The OPPO Find X8 Pro is an Ultra Android flagship in all but name

It’s been a while since OPPO made its way to Europe. The brand is responsible for some of the best Android phones in recent years. Now, the OPPO Find X8 Pro has landed, but you might be more familiar with this phone than you think, especially if you’re an iPhone user. It’s undoubtedly an Android phone, but draws plenty of inspiration from Apple’s flagship.

The OPPO Find X8 Pro offers a similar design to the X7 series but with a more uniform rear camera arrangement. Gone is the awkward middle lens on the Find X7 Ultra, and in comes four equidistant circular voids placed within a larger circular camera bump — pleasing symmetry. The X8 Pro also wears a single colorway across its rear shell that looks far cleaner than its predecessor.

The OPPO Find X8 Pro’s specs also stand out. Up front is a 6.78-inch OLED with a 4,500 nits peak brightness figure. That’s burning bright. It’s paired with a MediaTek Dimensity 9400 SoC, an excellent gaming processor. In our benchmarks, the chipset bests the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3-powered Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra in multi- and single-core Geekbench scores and barely trails behind the Snapdragon 8 Elite-powered ASUS ROG Phone 9 Pro — a proven gaming contender. I didn’t spend much time gaming on this device, but knowing those credentials are there brings welcome comfort.

Rounding off the experience is a 5,910mAh battery that offered me excellent endurance. No matter what I was doing, whether it was watching content or using its quad cameras to take photos and videos, I just couldn’t kill it. It can charge up to 65% in 30 minutes.

It’s also worth mentioning ColorOS. Like iOS, it’s quick and responsive, and I love that you can actually find what you’re looking for in the settings without having to dig through every single menu. There are also some really good AI features this year. You get Circle to Search and all of that goodness with Gemini. There’s AI Summary that can summarize web pages for you that works on almost all browsers, and there’s also AI Speak that can be a bit temperamental but can read web pages for you aloud pretty well.

OPPO has said there will also be five years of OS updates for this, which I think is really nice, but it doesn’t quite compare to Google and Samsung’s promises.

The first thing I noticed about the Find X8 Pro was its new quick camera control button at the side of the phone. I know that Android phones have had this way before the iPhone 16 was introduced (Sony phones have also had them for ages). However, Sony doesn’t have a touch-capacity button, which the iPhone does, as does the Find X8 Pro. But is it any good? In short, no. It’s not easy to use and might be worse than Apple’s implementation.

You double-click it to open the camera and then swipe your finger back and forth to change the zoom, which is difficult. I could never get the zoom I wanted without going past it or falling short. I either have to go really slowly or try about five times to have it stop where I’m actually trying to get it. I’d rather just use the on-screen buttons.

The quick button doesn’t allow you to do anything other than zoom at the moment, and you can’t change any more functions within the camera app. You can single-tap to take a photo or press to burst, but that’s about it. Now, OPPO did say that an update is coming to allow you to do more with this, but I’m not sure any amount of updates can make me want to use the quick button.

Other aspects of the device also lack a degree of polish. OPPO has introduced an almost AirDrop-like feature called O Plus Connect, which is meant to make photo and video sharing with iPhones a little bit easier (in theory). For me, this app didn’t work all of the time. You need to download the O Plus Connect app on your iPhone, have that open, and then connect to the OPPO phone’s hotspot to receive the file. I did try it a few times, and it failed far too many times when it worked, and it kind of just made me not want to try this again.

As much as I enjoy Color OS, the skin has flaws and annoyances you won’t find on a Pixel. I don’t like the number of random apps you have downloaded onto your phone or are heavily suggested to download through hot apps. Then there are the split quick controls and notification shade, which I actually don’t like. Luckily you get the chance to turn this off on setup.

This brings me to the biggest selling point here, and that is the cameras. As there is no Ultra for the Find X8 series (at least not at the time of this writing), we’re going to take this as the best that OPPO can give us.

While the cameras are actually a slight downgrade from the Find X7 Ultra, with the main camera offering a smaller sensor than the one-inch example on that Ultra, it still takes some great photos. Check out the YouTube video at the top of this review for all of my samples.

All four of these lenses are 50MP, and the main camera still captures some really impressive pictures. The details that you get are great. Maybe those details aren’t so great in the shadows, but overall I actually had no complaints.

For telephoto demands, you get the options of either 3x or 6x times zoom levels, and both of these lengths capture some great photos. I actually really love having the option of both because it covers you for pretty much everything. You get AI telescope zoom, which kicks in after 10x, and the AI here helps to enhance that photo. At lower zoom levels, this does a really good job, and it can do a good job as well at 60x zoom if the photo is clear. But if you zoom in on something that’s obfuscated, no amount of AI will save the image.

The video capabilities peak at 4K 60fps, and it’s okay, but I found it to be a little jittery when moving. While the video isn’t that bad, I struggled to look past that jitteriness when moving around with the phone.

The OPPO Find X8 Pro is a compelling flagship contender with a large battery, great gaming chipset, and four capable main cameras. A fair update support period alongside solid build quality makes it a sensible option for those who like looking beyond the big contenders.

However, the most important factor when considering purchasing the OPPO Find X8 Pro is the price, and the price is sky-high. At £1,049 in the UK, you’re looking at around $1,300 in the US. That places the device above both Google and Samsung’s 2024 flagships. While I had a really good time using OPPO’s latest flagship, it’s definitely a niche pick at this price point. However, if you don’t mind paying up, it’s the perfect device for those seeking something a little different beyond the usual suspects.