Oppo A73 review

Oppo A73 review

The Oppo A73 or the Oppo F5 Youth is a budget device with some pretty impressive specs and looks for the low-end market. With some phones retailing in excess of 1500 bucks then 325 bucks is low end. However more and more these days the low end is catching up to and in some cases overtaking the mid range. This happened with the midrange taking on the flagship range. Companies like oneplus pushing the limits.

Oppo or Oneplus are doing it again with the low-end smartphones.

Enter the Oppo A73. With these awesome specs

• Screen 6 inch ltps tft display 2160 x 1080 402 ppi
• Chipset Mediatek MT6763T Helio P23
• CPU Octa-core 2.5 GHz Cortex-A53
• GPU Mali-G71 MP2
• Cameras are different but impressive for selfies
• Front facing 16 megapixel
• Rear Facing 13 Megapixel
• Android 7.1.1 an colour OS3.2
• 3200mah battery
• Micro USB
• Fingerprint scanner
• Dual Sim
• Plastic Back
• Glass front

Design and Build

With all those impressive specs out of the way we can look at the design, The first thing i will say is the Gold colour is definitely pink looking and some may not like that pinky hue. The phone despite its 6 inch display is surprisingly small feeling and easy to hold, The back is not to slippery and the fact that it comes with a nice case makes it even easy to hold. The display is very easy on the eye and pushes the bezels back to keep pace with the current trend, it’s a tad dull in direct sunlight. The forehead and chin are quite small as well, about the same size as the S8 forehead and chin. The fingerprint scanner is in the right position and is fast enough, definitely faster than the Galaxy S8.

Software

The Oppo A73 is running Colour OS3.2 on top of android 7.1.1 and although the software resembles more apple than android it has its place and is easy enough to navigate. Especially without having an app drawer, Swiping up from the bottom is like Apple all over yet the functionality is there and it works. Swiping down from the top reveals the notifications with yet again resemble more apple than android, this is a bad thing i must reiterate. Then the android world comes screaming back in with awesome lock screen features like double tap to wake, draw an O to open the camera, A w for weather or an M for Music. Create your own even. One of the most surprising features is the face unlock feature. This is fast, real fast. I’m not for a second going to say it is secure, i don’t feel confident using it, however it is super fast. It actually made encrypting some apps easy due to the speed at which it recognizes my face and unlocks the encrypted apps. Another issue i have with the software is that you cannot install your own phone dialer or messaging app. This is very annoying for some users and if they knew this was the case before they bought it they may not buy it.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCSiK5IAijkytFFj4m-3oy6w

Performance

Now this isn’t for gaming, however the little gaming i did do on it was capable of playing asphalt 8 and Leos fortune. But just let me clarify if you are buying this for gaming, your a goose. For everyday performance i was impressed with its ability to work through different tasks and split screen mode, which using surprisingly little amount of the Oppo apps and a lot more google apps were supported. Go Figure. It could do 2 tasks at once with minimal fuss but occasionally bunkered down and slowed up. Nothing a quick reboot wouldn’t fix.

Cameras

The camera is a mixed bag, Now I’ve been harsh on the Motorola and Nokia cameras in similar price brackets so I’m going to be just as unfair on the Oppo Camera. First things first this camera has a fairly quick shutter experience. Press the shutter and it makes a photo taking sound and takes the photo all really quickly and one of my biggest complaints with the motorola phones was the lag in the camera shutter. So good work Oppo. Now the camera and phone itself is clearly aimed at a people who like taking selfies and the 16 megapixel front facing cam is the star here. The photos are quite clear, a little blown out, perhaps a little unsaturated but have a great portrait mode and it lets you really blur out the background but it looks kinda cool.

Here are some samples of the front facing camera and a video sample.

The rear facing Cam is much or the same only without the portrait

Battery

I’m going to go all out and say this is a 2 day phone. The battery isn’t that big but it doesn’t take a lot to power this device. I got 2 days of email, phone, sms, some YouTube, a tad bit of gaming, social media on WiFi, Bluetooth on and 4G cranking when I’m not at home.

You won’t be disappointed with the battery.

Final Say

The device is DIFFERENT.

It’s not for your android purest, not even close. It’s not for your high-end user, it’s not for your sporty or adventure bound person.

It is by all accounts aimed at people who love taking selfies. It takes dam good selfies too. My 16 yr old daughter who loves her iPhone to death commented on more than one occasion that she loves this phone. That’s because of the way it looks. The software, the design and the build all look like an iPhone. This ladies and gentlemen is the iPhone A73.

So to be fair i think this phone would suit a younger person who cannot afford the iPhone but wants the look and feel of the iPhone. This phone isn’t a bad phone, for the price it’s an amazingly good phone. The software is OK, the build is OK, the camera is OK, the battery life is OK, the performance is OK. You get where I’m going with this. If i only had the budget for this phone then i would definitely consider it. I think the Oppo A73 has its place and if you’re inclined to like it, then you will like it.

Now where is my other phone, I need another phone!!