Oppo A60 Review – Tough Everyday Budget Phone for Malaysia with stereo speakers and 45W fast charging

Not everyone wants or needs a high end super flagship phone with all the bells and whistles along with the lofty price tag to match it. For those on a tight budget but seeking a modicum of desirable features in a smartphone, the Oppo A60 beckons.

Ahead of its global launch, we got our hands on a sample to suss out what it’s made of. Here’s our Oppo A60 review where we share if their latest budget phone it’s worth your money!

Oppo A60 Review – Build and Design

Budget smartphones typically concede a number of features to keep the price low but the Oppo A60 manages to improve and retain a number of key aspects necessary to a pleasant user experience while adding several unexpected extras – chief among them an unprecedented US military grade MIL-STD-810H rating.

To achieve this toughness rating, the Oppo A60 managed to survive 26 drops from a height of 1.22m in various positions without damage. This means that it was dropped from waist height and kept on ticking.

Oddly enough, there’s no official literature in the market on what kind of armoured glass or material it uses for the display or for the chassis. The proof is in the pudding and in live field tests we dropped our Oppo A60 from waist height onto concrete, wood and marble flooring, with it emerging unscathed. It even managed to crush an ice cube into tiny chunks on a lark.

Out of the box, you get a relatively generous array of kit that include a soft TPU casing to protect the phone, a fast 45W SUPERVOOC charger with its accompanying USB-C cable, a SIM eject pin and the usual quick start guide paperwork. 

While our Oppo A60 review sample has a non-local European style plug on account of being an early review sample, Malaysia retail units will have the usual UK-style 3-pin plug on the charger. Bar the charger, our test sample has identical specifications to a Malaysia retail unit. Another interesting addition is that Oppo has pre-applied a screen protector on the display for a modicum of protection.

For Malaysia, the phone will be available in either a light blue shade of Ripple Blue or a darker Midnight Purple colourway. Our Oppo A60 review sample came in the latter with a deep purple finish verging on black all across its sides and backplate.

The finish itself pleasantly repels fingerprints and looks rather premium from a distance though it is somewhat slippery to hold especially if your fingers are wet. On top of a MIL-STD-810H rating, Oppo has also surprisingly added an IP54 dust and water resistance rating to the phone which means that it’s able to survive the odd splash or two of water which is an unexpected bonus for a budget phone.

The backplate is dominated by its oblong-shaped dual camera housing which has a modest dual camera setup that consists of a 50MP F/1.8 autofocus camera with a secondary 2MP portrait camera along with an LED flash.

The right side of our Oppo A60 review sample hosts a power button and volume rocker while the left hosts a triple card tray that allows for two SIM cards as well as a microSD card up to 1TB in size to augment the onboard 256GB of expandable storage. A more affordable variant is also available with 128GB of storage that can also be augmented via a microSD card.

The provision of a microSD card slot is a feature that rarely exists in higher end phones, lending it exceptional versatility as you can simply bung in a higher capacity microSD card to upgrade your storage sizes without having to chunk out for a new phone.. 

The base hosts a USB-C port for 45W fast charging via Oppo’s own proprietary SUPERVOOC charging protocol and has a grille for a downward-firing speaker with the other located in a tiny slit at the top of the display to form a stereo pair of speakers which is a rarity in budget phones. Best of all, it is one of a vanishingly rare set of phones that still has a 3.5mm audio jack for headphones, making it useful for traditionalists who prefer wired headphones.

Up front, our Oppo A60 review sample hosts a relatively large 6.67-inch LCD display though it only maxes out at HD+ resolution (1,604 x 720 pixels) which is somewhat low circa 2024 though seeing as this is intended as a budget phone, it’s not a deal breaker. Closer inspection reveals that it has what Oppo refers to as a 2.5D curved screen where the edges slope down into the frame though this is primarily for aesthetics.

Where it offers additional value though is that it has an above average 90Hz refresh rate – most cheaper phones max out at just 60Hz – along with a quoted 950 nits peak brightness which is also above average for its category. 

In essence, the Oppo A60’s display is large, has a relatively good refresh rate, works even in the rain and has better clarity under sunlight than older models with the lower quadrant featuring an in-display fingerprint reader. 

Perched up top in a tiny punch hole is a small 8MP selfie camera for mugshots and for facial recognition with the aforementioned slit on the upper edge of the display for the earpiece and speaker. Interestingly, the Oppo A60 also has the rather novel ability to ramp up sound by up to 300% from its stereo speakers if so needed.

In terms of build quality, our Oppo A60 review sample does a surprisingly decent job belying its price point. Even with an all-polycarbonate chassis, it looks pleasantly premium and its true nature is revealed only when you hold it. It also has relatively good ergonomics with the power button and volume rocker within easy reach and the provision of its charger and case lends it additional value.

Oppo A60 Review – Performance

When it comes to the hardware running under the hood, our Oppo A60 review unit has an optimised mix of hardware that aims to optimise its capabilities as a budget phone. Powering the phone is a midrange Snapdragon 680 processor paired with 8GB RAM supplemented by up to 8GB of RAM Expansion virtual RAM assigned off the onboard storage along with 256GB of expandable storage.

The Snapdragon 680 2.4GHz octacore chipset is built on a 6nm process and is primarily intended for entry to midrange smartphones and tablets which is spot on for the Oppo A60’s intended price-focused niche.

One thing to note is that the Oppo A60 does not have 5G connectivity and is relegated to 4G LTE which isn’t a deal breaker seeing its intended price-conscious audience. Here’s the specifications for our Oppo A60 review sample which are indicative for Malaysia:

Price	RM799 (256GB storage) RM699 (128GB storage)
Display	6.67-inch HD LCD, 1,604 x 720 pixels, 90Hz refresh rate, 950 nits peak brightness, 89.9% screen-to-body ratio
Processor	Snapdragon 680
OS	Android 14 w/ ColorOS 14
Memory	8GB RAM / 256GB storage + microSD card(Oppo A60 review unit) / 128GB storage variant available
Camera	50MP F/1.8 w/ autofocus + 2MP F/2.4 portrait camera [rear] / 8MP F/2.0 [front]
Battery	5,000mAh w/ 45W SUPERVOOC wired charging
Size/Weight	165.71 x 76.02 x 7.68mm /186g

While it won’t break speed records, the feature set of the Oppo A60 is more than sufficient for everyday use and light gaming. Oppo’s ColorOS also offers RAM Expansion virtual RAM with options for 4GB, 6GB and 8GB allocations off the onboard storage which theoretically offers a pool of up to 16GB RAM in total in combination with the physical 8GB RAM.

Much like the prior Oppo Reno 11 Pro that we reviewed, ColorOS 14 is chock full of preinstalled bloatware taking up space on the phone including Booking.com, LinkedIn, Fineeasy, a trial version of WPS Office and more. Fortunately, all of these additions can be deleted off the phone without issue. You also get Oppo’s own AppMarket which overlaps in part with the Google Play Store with most of its feature apps being simple games though it’s worth rummaging about for the odd app or two. 

According to Oppo, the A60 has a 4-year Fluency Protection test that guarantees regular use for at least four years though we are unable to test this claim during the short duration of our review period.

When subjected to synthetic benchmarks with the default 4GB virtual RAM, our Oppo A60 review sample scored the following:

3D Mark Wild Life Extreme	126
3D Mark Wild Life Extreme Unlimited	126
3D Mark Wild Life	601
3D Mark  Wild Life Unlimited	588
Geekbench 6 Single core	413
Geekbench 6 Multi core	1,438
Geekbench 6 OpenCL	350
Geekbench 6 Vulkan	N/A
PC Mark Work 3.0	7,203
PC Mark Battery life	17 hours 16 mins

In terms of benchmarks, our Oppo A60 review unit performed within expectations for a budget smartphone. The Snapdragon 680 and its Adreno 610 GPU are a bit long in the tooth but still remain in current service with many phones including a number of new competing devices like the Huawei nova 12 SE and is highly efficient for its cost. 

It’s no speed demon by any means but the Oppo A60 can still play Genshin Impact comfortably on the lowest settings as well as Call of Duty Mobile and PUBG on the default base settings. It admittedly struggles with Warzone Mobile with long load times and noticeable lag but the fact that it even manages to run at all is quite a feat as it’s a new unoptimised game.

Fortunately, the Oppo A60 acquits itself well in day to day tasks like web browsing, social media use and the like where its surfeit of RAM ensures easy multitasking with easy swapping between multiple open tabs and relatively smooth navigation on social media. The lack of 5G isn’t a major deal breaker by any means for a budget phone and 4G LTE gets the job done for the vast majority of daily tasks be it banking, ordering a Grab or whatnot. 

In terms of endurance, the Oppo A60 proves to be an impressive design. Its combination of a HD+ resolution LCD display with an efficient Snapdragon 680 CPU along with its large 5,000mAh battery offer excellent battery life. 

It managed to offer up to 17 hours and 16 mins in the PCMark battery life test and was comfortably able to last close to two days of normal usage with a bit of light video playback, camera usage and gaming daily. Charging it was relatively fast off its bundled 45W charger as well, taking it to 50% from dead zero in about 35 minutes.

Oppo A60 Review – Display

The LCD display on our Oppo A60 review unit isn’t the crispest on test seeing as it maxes out at HD+ resolution though this works to its advantage as there are less pixels to push and which commensurately reduces the drain on the battery.

For general duties like reading emails, texting and sorting through Whatsapp messages, it’s more than sufficient for the task with sufficient brightness for daylight use though it is still a bit on the dim side when tested directly under a bright noonday sun. The quoted 90Hz refresh rate kicks in primarily when navigating the menus and dials down to 60Hz which seems to be its lowest setting when accessing most other apps and games.

The display also has an extra Splash Touch feature which allows users to keep using the phone even when the display is wet which is rare for a budget phone. In scenarios where there is water on the screen like being caught in the middle of a rain storm or when you’re working out, the touch controls go wonky but Oppo A60 uses its Splash Touch algorithm to ensure screen interactions remain accurate. This was borne out when it was used in the middle of a sudden pouring rain storm in town and the controls remained responsive.

Of note are its stereo speakers which are not something you’d typically see in budget designs and which were able to crank out impressive volume thanks to its 300% Ultra Volume mode which lets you ramp up the volume to almost triple the level of what a set of normal phone speakers could offer by holding down the volume up key past its usual limits though this goes straight from 100% to 300% without any intermediate settings in between which can lead to potential mishaps. 

To its credit, our Oppo A60 review sample was loud enough to go through an entire tracklist of Aerosmith songs at maximum volume without distortion. At its 300% Ultra Volume mode, the phone is loud enough to be heard in the middle of rush hour traffic. The quibble here is that there’s no intervening volume control between 100% to 300% volume mode. The moment you hold the volume rocker down you go straight from 100 to 300% which can happen at inopportune moments.

Oppo A60 Review – Cameras

The Oppo A60 has a fairly modest camera setup. You get a rear facing 50MP F/1.8 camera with autofocus paired with a 2MP F/2.4 portrait camera with most of the grunt work handled by the main camera. There’s 2x lossless zoom by cropping the feed from the main camera and up to 10x digital zoom with the option for up to 1080p@30fps video. 

Shots in daylight out to 2X are serviceable for social media use but anything beyond that turns out grainy with the need for a steady hand to get good shots.

On the bright side, the rear camera manages to execute surprisingly smooth bokeh though this effect works best in daylight conditions.

Unfortunately stills taken after dark turn out rather soft. For videos, the rear camera setup offers fairly good detail and colour rendition in daylight though the lack of optical image stabilisation means that you need a gimbal or tripod to yield steady, viewable footage.

Up front you get a single 8MP F/2.0 camera for video calls and selfies that can also capture up to 1080p@30fps video like the rear camera.

The front-facing camera isn’t the best on test and like the front camera delivers the best results in daylight. 

Should you buy the Oppo A60?

Belying its modest looks, the budget Oppo A60 offers exceptional value for what you pay for as it has a plethora of features from higher end phones. This modest workhorse shines on account of its large 90Hz display and hosts desirable features like a 3.5mm audio jack, exceptionally loud stereo speakers and good battery life paired with 45W fast charging.

The icing on the cake here is its IP54 splash resistant and MIL-STD-810H rated chassis which is a rarity at its price point and which makes it significantly more durable for everyday use. Even so, there are still has quite a bit of bloatware and aspects of its interface leave something to be desired like its quaint ability to go from 100% all the way to 300% volume without any intervening space in between.

Even so, the Oppo A60 makes for an easy recommendation for those on a tight budget and who need a smartphone for everyday use with a few extra creature comforts.

Oppo A60 review unit courtesy of Oppo Malaysia. For more details and to purchase check out their official page at https://www.oppo.com/my/