We just recently witnessed the successful launch event of OPPO Philippines last August 24, where they introduced the new OPPO Reno12 F 5G at SM Dasmariñas, Cavite. What made the event even more special was a meet and greet with their brand ambassador and Kapuso actress Bea Alonzo. But, before the event, we visited Tuny’s Resto Farm in Cavite to enjoy a photo walk, a painting session, and indulged the delectable food there.
After using the review unit for more than a week, and with our recent activities we did in Cavite, we were able to see the features and capabilities of the new OPPO Reno12 F 5G.
The new OPPO Reno12 F 5G is a budget-friendly option for those who want the AI features found on the top variant of its Reno12 series but at a more affordable price. It gave OPPO fans and new users a chance to experience the brand’s latest array of AI features while having a unique design exclusive to this model only.
We’ve already posted a first look and unboxing article on the OPPO Reno12 F 5G which focuses on its overall design and build quality. You can read it here.
For our full review, let’s dwell more into the realme 12’s key features, including its camera, hardware, software, and more.
Price and Availability
The OPPO Reno12 F 5G has a suggested retail price of Php18,999.
It will also be available thru OPPO online e-commerce stores on Lazada, Shopee, and TikTok Shop with a FREE TG654 Bluetooth Speaker starting August 20 to 31. Buyers are also entitled to free shipping, P100 GCash product review cashback, and PPO P1,000 off product voucher.
If you want to add an extra layer of protection, you can purchase an OPPO Care plan for a discounted price of PHP 999 only until September 30. Regular price starts at PHP 1,299.
The OPPO Reno12 F 5G will also be available in installment plans via Home Credit and Credit Card payment options.
For My OPPO app users, you can get redeemable perks:
- 4,500 Mabuhay Miles for the first 35 redemptions
- P1,000 Happy Skin Gift Code for the first 30 redemptions
- P300 Zalora Gift Code for the first 30 who create a new My OPPO account and redeem the code within 30 days
- Custom OPPO x BASH Billow Mini Pocket for the first 150 redemptions
Display
The OPPO Reno12 F 5G features a large 6.67-inch flat OLED display with a resolution of 1080×2400 pixels, a pixel density of 394 PPI, and a maximum touch sampling rate of 240Hz for responsive touch inputs.
The refresh rate can go up to 120Hz for smoother visuals or go down to 60Hz to conserve battery power. There’s also an Auto Select mode, where the display automatically chooses the optimal refresh rate base on the usage.
The phone’s screen is protected by an AGC Dragontrail Star 2 glass panel that can resist against accidental drops and scratches.
Good for bright outdoors and still viewable under direct sunlight with its 2100 nits peak brightness, but during indoor use the typical brightness is at 600 nits to help extend battery life.
So far, I had no complaints on the display, it’s vibrant, sharp and colors looks great when you watch any video content or play games on it. You can even push the saturation up a bit with the screen color mode to Vivid but we prefer the Natural color mode.
Additional features on the display are an eye comfort and sleep feature for your visual health and safety. Splash Touch allows for the screen to be responsive to tap or swipe in case your hands are wet or sweaty and greasy from cooking. These features are becoming standard on most phones, and OPPO doesn’t want to be left behind.
Performance
Under the hood, the OPPO Reno12 F 5G is powered by the MediaTek Dimensity 6300 octa-core processor manufactured using a 6-nanometer process technology with maximum clock speeds up to 2.4GHz and paired with ARM Mali-G57 MC2 for its GPU.
The flagship chipset also boasts a 10% overall improvement in energy efficiency, 13% boost in GPU performance for gaming and an 11% improvement in power optimization for heavy-loaded scenarios.
It is equipped with 8GB of LPDDR4X RAM with the internal storage capacity at 256GB of UFS 2.2 storage. After checking, we found that around 24.1GB of storage has already been used by the operating system, pre-installed apps, and other files. It leaves you with nearly 220GB of available space still enough space to store your photos, videos, and more apps.
The internal RAM can be increase up to 8GB via virtual RAM expansion technology using the unused internal storage of the phone. You can choose the additional RAM between 4GB, 6GB or 8GB bringing the total up to 16GB RAM. With a bigger RAM more apps can stay in the background for a longer period of time and guarantees a smoother experience.
Here’s our benchmark scores on the OPPO Reno12 F 5G.
- GeekBench 6 CPU: 785 Single Core / 1928 Multi-Core
- GeekBench 6 GPU: 1403 GPU Vulkan Score
- CPDT: 243.21 MB/s Write, 276.66 MB/s Read
- PCMark: 8116 Work 3.0 Performance
- 3DMark: 1349 Wild Life (8.08 fps)
The performance of the phone to handle any demanding task especially gameplay provides a smooth user experience thanks to OPPO’s exclusive Trinity Engine feature. Based on our online research about this technology, the Trinity Engine contains three core technologies – ROM Vitalization, RAM Vitalization, and CPU Vitalization. With each core technologies, the Reno12 F 5G operates at the algorithmic level to boost overall system smoothness by freeing up more memory space, power consumption, accelerate app launch speeds and switching.
To enjoy any multimedia content or online calls through the speakerphone on the OPPO Reno12 F 5G, it sports a dual stereo speaker and an Ultra Volume Mode to boost the sound level by up to 300% in case you’re in a noisy environment.
The dual stereo speakers are well balanced delivering a clear vocals and loud sound quality. The treble and mid-tones are well defined, we can hear a slight of bass which is good.
Now, if you push the volume up to 300%, it gets really loud, but the audio quality can suffer really bad especially when playing music or videos. However, I find it useful during online meetings or video calls when you need to focus more on the vocals.
If you connect your earphones, it can access the phone’s built-in audio enhancement technology with the OReality Audio and Holo Audio. The OReality Audio will improve audio performance in various scenerios with four available sound profiles – Smart, Movie, Gaming, and Music. While the Holo Audio is OPPO’s very own innovative spatial audio technology that enhances sound quality by creating an immersive 3D audio experience in their own audio space and at the same time.
For security, the OPPO Reno 12 F 5G offers both an in-display fingerprint sensor and face unlock. An extra layer of protection can be added with the usual screen lock with the numeric, alphanumeric and pattern. Both methods are fast and reliable, providing quick and secure access to the device.
Connectivity
OPPO’s latest innovation the BeaconLink is also found on the new Reno12 F 5G is. You can now make calls up to 200 meters to another phone without cellular network signal, wi-fi connection or even in airport mode. This is possible by transmitting data using the Bluetooth technology. It’s like a walkie talkie experience but exclusive only to the Reno 12 series 5G models and probably on their succeeding models.
Very soon some fintech companies will be rolling out Tap to Pay feature using the NFC technology as payment instead of the QR code for faster transactions. The OPPO Reno12 F 5G supports NFC which conveniently uses the phone as an electronic access card or a digital wallet by simply touching the upper part of the front, back, or top of the phone to an NFC reader.
Other connectivity options, the OPPO Reno 12 F 5G supports 5G connectivity, Wi-Fi 5, Bluetooth 5.3, and a USB Type-C port for charging or direct transfer of files to a PC/laptop. It can support dual SIM cards for users who wants to manage personal and work contacts on the same phone. Missing is a 3.5mm audio port for those using a wired headphone.
The OPPO Reno12 F 5G is fitted with a 360-degree surround antenna to ensure optimal communication by distributing frequency bands across all sides of the phone. With the aid of its AI algorithms, it further enhances connectivity by intelligently switching between antennas.
A great example is when you’re gaming on the phone, the AI dynamically adjusts the antenna based on how you’re holding the device, reducing latency by up to 6% to ensure you stay connected to the strongest signal, giving you that extra gameplay advantage.
Camera and Photo Samples
On the cameras of the OPPO Reno12 F 5G, you have a triple camera setup on the rear panel comprising of a 50MP main camera with an 1/2.88-inch sensor and an f/1.8 aperture. For close up shots, you have a 2MP macro camera with f/2.4 aperture and for landscape photos there’s an 8MP ultra-wide camera with an aperture of f/2.2 and 112-degree field of view.
Selfies or Groufies on the front camera offers a 32MP lens with a good sized image sensor at 1/2.74-inch for good output and an f/2.4 aperture. It has two default focal length options at 1x and a wide zoom at 0.8x.
For video recording, both the front and rear cameras can shoot at 1080p and 720p resolutions. The only key difference is in the frame rate with the rear camera can reach up to 60fps at 1080p, while the front camera is limited to 30fps.
If you want to enhance your face or smoothen your skin, the phone has an AI Portrait Retouching feature. You get 8 beauty tools that you can tweak with your skin texture, cheeks, eye size, nose, chin, head, touch up, and 3D.
The camera app’s layout is simple and easy to navigate, but some functions, like the aspect ratio and timer, are placed under the hamburger menu. We think that these should be more readily accessible on the camera app.
You have four basic shooting modes already available for use with Pro, Video, Photo, and Portait. If you click the more options, you’ll have 9 additional shooting modes with Hi-res, Pano, Macro, Slo-Mo, Time-Lapse, Dual-View Video, Sticker, Text Scanner, and a Night mode for low light situations.
The zoom switch offers three focal length options – 0.6x, 1x, and 2x. When you access the zoom dial, it allows you to extend the zoom up to 10x to capture distant shots.
Sharing our sample photos taken with the OPPO Reno12 F 5G.
1x Photo mode, Outdoor, Cloudy Weather
0.6x Photo mode, Outdoor, Sunny Weather
0.6x Photo mode, Outdoor, Cloudy Weather
1x Photo mode, Indoor, Ambient Lighting
2x Photo mode, Indoor, Ambient Lighting
1x Selfie Photo Mode / Portrait Mode f4.5 (Right Photo), Indoor, Ambient Lighting
0.8x Selfie, Indoor, Ambient Lighting
1x Photo mode, Indoor, Ambient Lighting
1x Photo mode, Outdoor, Low Lighting
0.6x Photo mode, Outdoor, Low Lighting
The 50MP lens on the main camera produced stunning photos with vibrant colors and sharp details. The f/1.8 aperture offers good low-light performance, but you may still notice some noise, particularly in very dark conditions at night or low ambient lighting.
The 8MP ultra-wide lens is still a notable lens to shoot landscapes and group shots. It manages to generate decent photos with fair amount of details and good color accuracy.
Although designed for close-up shots, the 2MP macro lens deliver decent results when used in good lighting conditions.
The 32MP lens of the front camera captures attractive selfies with good detail and natural skin tones on well-lit conditions or bright ambient lighting.
Generative AI For Imaging, Productivity, and Performance
Just like its top-tier variants, the OPPO Reno12 F 5G comes with the company’s new and advanced Generative AI features which offers users innovative tools to enhance or edit photos, boost productivity and improve the performance of the device.
The following AI features found on the new OPPO Reno12 F 5G are AI Eraser 2.0, AI Studio, AI Toolbox, AI Recording Summary and AI LinkBoost. We will discuss and explore each feature in detail.
The AI Eraser 2.0 can now remove unwanted people from your photos or an object you want remove. You have three options for selecting the portion you want to remove, you can use either the Smart Lasso tool for a general selection; Paint Over tool for a more precise selection, and Remove People. When you choose “Remove People,” the AI will automatically scan the whole image to identify a person or people and remove them instantly. The process is fast however you need to be online to use this feature.
The AI Eraser 2.0 can further enhance the overall quality of your photos.
How to Use the AI Eraser 2.0
- Choose an image you want to enhance on the photo gallery.
- Tap on ‘Edit’ feature and then select ‘AI Eraser’.
- Select the desired tool for the selection –Smart Lasso, Remove People, or Paint Over.
- AI Eraser seamlessly removes the object and naturally fills in the background, delivering a flawless image.
The AI Studio turns your portrait photos into a stylized digital avatar of your liking in various settings and different looks. Your portrait can be turned into different styles with templates ranging from school, professional, futuristic, playful, wedding, travel, featured western, workwear, or a cute cartoon. The fun part of this feature is making your avatar in either male or female and up to a maximum of two people is also available.
Just login to your MyOPPO app to unlock your free 5000 diamonds and for every single Gen AI you make it’s worth 10 diamonds. To make these avatars, OPPO need its cloud-based AI to generate the look, so you need to be online and takes a bit of time.
How to Use the AI Studio
- Open the AI Studio app on your phone and choose if it’s a single or group.
- Using OPPOints, unlock and choose the filter you want to use.
- After choosing your preferred filter, select the photo you want to transform.
- Wait for a couple of seconds then you’ll instantly get your digital avatar.
When it comes to productivity, the AI Toolbox is a very handy AI feature on the phone to be your everyday assistant whether it’s for work or school. The AI Toolbox is placed on the smart sidebar found on the top right corner with a long tab. The AI Toolbox has three AI capabilities that you can access with the AI Summary for summarising long articles, AI Writer to help you get an extra boost of inspiration to write sentences or captions, and AI Speak for reading news articles or website online.
Embedded in the Recording app is yet another helpful tool with the AI Recording Summary. If you’re too tired to write and hear a particular meeting you just recorded, let the AI Recording Summary do it for you. It summarizes up to five hours of your recordings to get the important parts and to do list then saving it under the Notes app. The AI Recording Summary supports speech-to-text conversion in Chinese, English, and Hindi.
To address poor connections and weak coverage areas such as elevators, underground passages, or crowded environments, the OPPO Reno12 F 5G offers the AI LinkBoost technology. The company’s proprietary communication technology combines the power of AI with a 360-degree Surround Antenna system placed on the phone. It ensures that your network connection is stable and performing at its best while you use the phone all day.
OPPO claims that the AI LinkBoost can enhance the user experience with the following:
- It improves video sharing speed by 12% and reduces buffering time by 17% in congested or weak networks. During video calls, it can lower the call buffering rate by up to 72%.
- After leaving an elevator, the AI LinkBoost can quickly detect and reconnect to an available network with full signal 36% faster than previous products.
- When you need to switch to data networks in Wi-Fi dead zones, AI LinkBoost supports switches that are completed in 43% less time than previously possible.
- AI LinkBoost can significantly improve location accuracy when navigating using the Google Maps.
The OPPO Reno12 F 5G’s impressive array of AI features, combined with its advanced camera, hardware, and software is what sets it apart in the smartphone market to enhance user experience and improving the performance of the device. And the best part about having these AI features on the phone is that they are all FREE to use.
Software
The OPPO Reno12 F 5G runs on ColorOS 14, based on the latest Android 14. The UI is clean and easy to navigate with a host of customization options from the wallpapers, themes, fingerprint animation, themes and Always-On Display.
The phone also comes a lot of pre-loaded range of apps, including Agoda, Booking.com, Facebook, Fineasy, FitBit, Lazada, LinkedIn, Netflix, Shopee, Spotify, TikTok, and Zalo. In addition to these, you’ll find a few casual game apps, OPPO’s proprietary apps, and essential Google tools. While these pre-installed apps offer convenience for users, they also take up some of the phone’s storage. The good thing users can easily uninstall the apps they don’t need.
For game enthusiasts, it has a Game Space sidebar that optimizes game performance with some extra functions like block calls, screen recording, network optimization, and more.
The ColorOS also introduced Aqua Dynamics feature a floating widget for a corresponding app such as Audio Recordings, Timer, Grab, etc. that will remain on-screen with real-time information. It is placed neatly into the top of your screen.
Located at the smart sidebar, the File Dock offers a cross-app sharing feature to easily transfer or drag texts, links, images or a screenshot into a temporary folder which you can later drop them on another app.
Let’s say you’re preparing a presentation or report, you can search and gather the text and images you need to store them in the file dock. Once you have everything, you can easily place them one by one into your slides or document. It’s very convenient and saves a lot of time compared to the usual copy-and-paste method.
Battery
The new OPPO Reno12 F 5G is powered by a large 5,000mAh battery which is capable of lasting up to one and a half days with medium use on a full charge. It also comes with a 45W SUPERVOOC Flash Charger included in the box to quickly juice up the phone.
A 30-minute charge increased the battery to 32%, and after another 30 minutes, it went up to 65%. It took us 1 hour and 36 minutes to fully charge the phone’s battery from 0 to 100%.
Charging Time Stamp
- 6:25 – 6:40 : 18%
- 6:40 – 6:55 : 32%
- 6:55 – 7:25 : 65%
- 7:25 – 7:45 : 82%
- 7:45 – 8:01 : 100%
- Total: 1 Hour 36 Minutes
There’s no wireless charging on the phone but it has reverse charging feature to power other devices like my earbuds.
In terms of extending the battery’s life and performance, the OPPO Reno12 F 5G is equipped with smart battery management features including a Power Saving Mode, High Performance Mode, Smart Charging, and Charging Limit.
During our photo walk event, we were able to test the battery life of the phone coming from a full charge. After a full day of taking photos, recording videos, played a few casual games, and posting on social media, the battery was still at 47%, which was enough to last until the end of the day.
What We Like
- Design
- Vibrant Display
- 120Hz Refresh Rate
- 2100 Nits Brightness
- AI Features (AI Studio, AI Recording, AI LinkBoost etc.)
- Reliable Cameras
- Large Battery
- 45W SUPERVOOC
- Dual Speakers
- 300% Ultra Volume
- RAM Expansion
- File Dock
- IP64 Rating
What We Want
- Telephoto Camera
- 5mm Audio Jack
- BeaconLink Can Connect Other OPPO Models
Conclusion
The OPPO Reno12 F 5G is a solid phone that includes all the Gen AI features from its higher-end models. The AI tools, like AI Recording and AI Writer, are incredibly useful for work, while the AI Studio and AI Eraser 2.0 add a fun and personalized touch to your creative projects and photos. The AI LinkBoost is a good feature to improve the connection or boost the signal of the phone especially for gaming and calls.
Among the AI feature that we believe still needs further development is the BeaconLink. While it has great potential, it currently only works with the OPPO Reno12 Series models. It would be great if it could connect with other existing OPPO phones on the market.
Beyond its array of AI features, the OPPO Reno12 F 5G boasts of a vibrant, bright display, a very reliable cameras, good flagship chipset, a large battery with fast charging, and dual stereo speakers.
In general, the OPPO Reno12 F 5G is designed by the brand to give users a broad experience of its innovative AI technology while still providing all the essential features of a smartphone at an affordable price point.
OPPO Reno12 F 5G – Full Specifications
- Price: PHP18,999
- Colors: Amber Orange, Olive Green
- Dimensions: Amber Orange 75.75×163.05×7.76 mm, Olive Green 75.75 mmx163.05×7.69 mm
- Weight: About 187g
- IP Rating: IP64
- Screen Size: 6.67-inch
- Refresh Rate: 60/120Hz
- Screen-to-body ratio: 92.2%
- Resolution: 1080p
- Peak Brightness: Local 2100nits, Overall 1200nits Platform
- Processor: MediaTek Dimensity 6300 5G
- OS: ColorOS 14.0.1
- Storage: 256GB (Expandable Up to 2TB microSD)
- RAM: 8GB (RAM Expansion Up to 8GB)
- Battery: 5,000mAh
- Fast Charging: 45W SUPERVOOC Flash Charge
- Rear Cameras: Main camera: 50MP, 1/2.88’’ sensor, f/1.8, Macro camera: 2MP, 1/5” sensor, f/2.4, Ultra-Wide-Angle camera: 8MP, 1.4” sensor, f/2.2 •
- Front Camera: 32MP, 1/2.74” sensor, f/2.4 Connectivity: Dual SIM, NFC supported, Bluetooth 5.3, 5G supported, Wi-Fi 5
- Audio: Dual Stereo Speakers
- In The Box: OPPO Reno12 F 5G Unit, SIM Ejector Tool, Clear Protective Case, USB-A to USB-C Cable, 45W SUPERVOOC Power Adapter, Quick Guide, Safety Guide
