It’s been a few months since we saw a mid-range smartphone from OPPO. For the past couple of months, the brand has been busy pushing the Reno and Reno 10x into the premium market. In a few days, however, OPPO will be introducing the OPPO A9 2020 and we’re fortunate enough to get an early look at the smartphone.
OPPO A9 2020
| OPPO A9 2020 | |
| Chipset | Qualcomm Snapdragon 665 |
| Screen | 6.5-inch, 1600 x 720, Waterdrop Notch, Corning Gorilla Glass 3 |
| RAM | 8GB |
| OS | Android 9.0 with ColorOS 6.0 |
| Rear Camera | 48MP, 8MP Ultrawide, 2MP Portrait, 2MP Mono |
| Front Camera | 16MP |
| Storage | 128GB expandable via dedicated MicroSD slot |
| Network | Dual-SIM, 4G LTE |
| Connectivity | WiFi, Bluetooth 5.0, USB Type-C, A-GPS |
| Battery | 5,000mAh, 10W Charging, Reverse Charging |
| Others | Face Unlock, Fingerprint Scanner |
| Colors | Space Purple, Marine Green |
Large form factor
Though the OPPO A9 2020 is positioned in the mid-range segment, the smartphone looks like a premium smartphone due to its size. Measuring at around 163.6mm in height, the A9 2020 is a tower of a smartphone.
Its large size, however, can be attributed to rather large bezels at the sides and top as well as a sizeable bottom chin. Its 6.5-inch-inch Waterdrop Notch display is also a bit less impressive only have a 1600 x 720 resolution.
Despite the lowered resolution, OPPO is introducing their Sunlight Screen tech on the OPPO A9 2020. This will allow the smartphone’s screen to have pixel-level contrast adjustment depending on the sunlight.
5 cameras is the new mid-range standard
It seems that every year we’re having an increase of the number of cameras on a smartphone. The OPPO A9 2020 has 5 cameras: 4 at the back and 1 at the front.
The 16MP front-facing camera of the A9 2020 is located, as expected, at the Waterdrop notch of the screen. Longtime OPPO favorite AI Beautification is available to remove any imperfections while taking a selfie.
The OPPO A9 2020’s glossy rear houses its 4 cameras. Its quad-camera setup is composed of a 48MP f/1.8 main shooter, an 8MP ultrawide camera, a 2MP portrait lens, and a 2MP mono lens.
The first two cameras are fairly straight forward. The 2MP portrait lens is most likely a depth sensor for applying bokeh in portraits. The 2MP mono lens, however, would probably capture black and white shots to be applied to other photos for better contrast.
New internals for the OPPO A9 2020
The OPPO A9 2020 is one of the first smartphones from the brand to come with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 665. This new chip employs the standard 4+4 core setup backed by an Adreno 610 GPU.
This new chip promises 20% lower power consumption as well as better AI performance compared to the Qualcomm Snapdragon 660 – a chip found on the previous OPPO A7.
To complement the Qualcomm Snapdragon 665, the OPPO A9 2020 comes with 8GB of RAM (which is a lot for a mid-range smartphone) and 128GB of internal storage. If you’re in need of more space, the smarphone has a dedicated MicroSD card slot alongside with two Nano-SIM slots.
A large battery for longevity
It’s no surprise that the OPPO A9 2020 will come with a rather massive battery. Inside its glossy shell is a 5,000mAh battery. The battery is also the reason why the smartphone is 9.1mm thick.
Paired with the power efficiency of its chipset, OPPO has rated the smartphone to last for up to 19 hours of continuous mobile use. Though this number will need to be taken with a bit of salt. Hopefully, we’ll be able to tell an exact figure of how long the smartphone lasts when our full review is out.
It’s a surprise, however, that the OPPO A9 2020 comes with a USB Type-C port. It seems that the brand is finally catching up to the times after releasing a few mid-range smartphones with a MicroUSB connector.
While the smartphone is not VOOC 3.0-rated, it does support 10W Charging which is the norm for most smartphones. The A9 2020 also comes with reverse charging via an OTG cable.
The OPPO A9 2020 will come in two colors
Set to launch on September 19, 2019, the OPPO A9 2020 will be initially available in two colors: Space Purple and Marine Green. This dual-tone color scheme is fast becoming the standard for most mid-range smartphones.
The price of the OPPO A9 2020 as well as the OPPO A5 2020 will be unveiled when both smartphones are launched on September 19, 2019.