Could a mid-range smartphone have a great design, a 90Hz display, and fast charging? Yes, if it’s OPPO Reno4 Pro.
Back in June, when I reviewed the mid-range Reno3 Pro, I had high expectations for the device, simply because it is a smartphone from the OPPO brand. But I was let down a bit. No doubt this is a good phone, but its specs and overall performance left much to be desired. So yes, I was looking forward to the Reno4 Pro, hoping that the Chinese company will draw conclusions and correct the shortcomings of its predecessor.
After several weeks of testing I can say that the new product pleasantly surprised me. Even the name is somewhat intriguing, given that Chinese manufacturers think “4” is an unfortunate number. In any case, Reno4 Pro continues the trend of the Reno series phones, which I consider to be some of the nicest smartphones on the market. I am sure that this smartphone will interest many potential buyers thanks to its powerful mid-range processor, AMOLED display and, most importantly, 65W fast charging, which is currently the fastest around. But it also has a fairly high price tag, which is quite difficult to justify, especially compared to the competition.
Still, the Oppo Reno 4 Pro is Oppo’s best deal this season. The smartphone features improved cameras, advanced video capabilities, a fast in-screen fingerprint scanner, and a fairly powerful Qualcomm Snapdragon 720G processor.
Read also: OPPO Reno3 Pro review – Lots of positives and a few negatives
So, is OPPO Reno4 Pro good enough? Is it really one of the best smartphones in the mid-range? Let’s find out. But first, let me remind you of the technical characteristics.
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The smartphone arrived in a dark turquoise box with the smartphone itself, a silicone case for it, wired headphones, a SIM card eject tool, paper manual… and a powerful 65 W power supply with cable. Yes, OPPO continues promoting its own fast charging with support for SuperVOOC 2.0 technology.
If I were asked to choose the most beautiful mid-range smartphone, I would choose the OPPO. The Reno series has premium touches that cannot be ignored. First of all, I really like the matte finish of smartphones, more than the shiny, glossy one. But, if you like the vibrant colors of the back, such as the ones found on Realme phones, then the design of the Reno 4 Pro might seem a little boring to you.
However, OPPO Reno4 Pro is a very neat and comfortable device. The dimensions are 159.6 x 72.5 x 7.6mm and weighs only 172g, making it one of the most comfortable smartphones I’ve used lately. The casing is slightly curved on the sides as well as on the back, so the phone fits perfectly in your hands.
In the box you will find a silicone soft transparent case that protects the device when you eventually drop it. Unfortunately, the camera modules still protrude slightly after putting on the case, so it is best to place Reno4 Pro carefully on a hard surface. If we talk about the camera unit, it is neat and looks aesthetically pleasing. It consists of round modules arranged vertically, without any bridge or material that connects them.
The phone features a 6.5-inch Full HD+ AMOLED screen with curved edges and a notch in the upper left corner that houses a single front camera. Due to the curved edges of the screen when viewed from the front, the smartphone has no side bezels. The “chin” is thin too, so it all looks very attractive and modern. The smartphone is only 7.6 mm thick. All this gives the impression of refinement and elegance.
If on the front we have a glass panel covered with Gorilla Glass 5, then the back panel is plastic. Both panels are connected by a neat aluminum frame. The presense of plastic may be frustrating for some, but this is at first glance. After five minutes of use, you will forget that this is not glass, it’s that good.
By the way, I am sure that 99% of you in the first minutes of use will put on a protective cover on the back panel, so it wouldn’t mean at all if it is plastic or not. But it is thanks to this material that the smartphone is quite lightweight and pleasant to use.
In some markets, OPPO Reno4 Pro will be available in two colors: Galactic Blue and Starry Night, my color. The shaded black rear has a matte finish; it even looks a little rough. Indeed, the plastic is of very high quality and it is not afraid of your greasy fingerprints, pleasant to the touch, and does not creak or bend.
The distinctive green power button is located on the right edge of the Reno4 Pro. The fingerprint reader is located under the smartphone’s AMOLED screen.
Two buttons on the left side of the device are responsible for volume control. OPRO, unlike many of its competitors, is not a proponent of an extra button for Google Assistant.
Bottom and top, the aluminum frame of the smartphone is smooth and flat. At the bottom you will see the main speaker grill, a USB 3.1 Type-C port with which you will charge your smartphone, a microphone hole and a 3.5mm jack for connecting wired headphones. Yes, the OPPO developers kept the classic minijack.
A SIM-card tray is placed on the top. It can accommodate two GSM access modules in Nano SIM format or one SIM card and memory card. Therefore, the data storage in OPPO Reno4 Pro is easy to expand with a fairly cheap microSDXC card. The manufacturer has placed an additional microphone next to the tray.
The design and materials of the case, as well as the location of ports are all great. And the plastic of the back surface did not spoil the impression at all, and I don’t understand why my colleagues hated it so much. In addition, most of them, I’m sure, will use a protective case anyway.
I also liked the design of the smartphone and the build quality. I can assure you that the Oppo Reno4 Pro is a thin, light smartphone made from high quality materials.
Unfortunately, the smartphone does not meet the IP68 standard.
At the front, we have a 6.55-inch AMOLED screen with FHD+ resolution (1080 × 2400 pixels) and a refresh rate of 90 Hz, which can be reduced to the traditional 60 Hz.
There is a small hole for a selfie camera in the upper left corner. The display has a protective film that guards it very well from scratches.
There are no issues with the display, the viewing angles are excellent, the colors are saturated, the visibility in the sun is excellent, as well as the minimum brightness at night, making the Reno4 Pro very comfortable to use in any conditions. The 90 Hz refresh rate makes every action on the screen incredibly smooth and fast.
As usual, an AMOLED screen guarantees us attractive, rich colors, excellent picture contrast, very good readability from outside on a bright day and wide viewing angles. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that the Reno4 Pro’s 6.5-inch display is very comfortable in everyday use. Last but not least, the colors are not even too bluish, which is a disadvantage of many mid-range models, especially those with LCD screens.
Reno4 Pro’s display can operate in two color modes: the default is Vivid and the optional is Delicate.
Image quality measurements in Vivid mode indicate that the Reno4 Pro screen meets the DCI-P3 cinema color space requirements and is reasonably well calibrated from the get go. The default color tone turned out to be slightly cold (white temperature is 7218K, standard 6500K), but the adjustment available in the settings covers the white temperature range from 6308K to 9054K, so by moving the slider towards the end of the setting range we can make the tone warmer.
When manually adjusting the brightness, the Reno4 Pro screen emits white with a brightness of 513 cd/m2, but in automatic mode, the brightness can be increased if necessary up to 796 cd/m2. This value guarantees not only good readability from the outside, but also good quality HDR content displayed on the screen. All in all, the smartphone screen is a win.
There is, of course, a dark mode and an Eye Comfort mode that reduces the amount of blue light. There is no notification LED, but there is support for the Always on Display mode with the ability to select a watchface, set display hours and display message icons from each application.
In addition, after receiving a notification, the edges of the screen light up and you can select a color (purple, blue, amber). To disable it, we can use a special widget on each screen.
I already wrote that in OPPO Reno4 Pro the fingerprint scanner is hidden under the screen. This solution is hardly unusual nowadays. It is an optical sensor, which means it illuminates the appropriate area for fingerprint detection. I have no particular complaints about the operation of the scanner itself, although it does not work as quickly as flagships and sometimes it makes mistakes.
Also, the Reno 4 Pro can be unlocked with facial recognition. This method is also fast and flawless, and is accompanied by nice animation via the front camera. It perfectly recognizes my face in a well-lit environment, but not so well when I’m standing near a light source or in a dimly lit room.
The hero of my review is powered by an eight-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 720G processor with a maximum clock speed of 2.3 GHz and paired with an Adreno 618 graphics processor. We have 8 GB of RAM and 256 GB of internal memory, which can be expanded using a microSDXC card.
If anyone is interested, the Qualcomm Snapdragon 720G is an eight-core chipset that consists of 2 Kryo 465 Gold (Cortex-A76) 2300 MHz cores and 6 Kryo 465 Silver (Cortex-A55) 1800 MHz cores. It’s quite powerful, although not new, processor in the mid-price segment with fairly energy-efficient settings and productive cores.
Oddly enough, this processor in Reno4 Pro seems to be a compromise, since some models in China and some European countries are equipped with a Snapdragon 765G processor, but with three cameras, whereas the variant available in some countries (and the model we’re testing now) has four cameras and is equipped with a Snapdragon 720G processor.
The average smartphone user may not see much of a difference between the Snapdragon 720G and the Snapdragon 765G for day-to-day tasks such as opening social network apps, using WhatsApp, Viber, Telegram, etc., or using the camera and listening to music on the phone. It handles multitasking quite well and can keep many apps running in the background thanks to its RAM capacity. Sure, the Snapdragon 765G will be slightly nicer than the Snapdragon 720G, but this difference isn’t enough to cause concern. But this difference becomes quite important when playing games on the Reno4 Pro.
I played PUBG Mobile, Call of Duty Mobile, and Asphalt 9: Legends on the Reno 4 Pro to see if it can provide a comfortable experience at the highest settings. To a certain extent, we can say that the processor copes with the task at hand. Games run well, even though some do stutter and show frame drops and visible lag. I couldn’t play PUBG Mobile or other games with full graphical settings and had to settle for the second largest option. This may not be critical for someone, but you should be aware of this. However, I was pleasantly surprised that the smartphone did not get very hot even during a 45 minute gaming session, apparently due to the fact that my games were not set to high graphics settings.
As for the modules and connection interfaces, there is nothing that separates it from the others. Everything is in place, everything works almost flawlessly. Thanks to the NFC module, you can use Google Pay to make contactless payments over the phone, and the GPS works seamlessly, locating quickly and maintaining a stable connection (tested on several bike rides). The stereo speakers make it ideal for a portable music player, with deep enough sound. It also works great with headphones, both wired and wireless. Dolby Atmos Equalizer works for any type of content. There are two modes – intelligent and manual.
The communication package contains all mobile communication standards, including LTE (unfortunately, the 5G module is not available); there is support for dual-band Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 5.1 and NFC. There’s Beidou, Galileo, GLONASS. The set of sensors includes: accelerometer, distance sensor, illumination, magnetometer, gyroscope, gravity sensor, fingerprint scanner.
The smartphone runs Android 10 with the proprietary ColorOS shell in version 7.2. I’ve always loved this software – it’s readable, transparent, easy to use and offers exactly what the manufacturer has to offer. It is not overloaded with bloatware (which unfortunately happens in some competitors’ smartphones). It’s also faster than Xiaomi shell in my subjective opinion.
In addition, very soon on OPPO Reno4 Pro ColorOS 11 built on the basis of the new version of Android 11 will be available. OPPO is one of the manufacturers that quickly and regularly distributes updates.
Read also: OPPO Find X2 review — The Best Display on the Market?
Given the lightweight structure and very thin body of the Oppo Reno 4 Pro 5G, I didn’t expect to find a huge battery here. We get a 4000 mAh battery, which with these components and the screen can last for a day and a half on a single charge, which is a really good result.
And even if you run out of energy, there is no need to be sad, because the set includes a charger… 65W. When OPPO officially unveiled their SuperVOOC 3.0 technology, I had some doubts.
And they disappeared after testing. This is fantastic, the smartphone charges very quickly. From zero to one hundred, the Oppo Reno 4 Pro charges in about 33-38 minutes.
| Battery charging speed | Time |
|---|---|
| 10% █ ░ ░ ░ ░ ░ ░ ░ ░ ░ | 3 minutes |
| 20% █ █ ░ ░ ░ ░ ░ ░ ░ ░ | 9 minutes |
| 30% █ █ █ ░ ░ ░ ░ ░ ░ ░ | 13 minutes |
| 40% █ █ █ █ ░ ░ ░ ░ ░ ░ | 18 minutes |
| 50% █ █ █ █ █ ░ ░ ░ ░ ░ | 21 minutes |
| 60% █ █ █ █ █ █ ░ ░ ░ ░ | 24 minutes |
| 70% █ █ █ █ █ █ █ ░ ░ ░ | 27 minutes |
| 80% █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ ░ ░ | 30 minutes |
| 90% █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ ░ | 34 minutes |
| 100% █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ | 37 minutes |
Sometimes it happened that I left the smartphone on charge for a few minutes, and did not even notice that the charge jumped by several tens of percent of the battery. In this situation, I can even forgive the lack of inductive charging. It is really very fast charging, which is definitely one of the strongest points of the new ORPO smartphone.
Read also: OPPO Reno2 Z review
Yes, unlike the Reno4 Pro 5G which is available in China and Europe, my version has 4 main cameras. They are neatly located on the back. The set of camera modules is rather unusual, but more on that later.
Even when I tested the Reno3 Pro, I was surprised by the quality of the photos of this smartphone. Yes, we are accustomed to the fact that mid-range devices take very high-quality photos and shoot gorgeous videos, but I still can’t get used to it.
I was amazed at how bright, crisp and detailed the photos are, especially when taken in daylight. The dynamic range in photographs is good and retains the color depth of most subjects. Cameras can preserve natural colors without adding any artificial tones to them. Portrait shots taken with the rear camera come out good, but sometimes show signs of skin smoothing and aggressive blur.
There is a main 48MP Sony IMX586 camera that does basic tasks, but it is accompanied by an 8MP Hynix Hi-846 8M ultra-wide sensor, a GalaxyCore GC02M1B 2MP depth sensor and a 2MP OVT OV02B10 macro sensor. I have some doubts if these two additional sensors are really needed.
Many other smartphones do this quite well without additional cameras. It looks a bit like OPRO installed cameras just to differentiate itself from other devices in this price range.
By the way, the main sensor can provide 10x digital zoom, while the optical zoom can provide 2x. Photos taken at 10x magnification sometimes look less attractive and lack good detail. For taking photos in low light conditions, Orro Reno4 Pro uses night mode, which adds some brightness to the scene and makes subjects appear sharper than usual.
Also equally important, the Reno4 Pro has an ultra-wide-angle camera with an 8MP 1/4-inch sensor and f2/2 aperture. This means you can take pretty decent photos throughout the day. But some details are lost at night. Fortunately, thanks to the advanced blending function, good results can be achieved at night.
The wide-angle camera takes realistic pictures at night, and the standard camera produces decent photos in the dark. The results can be compared with those of Huawei smartphones. Yes, night shots on the Reno4 Pro are somewhat inferior to the flagships of Huawei and Samsung, but now you can take great night shots with a mid-range device. Wide angle photos are good, but too soft.
If this smartphone was priced over $900, I would rate it below average, but in this price range it surpasses any expectations. Low light photography is poor compared to more expensive devices, but results are above average for mid-range smartphones.
Photos and portraits are great during the day, and video features are also above average in this price range. OPPO also equipped the Reno4 Pro with Ultra Steady mode, which eliminates shake when shooting video.
The 32MP front camera takes pretty decent selfies. You (probably) won’t be ashamed of your Instagram selfies.
There is AI Beauty, this mode is already on, but it can be turned off depending on preference.
I turned it off to make sure my face doesn’t look artificial and weird in my selfies. The camera can also take night mode selfies and record videos at 1080p 30fps for your Stories.
When I test a new smartphone, I keep asking myself whether it’s worth the asking price. Sometimes the answer is unambiguous, and sometimes there are doubts. Like today.
I will tell you frankly that I really liked the smartphone as a whole. What I didn’t like was its price.
Yes, it looks very elegant: slim body, pleasant to the touch, fits well in the hand, you don’t even notice the plastic. Its quality is excellent. The OPPO Reno4 Pro has high-quality four main cameras that are capable of taking decent photos, especially in daylight. There may be some issues with 10x digital zoom, but they are not critical. Overall, the camera won’t leave you disappointed.
The SuperVOOC 3.0 technology deserves special attention. It really looks incredible when your smartphone charges almost lightning fast. Words cannot convey this, you need to see for yourself how charge percentages appear almost instantly. Battery life? It is standard for a modern smartphone, and fast charging makes up for this.
The performance may be mediocre, but it is enough for a comfortable work. Yes, mobile gamers will be disappointed at times, but there are gaming devices or flagships for them. The excellent AMOLED display with a refresh rate of 90 Hz will help you comfortably use your smartphone for any purpose. It is much more pleasant and convenient for me to work with such a device. The difference is obvious.
Price. This factor can be decisive when it comes to a mid-range smartphone. There are so many competitors here. And it’s this moment that OPPO Reno4 Pro has failed.
But this mobile device from OPPO has every chance of outperforming its competitors. Therefore, if you are looking for a reliable companion who will delight you with a quality display, sufficient performance, decent battery life with fast charging and decent cameras, then OPPO Reno4 Pro will be an excellent choice.
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