OPPO has recently released the F1 Plus in local stores — a 5.5-inch device that touts an impressive 16-megapixel resolution on its front camera, and is equipped with MediaTek’s Helio P10 chip, 4GB of RAM, and an AMOLED screen. Is it your next selfie-centric phone? Here is our full review.
Design and Construction
The F1 Plus is an all-metal smartphone with an overall design that reminds us of the iPhone. At the front is the 5.5-inch AMOLED display with a Full HD resolution with a thin black bezel, the white face with the call speaker, sensors and the 16MP front camera on top, and the home key that acts as a fingerprint scanner sits at the bottom-middle part. Two capacitive buttons are also available and they light up when pressed, similar to the setup on the current Samsung Galaxy series.
The SIM card slot and the volume rocker are located at the right side of the device. The SIM card tray can be accessed by with an SIM ejector pin included in the box, and can store a combination of either two SIM cards, or a SIM and microSD card.
On the other side the the volume controls flushed towards the top corner. The screen edges are also smoothed out with its 2.5D Gorilla Glass enclosure, and the chamfered edges give the device a premium look.
At the bottom of the device are five pin holes lined up nicely as the speaker, the microUSB port for charging, another small hole for the microphone and a 3.5mm audio port. At the back of the device is the 13MP rear camera that slightly protrudes out of the flat back panel, its accompanying LED Flash and the OPPO logo at the middle.
The F1 Plus, donning a gold finish, has an obvious resemblance to the iPhone 6S in terms of design, but the company has its own elements that make it easily distinguishable such as the two horizontal lines at the back that extend to its sides are colored similarly with the golden back plate to become an accent rather than an annoyance.
The device itself is lightweight and is easy to grip, thanks to its slim profile. One-hand operation is a bit comfortable, as you need to reach out on the extreme areas if you have small hands.
Display and Multimedia
Instead of the usual IPS LCD panel laid out on the F1, OPPO opted to place a 5.5-inch Full HD AMOLED panel on the F1 Plus. Suffice to say, we expected the same impressive display quality. It produces bright, vivid colors with a good amount of sharpness and contrast in all viewing angles. Outdoor use is okay, but there will be times that your operation may be hampered by strong sunlight glare.
As a result, the F1 Plus is great for multimedia content consumption — Full HD movies appear with good detail and sound quality is good when listening with in-ear monitors. Its lone bottom-blasting speaker is loud enough to be heard on a medium-sized room even when the heavy rain pours. It can also be heard on moderately-noised outdoor environments such as an ordinary bus or during an MRT rush.
Camera
The F1 Plus uses the same 13MP rear camera found on its smaller sibling. Unlike the F1, though, the Plus opted to make the camera placement on a round glass accentuated by a chrome outline. It looks nicer, but it’s more likely to remind you of the Cupertino smartphone. The same 13MP camera offers photo shots with good detail, color, and vibrance. It’s not the best to shoot with low-light, but it can handle some scenes pretty well.
On the other side, the 16-megapixel rear camera is something selfie lovers would really love. While it does not have a front flash to accommodate low-light scenarios, it makes use of the display to flash white light similar to the iPhone. Likewise, it also produces accurate colors on lighted environments and takes decent shots on low-light scenes. The on-screen flash, though, renders a warm tone that some may not like.
Both of these cameras feature the same functions: a time lapse feature, a video mode, a normal photo mode, a beauty mode for live quick touch-ups, and a panorama feature. On photo mode, there are unique features such as double exposure, Ultra HD mode, and an Expert (Manual) mode. Both of these cameras quickly focus on the targets, between milliseconds to 1 second. Take a look at some of the shots we took:
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Both cameras can also take Full HD videos at 30fps saved in MP4 format with sharp details, good colors, and dynamic range. Stabilization is not that present, though, but its focus can lock on, which can be useful for moving subjects. Here’s a sample video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vDRGxQIvKps
OS, UI, and Apps
Pre-installed on the OPPO F1 Plus is a forked version of Android Lollipop called the ColorOS baked with translucent notification panels, modern icons, and a colorful scheme that would make you think twice of the device you’re holding when browsing the device. The ColorOS forgoes the app drawers in favor of multiple home screens for installed apps.
Several notable apps are also available by default. Aside from preinstalled Google apps, there’s O-Cloud, KingSoft Office, a built-in security center, built-in gestures, a lockscreen magazine that displays different photos every time you wake the device, and a simple mode for easier navigation. There’s still plenty of room for apps and media files, as there’s an onboard 64GB of internal storage with 49.72GB available.
Be advised that there are a few times that app compatibility issues may arise, especially when clicking on them through the notification panel. This may be addressed through subsequent updates.
Performance and Benchmarks
Performance-wise, the F1 Plus delivers. It is capable of handling multitasking with ease, and works smoothly. Intensive games such as Asphalt Nitro gamely is seamless but suffers from minimal lags.
While it bears a Mediatek Helio P10 and 4GB RAM, the benchmarks seem to be close to the smaller F1. Here’s a rundown:
| OPPO F1 | OPPO F1 Plus |
| Hardware | 1.7GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 616 octa-core processor | 2.0GHz MediaTek MT6755 Helio P10 octa-core CPU |
| Adreno 405 | Mali-T860 MP2 |
| 3GB RAM | 4GB RAM |
| AnTuTu | 35,031 | 51,618 |
| Quadrant Standard | 21,910 | 25,122 |
| Vellamo | 2,302 (Chrome)
1,758 (Multicore)
1,199 (Metal) | 2,404 (Chrome)
1,988 (Multicore)
1,377 (Metal) |
| PCMark Work | | 4,165 |
| PCMark Storage | | 4,046 |
| 3DMark | 476 (Sling Shot ES 3.0) | 488 (Slingshot ES 3.0)
376 (Slingshot ES 3.1) |
The 2.0GHz Mediatek chip of the F1 Plus did well on the AnTuTu test, but the other results were near the same levels as the F1.
Connectivity and Battery Life
The F1 Plus, given its premium metal build, could easily hamper mobile signal reception. OPPO, in a way to alleviate this problem, has applied two straight bands that are stretched on both of its sides. Signal reception is decent and does not significantly affect calls or SMS. Its other connectivity features work well — Bluetooth is great, GPS may take a little while before locking in since we have a MediaTek chip, and WiFi connection is consistently good even on far distances.
There’s also a fingerprint scanner that can store up to five fingerprints, and can be used to unlock your phone, open an encypted file, or access a file locker. It’s one of the fastest fingerprint scanners around. You have to wake your device first, though, before your proceed with your unlocking process.
With a 2,850mAh battery in tow, OPPO’s 5.5-inch selfie smartphone can power up your device up to a whole day (and a few juice left for the next) with regular to heavy use of calls, SMS, camera, games, and mobile browsing both over WiFi and mobile data. As tested with our benchmarks, PCMark’s own battery bencmark test clocked it at 8 hours and 50 minutes — placing it with contemporaries such as Samsung Galaxy S6 (8h 53m), Lenovo A6000 Plus, Xiaomi Mi4i (both at 8h 51m) and the O+ Venti (8h 49m) on our Android Battery database.
Meanwhile, our standard video test took the device from 100 to 0% in around 11 hours and 16 minutes. Battery recharging won’t be a problem, as the phone has a VOOC charger equipped with a 4A output, and can speed up charging time to just 49 minutes.
Conclusion
In a world of 8MP front shooters, there’s one that stands out with a 16MP sensor on the front and it’s called the OPPO F1 Plus. Coupled with a great metal build, a good operating system, a nice AMOLED display, an insanely fast fingerprint scanner, and well-performing cameras on both sides, the selfie-centric smartphone from the Chinese tech giant is poised to stand out among those who love to take photos.
However, there are issues that need to be ironed out. The operating system’s incompatibility with some Android apps may hamper one’s normal usage. The phone’s operating system, and the phone design in general, reminds us of another smartphone which could be a good or a bad thing depending on how you look at it. The price, too, now at Php19,999, could be a deal-breaker for those looking for a bang-for-the-buck phone. Nevertheless, who else has a good 16MP front camera priced at this range?
OPPO F1 Plus specifications:
5.5-inch Full HD AMOLED display, 401ppi
2.0GHz MediaTek MT6755 Helio P10 octa-core CPU
Mali-T860 MP2 GPU
4GB RAM
64GB of internal storage
up to 128GB via microSD
13MP PDAF rear camera w/ LED flash
16MP f/2.0 wide-angle front camera
Dual-SIM (SIM 2 hybrid)
4G LTE, 3G HSPA+
WiFi 802.11 a/b/g/n
Bluetooth 4.0
GPS, A-GPS
Fingerprint scanner
ColorOS 3.0 (Android 5.1 Lollipop)
2,850mAh battery w/ VOOC Flash Charge
151.8 x 74.3 x 6.6mm
145g
What we liked about it:
* Good build and construction
* Great display
* Good front and rear cameras
* Fast fingerprint scanner
What we didn’t like:
* App incompatibility issues (notifications)
* Phone is quite expensive
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