Oppo Find X5 Pro hands-on review

Camera impressions

In their essence, the main and UW cameras on the Oppo Find X5 Pro are the same as before, the telephoto, too. We no longer get the microscope camera from the Find X3 Pro, but it was quite fiddly to shoot with anyway, so it won't be missed. What will be missed is that we don't get a zoom camera with a longer reach in Oppo's flagship for the second year in a row. And even the 2x zoom camera onboard the Find X5 Pro still lacks OIS, and its autofocus is far from great.

But all that does not mean there are no upgrades at all. So let's check them out.

The Find X5 still has a main camera and ultrawide cams, which have identical high-end Sony IMX 766 sensors and omnidirectional all-pixel autofocus, which is still as fast as it gets.

The main cam now has a real glass front element, reportedly improving the color accuracy and eliminating chromatic aberration by up to 77%. Samsung has just introduced a front glass lens with the S22 Series, too, so we'll probably see more of that development across the industry - at least as far as flagships are concerned.

Along with that, this main camera has also gotten an ever-so-slightly wider aperture of f/1.7 compared to f/1.8 on the Find X3 Pro.

The main cam has also been upgraded with a brand new stabilization system, which they call DSLR-level. It's a combination of lens-based stabilization with a sensor-shift based stabilization.

Calling it five-axis OIS may not be 100% technically correct, but it's still impressive that they have somehow paired a 3-axis sensor-shift + 2-axis lens-based optical stabilizations working in tandem. The end result is a system that can reportedly counterbalance up to 3 degrees of shaking. And the system is put to use in both photos and videos.

Unfortunately, this promising setup had not reached its full potential in the pre-release software that our unit got so stay tuned for our real-life impressions in our full review.

Oppo's 6nm custom MariSilicon X Imaging NPU is another thing that's new. Allegedly, the MariSilicon X chip provides super-efficient AI computing power, which allows for best-in-class 4K Ultra Night Video recording with both wide and ultra-wide cameras. Unfortunately, the 4K Ultra Night Video recording feature was not available with this pre-production software.

Again, according to Oppo, the powerful ISP within MariSilicon X allows HDR video to be captured in a 20-bit dynamic range - which is supposedly 4x greater than the Find X3 Pro. This means real-time RAW processing, down at the pixel level and without any compression, thus achieving an overall improvement in signal-to-noise ratio of 8dB.

A new 13-channel spectral sensor on the back replaces the previous 5-channel RGBCW sensor on the camera bump to more accurately detect a scene's color spectrum and adjust white balance and skin tones better.

Additionally, Oppo has expanded OnePlus' Hasselblad partnership, and the phone proudly carries the camera company's branding.

OPPO Find X5 Pro also features Hasselblad Natural Colour Calibration in Pro Mode. The UI of the Pro mode has been slightly tuned to match Hassselblad's and the shutter sound mimics that of the professional camera series.

As you will see in the samples below, Oppo has once again done a great job of tuning all three cameras to produce comparable results in terms of colors and contrast.

Nicely consistent cameras: Ultra wide • Main • 2x zoom

Nicely consistent cameras: Ultra wide • Main • 2x zoom

Nicely consistent cameras: Ultra wide • Main • 2x zoom

Daylight photography

The 50MP main camera is a great performer. You get 12MP photos with amazing detail and stellar dynamic range in pretty much every scenario. This camera is definitely up with the best out there.

Main camera samples

Ultra-wide camera samples

Telephoto camera (2x zoom) samples

We spent a day shooting with the Find X5 Pro but unfortunately, we couldn't really spot the direct improvements in the user experience or the end results when we compare it to the Find X3 Pro. Even the speed and responsiveness felt the same.

Main camera comparison: Find X5 Pro • Find X3 Pro

Telephoto (2x zoom) camera comparison: Find X5 Pro • Find X3 Pro

Ultra wide camera comparison: Find X5 Pro • Find X3 Pro

Nighttime photography

At night, we saw more of what we saw during the day. The Oppo Find X5 Pro has a stellar camera setup that can capture night scenes as the eyes see them. However, we are still a bit reluctant to give it the upper hand compared to the Find X3 Pro because it seems to be equally good.

Main camera: Regular • Night mode • Regular • Night mode

Telephoto camera: Regular • Night mode

Ultrawide camera: Regular • Night mode

Find X3 Pro night photos: Main Regular • Main Night • Ultrawide Regular • Ultrawide Night

We also took some test videos with the Find X5 Pro but we were disappointed to discover that two of the headline features of the updated camera system - the improved stabilization and the 4K Ultra Night video are not fully operational on our pre-release software. Oppo has promised an update with camera fixes and improvements which should hit our device just in time for our full review.

Still, we'd say the videos we were able to record with the phone are nothing shot of stellar. The only downside being is that we good equally good results out of the Find X3 Pro, which we had to compare directly. Here's hoping that the new software update for the Find X5 Pro will bring more substantial improvements.

4K 2160p 30fps (main camera) 62Mbps

4K 2160p 30fps (ultrawide camera) 50Mbps

4K 2160p 30fps (telephoto camera, 2x zoom) 50Mbps

4K 2160p 30fps (main camera)

4K 2160p 30fps (ultrawide camera)

4K 2160p 30fps (telephoto camera)

4K 2160p 30fps (zoom test)

4K 2160p 30fps (OIS walking, ultrawide camera)

Finally, we should mention that the Find X3 Pro comes with a customized Sony IMX709 sensor in its selfie camera (as seen in the Reno7 series). It uses an RGBW(hite) subpixel matrix to improve light capture, which allegedly allows the sensor to capture up 60% more light. And the MariSilicon X ISP is reportedly processing the White and RGB signals separately for improved Signal-to-Noise ratio and better photos in in challenging light conditions.

Conclusion

Overall, the Oppo Find X5 Pro is a fantastic device. But outside of the new Qualcomm silicon and the more durable build, we couldn't really find many reasons for consumers to go for this one instead of the older (and now possibly cheaper) Find X3 Pro.

Of course, we haven't really started our full review yet so our perspective might change by then as we gather more hands-on time with the device and get a better chance of experiencing it in different scenarios.