[Review] OPPO F1S – The Super Selfie Shooter

OPPO has never been afraid to experiment with an unorthodox approach in regards to smartphone design like their unusual N-series phones which saw them have a single high-performance camera that rotated back and forth with a motorised mechanism rather than adopting the conventional front-and-rear camera approach. Their latest phone, the OPPO F1s is the successor to their earlier selfie-centric F1 that adopts the latter conventional design approach but instead defies the norm by making sure that the front camera is significantly more powerful than the rear to fulfill it’s raison d‘être : taking great selfies.

The OPPO F1s comes in an extremely sturdy cardboard box that offers a premium unboxing experience. Crack the box open and you’ll find the OPPO F1s nestled on a plastic tray. Just beneath that is a cardboard insert that hides a SIM card pin, a quick start guide and – surprise – a soft silicone casing for the F1s.

Beneath that is a form-fitted tray that comes with a USB charger, a pair of headphones and a microUSB cable. The complimentary casing and headphone are a nice bonus.

The phone also comes with a pre-deployed screen protector so you’re able to use it straight out of the box.

In terms of design, the OPPO F1s plays it safe with rounded corners and an aluminium hewn, chamfered unibody chassis. Our test unit comes with a burnished gold finish that contrasts with the shiny silver trim inlaid on the antenna bands and around the edges of the phone which adds a classy touch to the whole affair.

The rear also comes with a 13-MP camera with an F/2.2 lens, phase detection autofocus and an LED flash.

The base of the phone is densely packed with a pair of machined speaker grilles, a 3.5mm audio jack and a conventional microUSB port for charging and docking duties.

The left side of the phone comes with a volume rocker done up with beautifully machined buttons. When viewed from the side, the inlaid silver trim on the phone looks exquisite. The right side has a power button and a triple hybrid card tray. Unlike conventional hybrid SIM card trays, the Oppo F1s has slots for two nano SIM cards and also a dedicated microSD card slot for a total of three card bays. Quite a pleasant bonus indeed. The top of the phone is otherwise unadorned.

The front is where the action is at as the phone sports a more powerful front camera than the one on the rear. Perched just above the 5.5-inch 720p LCD display, the selfie camera sports a 16-MP ISOCELL sensor and comes with an f/2.0 aperture along with the ability to use the entirety of the display as a flash. When you take a selfie, the touchscreen flashes white as an ad hoc flash.

The overall build quality is pleasingly good with a pleasantly posh look and feel though it plays it safe without radical aesthetics that serve to differentiate it out of the plethora of midrange workhorses out there.

Performance and Camera
On paper the OPPO F1s comes with hardware optimised for its price point. It comes with a 64-bit MediaTek MT6750 octacore processor, 3GB RAM and 32GB of onboard storage expandable via the aforementioned dedicated microSD card slot which supports cards up to 128GB in size. Running the show is Android Lollipop overlaid with their Color OS user interface.

When tested with GeekBench, the F1s yielded a single core score of 629 and a multicore score of 2443. When tested via the 3D Mark SlingShot using ES 3.1 demo, it yielded a low score of 248. Antutu Benchmark yielded a score of 41,024. In real world terms, what you’re getting with the F1s is more along the lines of a fuel efficient sedan; it’s not going to run in circles around any flagship sports car but it’ll get you where you need to go.

In practical terms, it will handle everything asked of it though not without some minor lag or delay here and there though it’s not particularly noticeable barring extremely heavy use. It was able to handle something taxing like Warhammer 40,000: FreeBlade at modest settings without undue complications and web browsing, texting and general social media use went by at a suitably nippy clip.

OPPO’s Color UI is relatively clean and straightforward with a modicum of customisability. The lock screen can be tweaked to offer a themed series of magazine style covers on demand with a new one shown everytime you turn on your phone. It doesn’t add to the utility of the phone but it does add a whimsical touch of variety to a plain old lockscreen. In terms of bloatware, OPPO keeps it simple and bundles WPS Office for productivity purposes on the phone and several of its own proprietary apps for general housekeeping.

The fingerprint reader works as advertised and is impressively swift to unlock the phone. The F1s also has an additional trick, allowing you to map specific fingerprints to act as a shortcut to specific apps or as a speed dial to access certain contacts.

The F1s’ 5.5-inch 720P LCD seems rather low res in an age when phone vendors are cramming 1080P screens in devices as the norm though the bright side is that it’s relatively power efficient compared to a screen pushing more pixels. Visuals onscreen are acceptable with accurate colours and reasonably sharp text and imagery that passes casual inspection. It’s only if you’re poring at it up close that you notice any jags but that’s nitpicking. Viewability under sunlight is serviceable as well. For all intended purposes, the display does the job though it’s not exactly a show stopper. It does however offer a series of interesting swipe gestures that let you fire up the camera, flashlight, control music playback or wake it up by just tapping or scrawling a symbol on the touchscreen. Nifty, that.

The rear 13-MP camera on the OPPO F1s isn’t exactly its main calling card though it does an otherwise solid job for general use. It has a selection of modes that covers the usual scenarios including a time lapse mode, a HDR mode and a panorama mode for wide scenery shots as well as a smattering of art filters.

Colours on the rear camera are pleasantly colour accurate most of the time and able to yield relatively shareworthy shots though occasionally rare situations come up where colours turned out duller than what the original looked like. With patience, you’re able to yield surprisingly good shots as a bunch of students and professionals did at the recent KLPF event. 

The 16-MP front camera is where the magic is at as the F1s has an impressive beautification filter that lets you dial how much correction you need as well as how white your skintone is and the rosiness of your complexion too. It’s quite an impressive feat in terms of what they can achieve with the camera firmware with relatively pleasing results though it seems optimised for use by the fairer sex. With modest results dialled in, female subjects were able to enjoy extremely pleasing selfie shots. Results on male subjects did not seem to fare as well with all the beauty settings maxed out. Regardless of gender, you’ll get more natural results with just a tweak or two of beautification. Less is more here. Even without beauty mode on, the front selfie camera does a solid job with good skin tones and detail. In low light situations, you can use the entire front display as an ersatz flash which comes in quite handy. All other concerns aside, the front camera on the F1s is a solid performer.

 

Battery Life & Conclusion
When put through it’s paces,the OPPO F1s was capable of excellent endurance in the field. With relatively heavy use – data, texting, web browsing, social media and, as you’d likely surmise, a ton of selfies, the phone managed to last well north of a day’s worth of battery life, helped in part by the lower resolution display though you’ll still likely need a charge come sundown. That said, it has more than enough juice to last through your average work day without the need for a top-up in the office unless you’ve been really hammering YouTube videos and gaming on it.

Unfortunately, the non-removable nature of the battery and the lack of fast charging means that you’ll have to pace usage if you’re away from the mains. The phone does have a power saving mode that ekes out a bit more battery life which comes in handy if you’re not able to top it up via a power bank in the field.  If you’re looking for a midrange phone around the RM1K mark and prioritise taking selfies over all other concerns, the Oppo F1s is a very unique, reasonably well made option that should fit the bill.

WHAT WE LIKED Good battery life, good selfie camera, great build quality
WHAT WE DIDN’T No VOOC fast charging, lacks NFC
WE SAY If you’re on the hunt for a well built mid-range phone that prioritises selfie quality, you’ll find that the OPPO F1s is right up your alley

Specifications
Price RM1,198
Display 5.5-inch IPS TFT LCD, 1,280 x 720p, 267ppi
Processor MediaTek MT6750 1.5GHz octacore
Memory 3GB RAM/ 32GB+microSD card
OS Android 5.0 Lollipop
Camera 13-MP  w/ f/2.2 (rear) / 16-MP w/ F/2.0 & Screen flash (front)
Battery 3,075mAh
Size/Weight 154.5 x 76 x 7.38mm / 160g