It’s makes perfect sense that OPPO would release a more affordable version of its well-received OPPO F5 smartphone.
The OPPO F5 Youth has a similar design and platform but with slightly lower front camera resolution. Does the ₱2,000.00 difference in price justify the trade-offs? Let’s find out in the full review below.
The OPPO F5 Youth looks almost exactly like the regular OPPO F5. It just lacks the shiny chrome accents and faux antenna lines. The color of the gold version also has a slight bronze tint.
It’s very comfortable to hold with one hand because of the 18:9 aspect ratio display. However, the coated polycarbonate plastic body still takes away some of the premium vibe. Hence, I prefer putting it in the free phone case.
Top and bottom views.
Above the tall display lies the front camera, earpiece and sensors. There’s nothing below the screen and an LED notification light is nowhere to be seen.
The volume rocker and power button are placed opposite each other on the left and right sides respectively. Its loudspeaker, microUSB 2.0 port and 3.5mm audio jack line up at the bottom.
Its fingerprint sensor also has an elongated design and occupy the above center position at the back. Meanwhile, the main camera and its LED flash are placed to the top left corner.
Screen of the OPPO F5 Youth.
The screen is a 6 inch LTPS panel with a resolution of 1080 x 2160 pixels, rounded corners and 2.5D arc edges. It’s bright and texts are perfectly legible under direct sunlight while showing vivid colors and high contrast for videos.
It has an issue though. The number of supported touch inputs at the same time is only four. Not a major turn off but may affect the controls in some games.
The OPPO F5 Youth is powered by the same MediaTek Helio P23 chipset but with 3GB of RAM only. Surprisingly, it scored higher in Antutu Benchmark with 64,571 points compared to 63,506 points of the OPPO F5.
Regular browsing across app screens and scrolling down through websites are smooth and fluid. Some stutters appear when switching between heavy games and apps. That’s understandable and can easily be fixed by clearing the recent apps.
Popular Android game titles like Asphalt 8 Airborne, Real Racing 3 and Garena AOV all work smoothly at medium to high graphics quality.
Some hiccups and jagged edges are experienced at the highest settings. Setup screens on AOV also have lags but my internet speed may have something to do with it and not entirely the fault of the device.
OPPO F5 Youth sample picture (rear camera).
Pictures shot with the 13 Megapixel main camera of the OPPO F5 Youth look good as long as the scene has ample lighting. However, it struggles when the environment is too bright.. Low light shots are acceptable but noticeably grainy.
Selfie with zoomed-in version.
On the other hand, the 16 Megapixel selfie camera is capable of producing stunning selfies. It’s understandably inferior to the 20 Megapixel selfie shooter of the regular F5 but the AI Beautification has a similar effect of removing blemishes while preserving enough details for a more natural selfie.
Selfies with bokeh or blurred background effect can also be achieved despite having a single camera only thanks to some software techniques.
High resolution versions and more OPPO F5 Youth sample pictures here.
The OPPO F5 Youth comes with Android 7.0 Nougat as its operating system with a Color OS 3.2 skin on top. This makes it look and work like Apple’s iOS 11.
A ‘control center’ like arrangement of the quick setting is accessible by swiping up from the bottom of the display. This is well thought off for reachability although the iPhone inspiration throughout the user interface is uncanny.
The phone looks bare on first boot but the free themes can spice it up.
Audio quality of the OPPO F5 Youth leaves a lot of room for improvement. The loudspeaker is loud but overpowered sacrificing quality and resulting in distortion at high volume.
The free earphones offer a better audio experience but not by much. You’ll have to get a pair of decent quality earphones to enjoy listening to music.
Nevertheless, the phone’s earpiece produce good voice quality during calls.
Triple card slots.
The phone has triple card slots – two for SIM cards and one for a microSD card. It’s easy to take this for granted but when you shoot a lot of pictures, the extra storage without sacrificing your second SIM is a necessity.
It can easily connect to 4G LTE networks resulting in decent mobile internet speed. However, there’s no 4G only option and it will shift down to 3G once the 4G signal weakens.
Meanwhile, other connectivity options such as Bluetooth all work well. GPS locks-in swiftly and file transfer via USB OTG is fast.
The OPPO F5 Youth offers two biometric security features: a fingerprint sensor and Facial Recognition. Both are fast and reliable but the latter is only supported in well-lit environments. A PIN number serves as backup.
For lovers of AR and VR applications, don’t worry, the device has a gyroscope and a 3-axis orientation sensor.
In our Selfie Battery Test, the OPPO F5 Youth lasted 7 hours and 13 minutes. That’s continuously taking a selfie every minute with the screen always on and at maximum brightness.
When it comes to regular usage, the device always lasts the entire day on a single charge with plenty of battery life to spare. It can even survive two full days with its Power saving mode turned on.
Meanwhile, charging time is around 2 hours and 10 minutes using the original charger.
The OPPO F5 Youth offers decent camera quality and a smooth gaming performance for its price. The design is modern and its battery is long lasting.
However, the regular OPPO F5 has substantially better cameras that saving ₱2,000.00 to get it instead would be a wise decision.
