storage
50MP f/1.8 main camera
2MP f/2.4 second camera
8MP front camera
Nano-SIM card
WiFi 5 (802.11ac), 802.11a/b/g/n
Bluetooth 5.0
USB Type-C
3.5mm audio port
ColorOS 14.0.1 (based on Android 14)
5,000mAh battery
165.71mm x 76.02mm x 7.68mm (dimensions)
186 grams (weight)
Black purple, Green
