When it comes to the Oppo lineup, Stuff is usually on board. That’s because the Chinese manufacturer is at its best when it’s pumping out mid-rangers, and bringing as many of them as possible to South African shores. Oppo’s latest release, the Oppo A98 5G, ticks both those boxes, having already hit South Africa’s shelves and selling for a decent price.
When it comes to the Oppo’s A series, the A98 5G is the new top dog, dethroning the A78 5G that launched in South Africa in February of this year. It appears to be a solid follow-up, maintaining the value-for-money ideology that the A series is known for.
That’s why the A98 5G has a recommended retail price of R12,000 slapped onto the box. Is it worth it? That’s up to you. But before you make any big decisions, look at all the specs on offer here.
Oppo on a budget
Let’s start with those innards. Oppo says it’s made upgrades in the flash charging and battery department, despite sticking with the same 5,000mAh battery we saw in the A78. That’s actually fine for a phone in this price bracket, especially when you factor in the newly-added 67W wired charging, which Oppo says will net a 50% charge in just 18 minutes. A full charge, however, will set you back 44 minutes. That’s obviously by design, letting the company launch something speedy enough to help its South African customers fight back against load shedding.
“We understand that the South African market is looking for this type of device that can go all day. This device meets this requirement, with one of the best configurations in flash charging and battery in its price range,” said Liam Faurie, Head of Operations & Go-to Markets at Oppo.
Performance, too, has seen a boost. It’s got 5G support (duh) thanks to the octa-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 695 chipset that’s keeping everything running. It’s propped up by 8GB of RAM and 256GB of onboard storage which is more than enough to get you by. And. if it’s really bugging you, Oppo says it’ll support a 1TB SD card expansion. Whew.
If you’re looking for something to get into any hardcore gaming, you won’t find it here. However, it’ll do a good-enough job to keep you in the conversation (and maybe some lower-tier leaderboards).
Shifting focus
Zoom out, and you’ll get a peek at the A98’s rather good-looking exterior. There are two shades to choose from – Dreamy Blue and Cool Black – which make up the device’s backplate. The phone’s 6.72in FullHD+ display is capable of hitting 120Hz if you don’t mind the knock to the battery life.
Flip it around and say hello to the rear’s 64MP primary shooter coupled with a 2MP depth sensor and 2MP macro lens. Oppo likes to throw around the word ‘AI’ when it comes to its cameras, promising a number of features like AI portrait retouching and AI Colour Portrait that’ll supposedly make your pictures look that teeny bit better. We’ll believe that when we see it.
You’ll find a 32MP selfie shooter on the device’s front-facing punch-hole, loaded up with all the same ‘AI’ features we mentioned above. And, as mentioned, it’s available now. So go and get one. You know, if you want to.