This isn’t a flagship phone, but like the Reno 2, the Z model will get you most of the way there. And for an astonishingly good price. That’s the real take-away of the Z: you’re getting a heck of a lot for your money, so it’s easily recommendable on account of that.
OPPO officially launched the Reno 2 series new OPPO Reno 2Z, which was officially launched on the 25th. OPPO Reno 2Z is a true full-screen mobile phone. Its core selling point is the colorful front-mounted lifting lens + 48MP nights and four shots, and the 6.5-inch panoramic screen.
Contents
The OPPO Reno 2Z is available in three colors: Morning Fog White, Extreme Night Nebula, and Deep Sea Luminous. In terms of the selling price, OPPO Reno 2Z only has an 8+128GB version and is priced at 2,499 yuan.
Lei Technology got the OPPO Reno 2Z (deep-sea luminous), the real machine arrived, we immediately picked up the professional camera and took some “photo” photos for it.
Pros:
- Superb value for money;
- High-quality industrial design;
- Dual SIM and MicroSD card support;
- Great OLED screen.
Cons:
- Two of the four rear cameras are arguably superfluous;
- No IP rating for dust/water resistance.
Design & Appearance
The front of the OPPO Reno 2Z (Deep Sea Luminous) is a 6.5-inch panoramic screen with a screen ratio of 91.1% and a resolution of 2340×1080. Except for the chin is slightly wider, the forehead and the border are made very narrow.
Its earpiece is hidden at the top of the screen, and up is the front lift structure. There is two-volume up and down buttons on the left side of the body, which may require a period of time for users who often use their right hand. There are a SIM card slot and AI+ power integrated button on the right side of the fuselage. The user can press the power button for 0.5 seconds to wake up the smart voice assistant Breeno. Pressing for 1.5 seconds will cause the screen to pop up the icon for restart and shutdown.
It is worth noting that the bottom of the machine actually retains the 3.5mm headphone jack. For users who like to listen to songs and play games with wired headphones, this is undoubtedly the biggest benefit OPPO gives them. In addition, there is a Type-C charging port and a single speaker at the bottom.
Due to the central axis symmetry design, the OPPO Reno 2Z combines the rear four-shot and the glass backplate, and the feel is very comfortable. The only thing that needs to be spit is that the back is like a “fingerprint harvester”. Users who love clean need to wipe frequently. It is best to wear a shell to protect the body of the phone and avoid unnecessary fingerprints.
Its back uses a micro-nano anti-radiation texture. When the light is projected on the black body, it will leave a faint blue fluorescence at the edge of the glass back, which is like a candle on a dark night. The light effect of the deep sea glow will be concentrated in the Logo bar in the center of the back. At the same time, there is a faint blue light on the border around the glass back.
Performance And Battery
- Mediatek MT6779 Helio P90, 8GB RAM
- 4000mAh battery, VOOC 3.0 charging
The headline here is that the Reno 2 Z eschews Oppo’s normal smartphone platform partner Qualcomm in favour of Mediatek’s P90 platform. In day-to-day use the difference between this and other mid-range smartphone platforms such as the Qualcomm Snapdragon 7150 is pretty indistinguishable, but it does lack in terms of graphics power.
Scrolling through Instagram quickly is choppy and it’s the same when rapidly scrolling through a picture-heavy webpage. There’s no issue with handling photos taken using the camera, however.
Charging and connectivity is provided by USB-C as you’d expect – there’s no wireless charging like Oppo’s other handsets – but this phone does support Oppo’s VOOC flash-charging tech. Rapid doesn’t quite do it justice, giving you around 50 percent charge in about half an hour. If you only need enough to pop out of the house for a couple of hours, you’re talking minutes to get that charge into your phone.
The battery is a capacious 4,000mAh, which we found was fairly long-lasting – it’ll certainly get you into the second day of use providing you’re not going to be thrashing it. We found we were looking at around 26-28 hours.
Cameras
Performance is not the main focus of OPPO Reno 2Z, its core selling point is the night shot. The camera is equipped with four cameras: 48MP main camera + 8MP wide-angle + 2MP black and white portrait + 2MP portrait, front 16MP lifting lens.
Taking pictures in a sunny scene, you can see the performance of OPPO Reno 2Z from the proofs. The white balance is basically accurate and the colors are in place. However, the contrast of the picture is a little worse. It is recommended that users who like to take photos to open the “colorful mode” to enhance the look and feel of the picture. In the same scene, switching the phone lens to 48MP, thanks to the super resolution of the Sony IMX586 sensor, the overall details of the photo have been better preserved. In addition, the sample in 48MP mode is consistent with the default mode in terms of color consistency and exposure accuracy, and there are almost only differences in details.
Reno 2Z’s photo performance has been good so far, but the style of the photo has changed after the super wide-angle mode is turned on. In the ultra-wide-angle mode, the exposure and color of the photos are basically the same, but the color in the sky has changed slightly. The contrast of the picture is slightly reduced, it is easy to see that the HDR function should be triggered automatically.
In addition, the rear portrait mode is not bad from the perspective, the details can be performed, and the edge of the map is also within the acceptable range. When the camera lens is switched to the front and the portrait mode is turned on, the general performance of the self-timer is OK, although there are some mistakes in the complex parts of the hair. On the whole, the daytime proofs of OPPO Reno 2Z are quite good, but in fact, the night is the occasion where it exerts its strength.
In the normal mode, the front light is highly suppressed, and the words on the rear light are more ambiguous and somewhat overexposed. The red banner details in the garage are well preserved and the words above can be clearly seen, but the highlights of the tube are not suppressed. As can be seen from the color of the branches, the overall photo is still reddish. The 2D light change of the night mode makes the picture look pure. The sky with 5 times light change is still very pure, and the two characters of Sushi are clearly visible. Although some details have been lost, you can see that the noise control of Reno 2Z is very good.
Software
- ColorOS 6.1
- Based on Android 9 Pie
- Dolby Atmos sound enhancements
The Reno 2 Z is based around Oppo’s ColorOS software, which is based on Google’s Android 9 Pie. As yet, there’s no date for Oppo phones to receive an upgrade to a version of the software based on the incoming Android 10.
As far as Android-based interfaces go, ColorOS is actually one of the best. It isn’t a million miles away from stock Android and the design – updated for this version – is fresh.
There’s a Smart Assistant screen if you swipe left from home, but customisations aren’t in your face, while Oppo’s own apps are complementary rather than frustratingly battling with Google’s suite of apps for supremacy.
Out of the box, the phone has the traditional Android three-button setup (on display these days, of course). However, you can set it up to bin these and move across to Android’s full-touch gestures that are a staple of Android 10.
Final Verdict
Summarizing the photo performance of Reno 2Z, you can see that its level is not bad. The advantage of glare photography is that the white balance is excellent and the color expression is more accurate. The advantage of night scene shooting is that the screen brightness is good, and the highlight control is at the upstream level. However, its photographs are not perfect. The main problem may be that the screen under HDR function is not good, and there will be a slight color cast during night shooting, especially in the case of extremely low light.
Now let’s go back to the product itself. Here are some of the advantages and disadvantages of the summary.
Advantage
- The design is stylish and well-made.
- The phone grip feels good.
- The photo taken by the 5x optical change is very pure.
- The mobile phone adaptively turns on the night mode is very convenient.
- It also supports video super anti-shake.
Disadvantages
- There is no setting to turn the polar night mode on and off manually.
- The lifting camera is not a side-swing lifting structure.
- The blurring algorithm needs to be further optimized.
- It’s not hard to see that Reno 2Z is a model for offline users. The focus is very clear, that is, to provide better photos, good looks, and other peripherals at a lower price (relative to Reno 2). Experience the bonus.
Because of this, its performance and design are competitive at the same price mobile phone. If you recognize the design concept of the Reno series of mobile phones and look at the photos and budget considerations, then Oppo Reno 2Z will be a good choice
