Gadget Review: OPPO Reno 8 – Best Mid-ranger Yet

Phone Manufacturer, OPPO, recently launched an addition to its Reno Series, the OPPO Reno 8. We received the OPPO Reno 8 for review and here are our honest thoughts on the phone.

This is the latest mid-range smartphone from OPPO that you can get in Kenya for Ksh 59,999 for the 5G unit while the 4G one goes for Ksh 43,000. At 60,000, the Reno 8 5G is not a cheap phone and when reviewing it, we wanted to know if it really offers value for money.

Performance

This phone is powered by the new MediaTek Dimensity 1300 processor which has proven to be quite powerful and reliable. It is also efficient and helps reduce battery consumption. When using this phone, I didn’t experience any performance issues.

The processor is paired with 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage. This RAM is enough for all your multitasking needs and if you need extra, you can use up to 3GB of virtual RAM to extend the total RAM available to 11GB. Switching between different apps is not an issue and with up to 11GB of RAM, apps will not keep restarting every time you switch back to them.

According to MediaTek, this processor is built for superior performance and that is exactly what I experienced. Besides improved performance when running day to day tasks, this phone also handles really well when playing games. It has gaming related optimizations that ensure it can handle any game without lagging.

Still on performance, the Reno 8 5G comes with Android 12 with ColorOS 12.1. ColorOS has really matured these days, it has a ton of customizations but does not feel overwhelming. If you are coming from another smartphone brand, you will still find ColorOS easy to use and intuitive.

Display

The OPPO Reno 8 5G has a 6.43 inch Full HD AMOLED display with 90Hz refresh rate. This display is easy to operate with one hand but you may have to stretch a bit to reach all edges of the display.

It is an AMOLED display which is always a plus on any smartphone. The colors are sharper, rich  and vibrant. This display is perfect for media consumption, the experience is much more fulfilling. The display is also a bit brighter than what we had on the OPPO Reno 7 series.

The 90Hz refresh rate ensures a smoother experience as it refreshes 90 times every second. This is much better than a display with 60Hz refresh rate but I would have hoped for 120Hz refresh rate.

Overall, the display is quite good, very responsive and the fingerprint scanner embedded underneath is one of the fastest optical scanners I have ever used.

Battery and Charging

With a 4500 mAh battery, the OPPO Reno 8 5G holds enough power to keep your phone on for an entire day. Such a battery will typically take you only 11 minutes to charge from 0% to 50% (tested and proven). With 80W Super VOOC fast charging, it means you do not have to leave it charging overnight as you can just wake up in the morning, start charging and it will be full by the time you leave the house.

If you prefer letting your phone charge overnight, the Reno 8 5G can trickle charge all night and then bump up the charging speeds right about when you normally wake up. Your phone already has a good prediction of when you wake up and can optimize the charging to ensure it doesn’t charge at the fastest speeds overnight.

Camera

The Reno 8 5G has a triple camera setup at the back. This is made up of a 50MP main sensor, 8MP wide lens and a 2MP macro lens. The quality of photos you get is really good with balanced saturation even with different light settings. The photos are detailed and much better than what we had on the Reno 7. The improvements are evident and you just can’t go wrong with this camera.

For video recording, the videos you get are also good. The phone can record very good 4K videos even in low light settings especially after the recent update it got that improved this.

For selfies, you also get some good photos. The 32MP is quite good for most settings even when the lighting is not so good.

5G Support

This is one of the phones that launched just before Safaricom 5G was introduced. I have enabled 5G and it does connect and work as expected. The speeds are good and stable. If you want a 5G phone, this should be on top of your list.

Design and Build Quality

To finish off, let us talk about the design and build quality of the Reno 8 5G. This phone feels well-built and the design is modern. It does have a premium feel to it. It is a thin phone that is light so carrying it around will not be an issue.

The power button that also doubles as the Google Assistant button is on the right. The volume keys are on the left. The USB-C port, speaker grille and microphone are on the bottom. This phone has no stereo speakers which is a bit of a disappointment. The sound quality is good but could have been much better with stereo speakers.

The camera bump at the back is unique and that is always a good thing.

Conclusion

Having used the Reno 8 5G for a few weeks, this is one phone I can recommend to anyone. I have had a good time using it. Performance is really good no matter what I was doing, The MediaTek Dimensity 1300 is reliable. The display is also really good and so are the cameras. 80W fast charging is always a nice addition especially for me coming from the Reno 7 that supports 67W fast charging.