Just in: Oppo F3 hands-on

Oppo released the F3 for five key markets, but before it hits the shelves, we snatched a unit for our tests. The company dubbed the Oppo F3 the "Selfie Expert," so we tinkered around a bit with the front camera to see if it stands up to its name, before sending the device to our labs for external tests.

The F3 review unit we got here is Gold in color, but it can easily be mistaken for Rose Pink in certain lighting or at an angle. The back is the only gold-colored part though, which is how Oppo has always preferred to have it.

Design-wise, the back panel doesn't look particularly attractive or original. We miss the six-string antenna band, which we saw on the back of the Oppo F3 Plus, F3's bigger sibling.

The phone has a dedicated slot for two SIM cards and a microSD, and you can have all three inside simultaneously, which is a rarity these days.

We wish Oppo already moved to USB-C, but this is yet another new device that comes only with microUSB. The transition can't come soon enough, and since everyone is going in that direction, there is no use holding off.

The most significant shortcoming is the Mediatek MT6750 chipset. We’ve already reviewed the vivo V5 earlier this year that was powered by the very same SoC. We found it to be dated even back then and its performance was mediocre.

Oppo is eager to promote its dual front camera setup, so we spent some time trying it out despite the fact that, on paper, these look to be the same front cameras as on the Oppo F3 Plus.

The interface looks a lot like the one you might find in Apple's iOS - it has a minimalistic design and a convenient way to change modes and adjust exposure compensation. Unlike on iOS, however, there are plenty of options here. It even has an Expert Mode where you can try for a masterpiece with the Exposure, ISO and Shutter Speed pulls. Don’t get your hopes high though - it does produce a lot of noise in low-light setups.

Selfie • Wide-angle selfie • Low light selfie • Low light wide-angle selfie

The two selfie cameras above the display are not identical - they differ both on resolution and field of view. The regular one is 16MP in resolution, while the secondary wide-angle one is 8MP. Interestingly, none of the third-party apps we tried (Snapchat or Instagram included) could recognize the wide-angle camera, so if you are after wide-angle selfies, you would be limited to using Oppo's camera application. It also offers Beauty and Bokeh modes for more artistic selfies.

Beauty effect • Bokeh effect

For in-depth tests, check back next week for our full Oppo F3 review. In the meantime, check out the one we did for the Oppo F3 Plus. We are curious to see how far their similarities go.