The world is about to go 5G. It’s the successor to the 4G mobile internet the phone in your pocket has, and is the most important tech advancement in many years.
Incredible speed grabs a lot of the headlines: 5G makes on-the-go Gigabit speeds possible. You can wave bye-bye to those video stream buffering screens. But we’re just as excited to see what 5G’s ultra-low latency does for futuristic game streaming services like Google Stadia, and how its turbo-charged connectivity opens up our homes’ smart devices.
The Oppo Reno 5G is one of the first devices that lets you experience 5G first-hand. When Switzerland’s Swisscom launched Europe’s first 5G service in April, it was right there in the launch line-up.
And now EE offers 5G in the UK, the Reno 5G is one of the only phones that lets you use it. You can buy one at EE today.
Oppo has worked on bringing 5G to its phones since 2015, when it built up its dedicated 5G team. It partnered with Qualcomm, Ericsson and many others to engineer all the tech required into a phone just 9.3mm thick.
5G is not the only area in which the Oppo Reno 5G is a pioneer, though. There are a handful of them.
Beyond 5G
The phone's selfie camera raises out of the top of the frame, using an Oppo-design motorised "Pivot Rising" structure. It’s slickest cheese wedge of tech you’ll find in a phone, if you ask us.
Oppo has tested it to withstand at least 200,000 uses. That’s over five years of real-world use, or 100 selfie sessions a day for a half-decade.
And it’s not just there to provide some James Bond-style gadget charm. The Pivot Rising camera frees-up the Oppo Reno 5G’s screen so all 6.6 inches of it can be used for your movies, games and apps.
5G and a mesmerising "full view" OLED display make the Oppo Reno 5G show you how a phone ready for cinematic streaming should be designed.
Worry not if you’re a bit clumsy, and tend to drop your phone every other day. You won’t damage the camera as the Oppo Reno 5G has a clever anti-drop system. It uses the motion sensors to quickly retract the Pivot Rising housing when it senses the phone is in free-fall.
It's 10x better to see you
The Oppo Reno 5G rear camera array is just as advanced as the front one. There are three sensors on the back, with wide and ultra-wide views, and a powerful "periscope" zoom.
Our favourite feature is 10x hybrid zoom. It lets you bring the world closer to you, to capture photos you’d miss with another phone. They might be of a surfer cutting through waves while you’re on holiday, or the cute baby ducks at the local park on your lunch break. We’ve been surprised by how often a zoom camera in a phone comes in handy.
The Oppo Reno 5G’s 10x zoom uses the periscope camera, which has the same view of the world as an extra-long DSLR lens. But here all three cameras sit flush with the rear toughened Gorilla Glass. It looks super-slick.
Just below the camera trio there’s a raised ceramic "O Dot". This looks good in its own right, and protects the camera lenses from damage should you put the Reno 5G down on a rough surface.
The Oppo Reno 5G’s rear camera is also a master of night photography. Its primary and zoom cameras are both stabilised, making it easier to keep your photos tack-sharp in low light.
There’s also Ultra Night Mode 2.0. This "ultra" clever low-light photography mode uses AI-assisted multi-exposure merging and HDR to make sure your night images look great, and that any moon-lit portraits you take have natural-looking skin tones.
The tech that matters
The Oppo Reno 5G is also tooled-up with the powerful Snapdragon 855 processor. Android’s most demanding games will run smooth as silk, and 5G provides the supreme low latency required for slick online gameplay.
The Oppo Reno 5G is tech-packed. But each techy element is there to enhance the way we use our phones, not just for future-gazing bragging rights. That’s what we like to see at TechRadar.
It nails the first impressions aspect too. The Oppo Reno 5G is made of toughened Gorilla Glass and aluminium, and comes in matt or glossy glass finishes to suit all tastes.
Oppo’s Ocean Green variant has dark green overtones that appear when the Reno 5G catches the light. And the more subdued Jet Black has hints of blue and grey only clear when you are drawn closer to this groundbreaking 5G phone. Trust us, you will be.
The Oppo Reno 5G is now available online and in store nationwide at EE.
