Oppo Reno6 Pro 5G (Snapdragon) review

Flagship-grade triple camera

The Reno6 Pro 5G in this West-bound Snapdragon trim comes with a quad-camera setup on its back that's more of a tri-camera setup when you scratch out the nigh-useless 2MP macro. The remaining three are pretty good, though, with traces of the Find X3's imaging genes.

The primary camera uses the Sony IMX 766 sensor, a 50MP 1/1.56" type imager with 1.0µm pixels and 4-to-1 binning behind a Quad Bayer color filter array. It features omnidirectional PDAF and what Sony calls DOL-HDR (digital overlap) or essentially capturing different exposures simultaneously at the sensor, instead of stacking consecutive frames with different exposure. That's the same sensor used for the main and ultrawide cameras in the Find X3/X3 Pro. The lens on the main camera is stabilized and has a 24mm equivalent focal length and an f/1.8 aperture.

The telephoto, too, comes from the high-end Finds. It's the same 2x zoom unit (so not all that telephoto) with an f/2.4 aperture and a 13MP sensor.

The ultrawide is different, though - it relies on a more modest 16MP 1/3.09" sensor paired with an f/2.2 aperture lens with a focal length in the low teens (or a 123-degree field of view as per Oppo specs). Sadly, this one is missing autofocus.

The selfie camera is using a 32MP sensor with an f/2.2 aperture lens that covers an 80-degree field of view. Again, no autofocus here.

The camera app of the Reno6 Pro 5G is very similar to other iterations we've seen on previous Oppos and Realmes alike, and it's a fairly simple layout, with menus hidden from view. A lot of the main modes are on the main rolodex, which is good, but there's a host of extra ones in the More tab - that's where 'Macro' and 'Expert' modes are. There are more zoom levels shown than actual cameras, and the 5x and 10x levels are a digital zoom from the tele camera.

The usual controls for HDR and the AI mode can be found on top of the viewfinder. The Settings menu gives you the standard list of options, including watermarks (thankfully off by default), shutter release sound and grid overlays.

Camera UI

Daylight image quality

The Reno6 Pro 5G captures great-looking photos with its main camera in daylight. You can expect lively colors that pop without being excessively saturated, and the white balance is consistently on point. Dynamic range is excellent, and even complex scenes have well-developed tonal extremes.

Similarly, there's a great level of detail - to the extent that a 12-ish megapixel camera can resolve, of course. Textures are rendered relatively naturally, though there are hints of that characteristic artificial smartphone processing when they out resolve the sensor - nothing too dramatic. You could some grain in uniform color areas or in the lower midtones, but noise is well controlled overall.

Daylight samples, main camera (1x)

If you'd like to have a bit more color in your photos, the AI Scene enhancement toggle will be happy to oblige. Not that the regular photos are dull, but the fall colors do get a nice boost shooting this way, and skies also turn into a deeper blue. It's a noticeable difference, but it's done in a fairly measured way, unlike some other efforts we've seen.

Daylight samples, main camera (1x), AI Scene enhancement

The full-res 50MP mode proved largely useless for extracting extra detail in the real world, giving us instead photos with an upscaled and heavily sharpened look. Our studio scene did show improved resolution, so with more balanced lighting and/or closer subjects, you might stand to gain some additional detail.

Daylight samples, main camera (1x), 50MP

The 2x tele is a competent performer and takes good photos. Detail is nice and sharp, but there's a bit more than the usual amount of noise. The color reproduction maintains the vivid look of the main camera and is a close match overall. Dynamic range, meanwhile, is very good as well.

Daylight samples, telephoto camera (2x)

Flipping casually to the 5x zoom level, we're getting usable shots, albeit with clear signs of digital zoom - the optics stop at 2x after all. These will do the trick at fit to screen magnification or for general social media sharing, just don't look at them from up close.

Daylight samples, telephoto camera (5x)

The ultrawide delivers great results too. The 16MP sensor captures a lot of fine detail, even though there's also a bunch of noise. Colors are a precise match for the main camera's and dynamic range leaves nothing to be desired either. You might spot some purple fringing around high contrast edges, but even that is minimal when it comes to smartphone ultrawide. One flaw you can't escape is the lack of autofocus, so emphasizing nearby subjects is not this one's strong suit.

Daylight samples, ultrawide camera (0.6x)

Macro

The 2MP 'macro' cam is no good, really - not for a phone this expensive, and possibly not even for a phone a third of the Reno's price. Resolution is low, colors are dull, dynamic range is narrow. We'd leave the 'Macro' mode the 'More' tab in the camera modes carousel and forget about it.

Close-up samples

Low-light image quality

Low-light photos from the Reno's main camera are overall good, but missing something. Detail is sharp in the well lit areas, but shadows are too dark for our liking and in need of better development. Highlights are reasonably well controlled, though there clearly are clipped areas here as well.

Low-light samples, main camera (1x)

Night mode isn't the savior we were expecting it to be either. It does bring down the highlights but does almost do too much of it - are crushed highlights a thing? And shadows don't see much change from their previous dark state. Then again, it could just be us being too used to the more dramatic Night mode look of other makers - you could be a fan of the Reno's more 'true-to-life' rendition.

Low-light samples, main camera (1x), Night mode

Having said that, a 1EV boost (perhaps more) in post makes these look a lot better to our eyes, a simple edit that doesn't require much work or understanding, though you could fiddle with sliders more if that's your thing. The extra detail in the shadows is appreciated, there's not a dramatic spike in noise, and even the highlights look more natural in this brighter state.

Low-light samples, main camera (1x), Night mode, +1EV in post

The phone doesn't trust its telephoto camera in the dark and shoots 2x zoom photos with the main camera. Images are then pretty soft on a pixel level, but they do look decent at fit to screen magnification. Even then, however, you can tell that dynamic range isn't great - deep shadows, clipped highlights.

Low-light samples, telephoto camera (2x)

In Night mode, we did get a couple of images sourced from the actual tele - the first and the sixth, and we'd say they look substantially better than the others. Oddly, that last scene also got captured by the main camera as well, and it serves to illustrate the difference between the two approaches.

Either way, Night mode shots have improved dynamic range, specifically in the highlights. Excessive sharpening can't help mask the softness of the digital zoom on the images captured by the main camera, while the ones taken by the tele actually have decently crisp detail.

Low-light samples, telephoto camera (2x), Night mode

The ultrawide, without Night mode assistance, can't gather quite enough light at night and captures deep, nearly black shadows. It has a limited dynamic range, too, so highlight clipping is also a thing. The images are very soft overall too.

Low-light samples, ultrawide camera (0.6x)

This one benefits the most from Night mode, which salvages some scenes and makes usable shots. It improves the development of both tonal extremes and gives color saturation a much-needed boost. Detail can best be described as okay.

Low-light samples, ultrawide camera (0.6x), Night mode

Once you're done with the real-world samples, head over to our Photo compare tool to see how the Oppo Reno6 Pro 5G stacks up against the competition.

Oppo Reno6 Pro 5G (SD) against the Xiaomi 11T Pro and the Motorola Edge 20 Pro in our Photo compare tool

Portrait mode

Portrait mode on the Reno6 Pro 5G works on the main camera only. It's super-competent with the subject isolation, and the blur is convincing at the default level. HDR is available, so you can count on a wide dynamic range in all lighting. If we had to point out one area that could use improvement, it's the skin tones - a bit more saturation and warmth wouldn't hurt.

Portrait mode samples

Selfies

Selfies on the Reno6 Pro 5G come from a 32MP camera that we've seen in one way or another on a number of Oppos and vivos recently. There's no option to shoot at a lower resolution so 32MP selfies are what you're getting. And in ideal conditions (ISO 100), those are going to be super detailed, more so than you'd like, perhaps. In even slightly dimmer settings, images will show signs of aggressive sharpening, but if you care to downsize them to a more manageable resolution like 12MP, they'd look great. Again, the color rendition is a bit lifeless, but the dynamic range is solid.

Selfie samples

HDR is in full swing in portrait mode, too; points for that. The subject detection is pretty great as well.

Selfie samples, Portrait mode