It’s not easy summing up Oppo’s year. In its home market of China, Oppo was a solid top brand – virtually matching vivo and trading blows with Honor, Xiaomi, and Huawei.
But on the global stage, we saw very few products from Oppo. The company only resolved its patent disputes with Nokia at the start of the year and it takes time for the portfolio to be realigned for global launches. We were disappointed that some of Oppo’s finest efforts were kept to China, but at least the Find X8 series finally marked the start of the long-awaited return.
Winner: Oppo Find X8
The Find X8 series arrived in Q4, marking the proper return of Oppo to Western markets. The Oppo Find X8 is a great all-rounder and one of the rare compact phone flagships around.
We gave it high marks in our review because of its capable cameras, great battery life (5,630mAh battery in this form factor is nice!), and solid first-tier Dimensity 9400 SoC.
Oppo Find X8
Winner: Oppo Find X8 Pro
We liked the Oppo Find X8 Pro even more. It has a well-executed camera button, the same potent chipset, and an even better camera system with impressive dual-periscope zoom with 73mm and 135mm native options.
Oppo Find X8 Pro
Winner: Oppo Reno12 series
The Oppo Reno12 and Reno12 Pro are also global smartphones and they enjoy good fan support. Both were pricey at launch but have gone down slightly. They’re still not the most affordable options in the midrange, but they’re well-specced, and more importantly, they’re both posh and stand out from the crowd.
Even better, the pair put emphasis on great selfie cameras and are a great choice for people searching for a good portrait selfie taker.
Oppo Reno12
Undecided: Oppo Find X7 Ultra
We couldn’t really call the Find X7 Ultra a winner or a loser for Oppo. It arrived early in 2024 and was the first dual-periscope smartphone — a true trailblazer.
We fell in love with the all-out cameraphone then and there, but our hopes of using it outside of China were crushed from the get-go.
Still, we can’t deny that such a magnificent piece of imaging technology deserves to be considered a win for any company.
Oppo Find X7 Ultra (left) next to Find X6 Pro
Losers: Oppo Find N3 and N3 Flip successors
It’s a real shame that Oppo didn’t release successors to the Find N3 and Find N3 Flip. Both devices were among the best foldables of 2023 – the Find N3 and its globetrotting counterpart OnePlus Open were unequivocally fan favorites.
Six of our editors picked the Find N3/OnePlus Open as one of their favorite phones of the year (Yordan, Hristo, Kaloyan, George, Ivan, and Michail).
The Find N3 was a standout at the time – it was the first truly compact, slim, and light folding phone with a non-compromising camera system.
So it’s truly a letdown that a year on, Oppo hasn’t released follow-ups to either great foldable.
