Oppo F19 Pro+ review: Playing to the core strengths of Oppo

Oppo recently launched its F-series upgrade to shake up the industry in the mid-range segment. The F19 Pro+, at Rs 25,990, makes a compelling argument as it works with Oppo's success formula in India. Oppo F19 Pro+ touches upon the necessities of consumers instead of giving in to the temptation of spec-race.

It's no surprise that Oppo F19 Pro+ faces stiff competition in the sub-Rs 30,000 segment, but there are a few features cut out for the Oppo smartphone that makes it a worthy choice. From impressive camera output to aesthetically pleasing design and a reliable battery, Oppo F19 Pro+ wants to give users what they need to the most in a smartphone without having to burn a hole in the pocket.

In this review, we look at the areas where the Oppo F19 Pro+ shines and where it gives its competition way.

Design

Oppo F19 Pro+ plays to Oppo's strengths here in giving consumers one of the best looking phones they could ask for in the price segment. We got the Space Silver variant for review, but we are betting the Fluid Black is also quite appealing. With a frosted matte glass back, Oppo is going for class in the F19 Pro+ by removing the unnecessary bling. When light shines on the panel from different angles, you get to see a different shade.

Oppo F19 Pro+ is only 7.8mm thick and 173 grams light, which in our opinion gives an excellent in-hand feel. The metal frame holding the phone together gives that premium touch to the F19 Pro+. The phone still manages to retain a 3.5mm jack, offers a USB Type-C port and mono speaker at the bottom with the power button on the right and volume controls on the left. The F19 Pro+ offers excellent build quality and quite frankly feels more premium than just another mid-range phone.

Display

Oppo F19 Pro+ nails it on the design aspect, a large part of which is the display. The 6.43-inch Super AMOLED Full HD+ panel surely looks great on paper, but some eagle-eyed users might notice colour inaccuracies. But it's not something that will throw you off as a simple change in settings could fix that to your liking. The dark mode looks good on the display as the pitch-black background makes AMOLED truly shine and the always-on display kept minimalistic.

The only setback we felt while using the phone was the 60Hz refresh rate, especially after having used so many 90Hz and 120Hz phones in recent weeks and months. Even if we choose to ignore this fact, it is hard to justify considering rivals already have at least 90Hz as standard and the impact it has on user experience is vast.

Otherwise, the display is quite good for viewing content, playing games, has excellent viewing angles and it gets bright enough to be used under direct sunlight. The screen also supports Widewine L1 to enable HDR content on video streaming platform. The Gorilla Glass 5 keeps minor scratches at bay, but it is better to leave that screen guard on.

Camera

The F19 Pro+ has a 48-megapixel main camera, an 8-megapixel ultra-wide camera, a 2-megapixel monochrome camera, and a 2-megapixel macro camera. On the front is a 16MP snapper for selfies. But more than that, there is an abundance of camera and video features worth exploring. For instance, one can certainly find great use cases for AI Color Portrait Video, Dual-View Video, and Dynamic Bokeh.

The primary sensor managed to get accurate colours, with a good amount of details and dynamic range in outdoor lights. The ultra-wide sensor still gets the edges distorted, as is the case with other phones in the segment, but the shots are very usable for social media. 

The F19 Pro+'s macro lens lets you get close to the subject and capture the details that are not possible with the primary sensor. But we noticed it required a lot of patience as focusing and getting that closeup shot can be a tiresome task. But if you get that right, you can get detailed close-up shots. 

Other modes like the Portrait works well in edge detection and bokeh effect. There's the AI Colour Portrait mode, which is fun to use. The selfies turn out to be fine, but under harsh light, the colors lose their natural form. There's some AI retouching happening, but if you like it then there's no reason to complain.

Even with its setbacks, Oppo F19 Pro+ has a competition-worthy camera for its price range, something users will be able to rely on. Check out some samples below:

Performance

Oppo F19 Pro+ is powered by a MediaTek Dimensity 800U paired with 6GB RAM and 128GB UFS 2.1 storage. It is something that power users won't admire, but an average user can easily make it through the day without any hiccups. The MTK chipset can handle your multi-tasking, casual gaming and day-to-day tasks without much lag. We did notice that shooting the camera for long tends to force close the app.

Even gaming performance had to be set to Medium graphics to get better results. The chipset is also 5G compatible, but it is more of something for the future, but it is good to have a feature than regret not having it at all. The 4G performance was acceptable on Reliance Jio's network in Bengaluru.

Oppo F19 Pro+ also bags an in-display fingerprint scanner, which works effortlessly and accurately. The overall performance of the phone is not something to boast over, but it sure gets the job done, which is considerable over the fact that it is priced in the Rs 25,000 category.

Battery

Oppo F19 Pro+ is packing a 4,310mAh battery, which is good for a day of use. But what makes the real difference here is the 50W fast charging that can juice up the phone to full in under one hour. We could have asked for a bigger battery, but that would be at the cost of sleek and light form factor. But the blazing fast charging speed makes up for the average battery life.

Based on our usage, we could get a full day battery and that is with messaging, calls, social media browsing, a little bit of gaming and around 2 hours of video streaming. The battery life remained consistent throughout our test.

Verdict

Oppo F19 Pro+ 5G is a beautiful-looking phone for its price that offers some good cameras, impressive battery and support for 5G. The average performance is not a deal-breaker as competing phones don't fall too far from this one. But the lack of a 90Hz refresh rate panel is definitely something we miss. It would have offered the F19 Pro+ the much-needed edge over rivals as an overall package.