Oppo Reno6 Pro review: too good, but a little too expensive

The Reno series is reputed to be the most affordable range from Oppo, but it must be said that this Reno6 Pro is far from being “cheap” at the top of its 700 €. At this price, it is ahead of the Xiaomi Mi 11T Pro, the OnePlus 9 or the Pixel 6 Pro. The device is an excellent surprise in terms of finish, design and grip with a curved screen, a glass back with slight roughness that does not leave fingerprints. A little gem. Of course, in this segment we will find a fingerprint sensor under the screen, but there is no jack, no waterproof certification, no wireless charging and no expandable memory. It will have to do with the 256 GB of storage.

A very nice screen and a surprising chip

The display of the Oppo Reno6 Pro is AMOLED technology and measures 6.55 inches (16.6 cm) with a definition of 2400 x 1080 pixels (402 DPI). The refresh is 90 Hz which is the bare minimum in this price range. The screen is one of the strong points of the device with beautiful colors, the possibility of adjusting the colorimetry as you wish (thank you ColorOS!) and a minimum / maximum brightness which makes the device pleasant to use in all circumstances. In terms of performance, the Snapdragon 888 was not chosen, but the Snapdragon 870G fulfills its purpose perfectly. It is a less ambitious chip in terms of computing power, but which shows absolutely no signs of weakness. This may be the end of the dominance of a single chip on the very high end. It must be said that SoCs are constantly in the race for performance while uses remain generally the same, including for gaming. The proof is that this 870G chip even equips the Black Shark 4 which is a powerful device. and built for gaming. With its 12 GB of ultra-fast RAM with the possibility of allocating an additional 7 GB by “borrowing” from the storage memory, the Oppo Reno6 Pro is clearly in the category of powerful devices.

A very convincing photo part…

Our colleagues have rightly noted the many similarities between this Oppo Reno6 Pro and the Oppo Find X3 Neo released in July 2021. It is clear that as far as the photo is concerned, it is a copy and paste with a 50-megapixel Sony IMX766 main lens, a 16 MP ultra-wide-angle, a 13 MP x2 telephoto lens and a 2 MP macro sensor. Let’s skip the latter which brings absolutely nothing to the whole, to attack directly by the main course. The main module delivers excellent photos. By day, the details are numerous, the colors are well transcribed without abusing superfluous treatments. It is clear and natural. At night, it’s just as good with controlled noise and few color surprises. Beware of the 50 MP mode which records very heavy photos and not necessarily of better quality. It is, however, a feature that will allow you to capture well-exposed scenes in greater detail.

The ultra wide-angle isn’t bad. During the day, it will tend to produce images with a lack of sharpness on the periphery, which is the case with the majority of competitors. At night, it will tend to smooth the shots to erase the noise, but it’s far from being a disaster.

Then let’s see the 52 mm telephoto lens, which is twice the main sensor. During the day, there is a slight lack of sharpness, of “pep”, but it is still very usable, especially as the stabilization does the job well. When the light is lacking, it is also very good with a little more smoothing. At night it is however, and as often with these lenses, quite disappointing even if we had good surprises with an illuminated monument for example.

On the video side, the Oppo Reno6 Pro can capture up to 4K at 60 fps, but as often we will prefer to limit ourselves to 1080p since we will be able to take advantage of features specific to Oppo devices such as the very clean bokeh mode, stabilization, dual view for vloggers or scene recognition.

Fast charging, but battery life is down

Let’s attack a part that annoys: autonomy. Admittedly, it will clearly be necessary to abuse your device to drain the battery in less than a day, but the competitors are doing better overall, especially since the chip chosen is not the most greedy. The scan may have gone from 90 to 60 Hz, but it’s like driving a Porsche with a caravan behind: it’s a bit of a shame. Fortunately, the “eco” mode has the merit of working well if the day becomes too long. The strong point is the SuperVOOC 2 charge at 65 W which allows you to recharge the 4500 mAh battery in 30 minutes. Even if the record still goes to the Xiaomi 11T Pro and its “0 to 100” in 19 minutes, gaining 50% on its gauge during a shower is very significant.

Our Verdict:

The Reno6 Pro won’t appeal to everyone. In addition to its similarities with the Find X3 Neo, it offers both a good technical sheet, but cruel absences for a smartphone at 700 € (no waterproofing, autonomy a little tight). It still has strong assets like its screen, its fast charging and a beautiful design that stands out. The photo/video part is also very good, but it is unfortunately too expensive to really impose itself.

Shooting tests