OPPO Find X8 Review: The Ultimate Camera Experience

OPPO’s Find series has been a mystery to much of the world, as the last one to launch worldwide was the Find X5 over two years ago. Thankfully, after many requests from fans, OPPO is bringing its latest Find X8 series to all markets, and I couldn’t be more excited. The Find X8 is the first to feature MediaTek’s flagship Dimensity 9400 chip and houses three 50MP Hasselblad camera sensors.

I had the chance to test the OPPO Find X8 for a week, and it may just be one of the best flagship devices of 2024. To find out why, let’s get straight into my review of the OPPO Find X8.

OPPO Find X8 Review: Design & Hardware

OPPO knows how to make pretty phones; take the previous Find X7 as an example. While the leather-backed finish of its predecessor, which I was a big fan of, is gone, the new design is equally jaw-dropping. With 1.45mm thin bezels and a soft-touch back panel, the Find X8 screams premium and looks classy in the white colorway.

The camera module features OPPO’s signature Cosmos Ring design, and I like it quite a lot. The symmetry of individual sensors and the Hasselblad branding at the center adds a touch of sophistication. During my time with the device, friends and colleagues constantly asked about it. So, if you want your tech to make a statement, the Find X8 might be just for you.

However, the OPPO Find X8’s best feature is its compactness. I’ve always been a big phone person, but I didn’t mind the small size for several reasons. First, the bezels are so thin that the company has managed to fit a 6.58-inch display. Secondly, the phone’s in-hand feeling is at the next level. You can feel that OPPO has put time and effort into the design, as there are no sharp edges despite the flat design.

The brushed aluminum sides further add to the premium feel while offering decent durability. However, I’d still recommend using the included case for extra safety.

The OPPO Find X8 also comes with an alert slider, which is still the most convenient way to turn your phone on silent or vibrate mode without looking. Last but not least, the device has an IP69 water resistance rating, which means it can survive submerged in 1.5m water for 30 minutes.

OPPO Find X8 Review: Display

Almost all flagship devices have excellent displays, but the one on the Find X8 is pretty special. Its 6.59-inch 1256 x 2760 AMOLED LTPO display has a 120Hz refresh rate and supports Dolby Vision and HDR10+.

As you may have guessed, the movie-watching experience on the X8 is amazing, with accurate color representation, deep blacks, and stunning HDR. The device supports a local peak brightness of a whopping 4500 nits. However, in real-world outdoor scenarios, we measured a peak brightness of 1600 nits—more than sufficient for readability under direct sunlight.

Durability is another strong point. OPPO’s Crystal Shield Display Protection performed pretty well during my tests, which included carrying the phone without a case. It didn’t get any major scratches or scuffs.

OPPO Find X8 Review: Performance

As mentioned, the OPPO Find X8 is the first device with MediaTek’s flagship chip, the Dimensity 9400, built on the 3nm fabrication process. The processor includes one Cortex-X925 core clocked at 3630 MHz, three Cortex-X4 cores at 3300 MHz, and four Cortex-A720 cores at 2400 MHz, paired with the Mali-G925 Immortalis MP12 GPU. My review unit also had 16GB of LPDDR5X RAM and 512GB of UFS 4.0 storage.

Leaving the specs aside, the Find X8 is an excellent daily driver. The UI is smooth, and the phone glides through the apps without a hint of lag or stutter. Even when using the camera, I couldn’t see any issues. Simply put, pushing the Find X8 to its limits during everyday use is impossible.

Benchmarks & Gaming

To find the limits, I ran a series of benchmarks. On Geekbench, the Find X8 achieved a single-core score of 2799 and a multi-core score of 8253. In the AnTuTu benchmark, it scored an eye-watering 2,301,480. For comparison, the Realme GT 7 Pro, which houses Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Elite, scored 2,687,753 in AnTuTu. This puts the Dimensity 9400 just behind the 8 Elite, which is amazing if you are a fan of competition.

I also conducted the infamous 30-minute, 30-thread CPU throttle test to determine sustained performance, and the results were okay. The phone throttled to 75% of its peak performance.

For gaming, I tested BGMI, Rocket League Sideswipe, and Call of Duty Mobile (CODM) on the Find X8. The gameplay was buttery smooth, even at maximum settings, with no lags or stutters. Additionally, the phone remained cool throughout extended gaming sessions.

Battery Life & Charging

Battery technology has seen little innovation over the past decade, but OPPO is changing the game with its new Silicon-Carbon battery technology in the Find X8. Without getting into the technicalities, silicon-carbon batteries offer more energy density, better battery life, and faster charging speeds than traditional lithium-ion cells.

Thanks to this new technology, the OPPO Find X8 houses a massive 5,650 mAh cell. The battery consistently lasted me a day of heavy usage, including gaming, streaming YouTube videos, and taking photos. On lighter usage days, the phone even lasted the next day without recharging.

When it came time to recharge, the included 80W SUPERVOOC charger took the Find X8 from 0% to 100% in just under 50 minutes. The device also supports 50W of fast wireless charging and 10W of reverse wireless charging.

OPPO Find X8 Review: Cameras

Cameras are often the heart of a flagship device and the single biggest differentiating factor between them. The OPPO Find X8 packs a triple-camera setup featuring a 50MP LYT700 f/1.8 OIS primary lens, a 50MP JN1 15mm UltraWide lens, and a 50MP LYT600 73mm telephoto lens with an all-new tetra prism design, enabling optical zoom at 3x and 6x. Additionally, the Hasselblad collaboration brings several unique filters and signature looks to the table.

Daylight Photos & Filters

Thanks to the Hasselblad partnership, the OPPO Find X8 captures natural-looking photos in daylight, which is something I didn’t expect. The images were quite lively, featuring excellent detail courtesy of the 50MP sensor. Color accuracy was also impressive, with the X8 handling greens in outdoor scenarios particularly well.

I also loved how the skin tones were boosted with just the right amount of brightness to create a flattering effect without overwhelming the subject. Finally, there was zero shutter lag, and the action mode helped me capture fast-moving scenes without worrying about anything.

Another great thing about the Find X8 is its sheer number of photography options. While most regular consumers will never go this deep, if you are a photography lover like me, you know how exciting it is to play with the camera’s capabilities. These features include:

1. Xpan Mode

If you have used a Hasselblad-branded phone before, then Xpan mode needs no introduction. For everyone else, Xpan mode on the OPPO Find X8 emulates the Hasselblad Xpan camera, allowing users to capture photos in a cinematic 65:24 aspect ratio. The mode offers both black-and-white and color options. Speaking of results, I loved how these photos turned out with a gritty and almost sci-fi aesthetic.

2. Smart Scenes

We all love taking our phones to concerts or fireworks and capturing photos. However, most of the time, these photos are blurry. But not with the OPPO Find X8. The device includes modes for concerts, fireworks, and even silhouettes. The stage mode brings out more detail and sharpness in zoomed-in shots (20x to 30x), while the fireworks mode improves the shutter speed to help you capture quick photos.

Portrait shots

Portraits are another strong suit for the Find X8. The phone has five different portrait focal lengths, each imitating the look of a Hasselblad sensor. You also get different film filters, like CC, NC, and NH.

Looking past all the features, the photos captured by the OPPO Find X8 are just amazing. The edge detection is spot on—even with tiny hair strands—the colors are accurate, along with a natural depth of field. For those who prefer soft-light portraits, the phone also includes a dedicated Dreamy filter.

Even at nighttime, portrait shots are sharp and free of noise. However, if I had to nitpick, the phone would apply a beauty filter even when it was manually disabled.

Nighttime Shots

With the 50MP Sony primary camera, my expectations for nighttime shots were high, and the OPPO Find X8 didn’t disappoint. Its photos are detailed, noise-free, and display excellent color accuracy. Plus, I noticed no shutter lag when capturing these shots, making the X8 one of the best smartphones in the segment for low-light photography.

Zoom and UltraWide Shots

When I first got the OPPO Find X8 to test, I didn’t expect much from the zoom department, as most phones that promise 120x only deliver good photos until 10x-15x. However, I was pleasantly proven wrong in this department, as the Find X8’s zoom capabilities are great. You can capture detailed images with accurate colors up to 30x. OPPO’s processing also allows these great zoom capabilities in low-lighting scenarios.

Similarly, the 50MP UltraWide lens performed exceptionally. During the tests, the photos had little to no distortion, and the phone retained facial details in indoor lighting scenarios. The UltraWide lens also doubles as a macro sensor.

Selfies & Videos

The 32MP selfie shooter on the OPPO Find X8 is quite amazing. Sure, it applies a beauty filter to every photo, but the sharpness, low-light performance, and color reproduction are excellent. Additionally, the wide-angle lens proved handy for capturing group selfies.

On the other hand, OPPO has taken a major step forward in the video department, as all the Find X8 lenses—including the front—can record 4K@60fps Dolby Vision videos. I was impressed by the results. The inclusion of HDR added depth to the footage, the stabilization was spot-on, and the colors were accurate.

OPPO Find X8 Review: Software & AI

The OPPO Find X8 runs Android 15 on top of ColorOS 15. Quite frankly, I have never been a fan of OPPO’s ColorOS and found it confusing and complicated. However, my opinion changed after using the software on the Find X8. While ColorOS 15 still has the annoying Hot Apps/Hot Games folder and ads in the search menu, it also has a much-refined aesthetic, smooth UI, stunning animations, and several neat features that make the device more intuitive.

Among these features is the all-new Touch to Share tool, which allows the phone to send files to an iPhone or iPad with a tap. Additionally, the company has partnered with Google to bring the Circle to Search feature.

As you may have expected, there are also a slew of AI features. First, there is the all-new Notes app. It uses AI to convert messy notes into concise overviews. I tried this feature to write a project update, and the result was quite good. Instead of editing my rough notes to make something presentable, the AI did it for me.

Then there are the AI Summary, AI Speak, and AI Writer tools. As their names suggest, these tools help you summarize and listen to web pages, as well as suggest replies to emails or texts based on specific prompts. While I don’t usually use AI to search through websites, the AI summary was quite helpful in navigating sites with many ads. Also, the writing features worked pretty well.

Lastly, the Find X8 has AI Photo editing features, like Object Erasor and Image Unblur. I tested both, and the Object Eraser was solid. The tool automatically identified and selected objects for removal while also offering different modes for people and objects. Meanwhile, the Image Unblur feature added a subtle touch of sharpening and color enhancement to old photos.

Should You Buy the OPPO Find X8?

At INR 69,999, the OPPO Find X8 is one of the best flagship smartphones to launch in 2024. From its stunning design and powerhouse performance to its amazing cameras and fast charging, it’s a phone that’s hard to fault. You can feel OPPO has put time and effort into polishing the user experience, which is the hallmark of a great phone. As a result, I give the Find X8 a solid thumbs up, and you can check it out on OPPO’s website and Flipkart.