OPPO F17 Pro hands-on: Design, imaging take center stage in this smartphone

The OPPO F17 Pro brings most of the things you expect in a midrange smartphone - a lightweight design, AMOLED display, multi-optic camera system and refined user interface

Chinese smartphone maker OPPO on Wednesday launched its OPPO F17 series smartphones in India. The series includes the OPPO F17 Pro and its vanilla edition, the OPPO F17. While the latter is a successor to the OPPO F15, the Pro edition, a new addition to the line-up, brings most of the things you expect in a midrange smartphone — a lightweight design, AMOLED display, big-capacity battery with fast charging, multi-optic camera system, and refined user interface. Check out the phone’s hands-on and first impressions:

OPPO F17 Pro: Design

The OPPO F17 Pro is easily one of the most ergonomically built smartphone. It has a compact form factor (7.48 mm thin) and lightweight design (164g) unmatched by peers in the budget and midrange segments. Moreover, the design is accentuated by a two-tone gradient reflective cover on the back that looks familiar but intriguing.

The phone has an Apple iPhone 11 Pro-like square-shaped camera module on the back, which protrudes outwards from the chassis but not so much as to look odd or cause any distraction. Though made mostly of plastic, the phone’s overall build is sturdy and it looks premium from all angles. The OPPO F17 Pro does not have a clean or minimal design but it is crafted in a way that it looks coherent, if not perfect.

OPPO F17 Pro: Display

The OPPO F17 Pro has a 6.43-inch screen of fullHD+ (2400 x 1080) resolution, stretched in a tall 20:9 aspect ratio. It is an AMOLED screen of 60Hz refresh rate. The screen lacks fancy features like HDR and high refresh rates, but it seems to be great for everyday use in its present form. Besides, it is bright, vivid and responsive. It supports the always-on display feature and dark mode. It, however, has a distraction in the form of a capsule-shaped punch-hole in the top-left corner. Bezels, especially the fairly big one at the bottom, are another distraction from a design point of view.

OPPO F17 Pro: Camera

Imaging in the OPPO F17 Pro is covered by six cameras – four on the rear and two on the front. The rear camera set-up includes a 48-megapixel primary sensor of an f1.8 aperture, an 8MP ultra-wide sensor of an f2.2 aperture, and two 2MP monochrome sensors of an f2.4 aperture. On the front, the phone has a 16MP primary sensor of an f2.4 aperture mated with a 2MP depth sensor.

Overall, the camera set-up seems unconventional, especially the dual monochrome sensors on the back. Nonetheless, the cameras on the front and back seem good for regular imaging. Detailed coverage and camera samples will be available in the full review, which will be published soon.

OPPO F17 Pro: Performance

The OPPO F17 Pro is powered by MediaTek Helio P95 system-on-chip, paired with up to 8 GB of RAM and 128 GB of internal storage. The phone boots Android 10 based ColorOS 7.2 user interface. During initial set-up, the phone showed no performance bottlenecks and sailed smoothly. Its custom Android operating system seems optimised and has many options for customisation. Like other OPPO smartphones, the F17 Pro comes with the company’s bloatware pre-installed. However, bloatware from third-party apps is minimal. The phone is powered by a a 4,000mAh battery supported by 30W fast charging.

OPPO F17 Pro price in India and availability details

The OPPO F17 Pro will be available at Rs 22,990 for the 8GB RAM + 128GB storage model. It will be available in Magic Blue, Matte Black, and Metallic White across online and offline stores from September 7. The phone goes up for pre-orders starting today.

The OPPO F17 Pro review is under process and will be out soon…