When is a phone actually a camera? When it’s this | Tech News

Many high-end telephones lately might declare to be a digicam with a pc screen hooked up to them that sometimes is used to make voice calls. From the iPhone 17 Pro’s adverts claiming it may be used to movie in excessive situations to Samsung’s quadruple lenses on the Galaxy S25 Ultra together with two telephoto zoom lenses, premium telephones in 2025 are bought on their pictures chops.

But I believe I’ve discovered a phone that is a pure digicam by means of and thru, and will declare to be a digicam more than it is a phone – particularly if you add in a expensive accent that makes it apparent the place this phone’s best options lie.

That phone is the Oppo Find X9 Pro. I attended the launch occasion of the unique Oppo Find X in 2018, the primary phone within the vary, discovering an formidable gadget with a bodily transferring pop-up digicam mechanism however flawed software program and an unfinished feeling.

Since then I’ve used or reviewed the Find X2 Pro, Find X3 Pro, Find X5 Pro, Find X7 Ultra and final 12 months’s Find X8 Pro. All have offered themselves as camera-first Android flagships, however the Find X9 Pro is a totally different beast altogether.

The first large change is the gadget’s design, which borrows from Apple, Samsung and Google and goes with flat edges and a flat screen. I personally desire the curved screen and edges of the X8 Pro (and different telephones just like the OnePlus 13), however in Oppo’s occasion, the flat design is smart.

That’s down to the straight strains required to connect the non-compulsory Hasselblad Teleconverter Kit, a €499 telephoto lens attachment – obtainable solely in Europe through Italy, sadly – that comes with a particular phone case and mount to affix it to the phone. It extends the X9 Pro’s already glorious 200MP 3x optical zoom lens to offer an even longer attain, with higher high quality than the digital zoom of the phone alone.

I’ve been testing the Kit with the X9 Pro and it’s a supremely succesful digicam set up. I’ve taken pictures I’d by no means handle with this, or any, phone on its own. The longer vary afforded to you is an approximation of shopping for a lens so as to add on to your DSLR digicam, with a natural depth of discipline in addition to long attain. But right here you might be paying a premium price for a phone accent that in the long run gained’t give higher pictures than a cheaper DSLR set up.

That’s as a result of this phone prices £1,099 within the UK. That’s a lot of money to pay for a phone, however this is additionally the best Oppo phone but. The firm, which is owned by the identical company that owns OnePlus, has labored exhausting since 2018 to refine, refine, refine the system of a camera-first smartphone, and nailed it with this one.

The most important enhancements over earlier generations are the assured design, much-improved, mature ColorOS software program, and battery life. Amazing battery life. The Find X9 Pro has a 7,500mAh cell, which is a silicon-carbon battery, versus older lithium-ion tech. It’s denser, which means it’s potential to suit a greater capability in comparison with different telephones. The Oppo simply lasts me two days of regular use, which is not one thing I can say for the Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra or iPhone 16, each of which have lithium-ion batteries with 5,000mAh and three,561mAh respectively.

All that juice means you’ll be able to shoot all day long with the wonderful cameras on this phone and never fear about your battery. Until now, the very best phone cameras I’d ever used had been the Xiaomi 15 Ultra and Vivo X200 Pro, telephones which can be comfortably head and shoulders above Apple, Samsung and Google within the imaging division however a lot much less well-liked with patrons (I lament that you’ll be able to’t buy Vivo telephones within the UK). The Oppo Find X9 Pro is good enough to hitch the highest desk, with excellent dynamic vary, control of gentle, sharpness, lack of noise and delightful processing. In half we are able to thank Oppo’s ongoing partnership with Hasselblad, which lends its experience to the output and has its ‘H’ brand subtly adorn the back of the phone.

Along with the 200MP telephoto that’s good for road pictures pictures, the principle 50MP is no slouch both, with a massive 1/1.28-inch sensor. I don’t a lot use the ultra-wide lenses on phone cameras, however this one is a useful 50MP that offers first rate outcomes. A 50MP selfie digicam rounds issues off.

Shooting with the X9 Pro on vacation in Italy, I really feel I used to be in a position to actually put the Find X9 Pro to the take a look at. Here are the pictures I’m most happy with:

Despite the premise of this review, a phone is additionally a phone and this one does all the opposite phone issues excellently.

It’s constructed like a tank – even after I by accident dropped it with out a case onto tiled ground, the screen stayed intact and the body solely has a couple of minor nicks to show for it. The show is beautiful and will get very vivid if you need it in direct daylight, plus Oppo’s ColorOS software program based mostly on Android 16 has come a long means since that first Find X all these years in the past.

Android followers may not like how a lot ColorOS seems like Apple’s iOS for the iPhone, however I don’t see that as a dangerous factor. This is a very mature working system with a lot of polish and no tough edges. Everything zips by rapidly and, identical to on different telephones, I get pleasure from ignoring all of the AI. It does include some pre-installed app bloatware, which I don’t wish to see at this price, however you’ll be able to uninstall all of them. Oppo is promising 5 years of Android OS updates and 6 years of security updates until 2031. That’s fairly good, however a tad behind Google and Samsung’s promise of seven on some of these corporations’ telephones.

And yes, £1,099 is a lot to pay for a phone. But if I had that chunk of money to spend on my subsequent phone it will at the moment be very close to the highest of the listing, and that is largely as a result of the Find X9 Pro is such an glorious digicam, even with out the non-compulsory lens.

The phone is obtainable from Oppo within the UK and in addition on contract from EE and Carphone Warehouse.