Oppo Find N foldable eliminates the crease and is nearly US$600 cheaper than the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold3

The Oppo Find N has been in the news for quite some time now and has been finally unveiled today. The Find N is Oppo's answer to the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold series but comes in a more compact form factor when folded instead of the elongated appearance of the Galaxy Z Fold. 

The Find N tips the scales at 275 g and is about 15.9 mm thick when folded. The smartphone sports a 5.5-inch 60 Hz outer screen with a 1972x988 resolution and an 18:9 aspect ratio. The inner screen is a 7.1-inch 1792x1920 120 Hz LTPO panel with a 9:8.4 aspect ratio that can dynamically change its refresh rate between 1 Hz and 120 Hz. The inner display works in landscape mode by default. According to Oppo, this was a design choice to make the inner display ideal for multimedia consumption while still offering a useable outer display for telephony.

While the display is verily Samsung's, Oppo does have a few tricks up its sleeve to distinguish itself from the Galaxy Z Fold3. Similar to the Galaxy Z Fold3, the Find N also features Ultra-Thin Glass (UTG) covering over the display. However, the Find N's folding crease is not as conspicuous as that of the Galaxy Z Fold 3 since it uses a patented teardrop-shaped hinge that enables the phone to fold without leaving any gap between the two halves of the display. The hinge also allows the phone to be half-folded in a laptop-esque form factor similar to Samsung's Flex Mode. The crease is still present, but it is hardly visible in regular use and normal viewing angles. Oppo says that the Find N has been tested to withstand over 200,000 folds.

Under the hood, we find a Snapdragon 888 SoC paired with up to 12 GB RAM and up to 512 GB storage — understandable given that the Find N has been in development much before the new Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 was made available. This also means that the Find N will not be using the company's new MariSilicon X NPU.

The Find N offers a triple-camera setup at the back. The main camera is the same 50 MP Sony IMX766 sensor with OIS and an f/1.8 lens found in the Find N's cousins such as the OnePlus 9 Pro and the Find X3 Pro. Complementing this sensor is a 16 MP f/2.2 ultrawide lens and a 13 MP f/2.4 telephoto lens with 2x zoom. Apart from these cameras, there are also two 32 MP f/2.4 Sony IMX615 selfie cameras on either display.

A 4,500 mAh battery powers the Find N, and this can be charged at 33 W with the company's SuperVOOC charging tech or at 15 W wirelessly. The Find N also supports 10 W reverse wireless charging. Information about dust and water ingress protection is not yet clear.

It will be interesting to see how Oppo is customizing its software to take advantage of the foldable design. It may not quite match that of Samsung's at this point, but there are quite a few gestures that allow multitasking. Some of Oppo's inbox apps can already take advantage of the split screen with hopefully more to follow.

Similar to Oppo's Air Glass that was announced yesterday, the Find N will be a China-exclusive for now and will go on sale from December 23 in Black, Purple, and White colors, though a global release is not being fully ruled out.

Interestingly, the Find N is the cheapest of the foldables retailing at just ¥7,699 (US$1,210) for 8 GB RAM and 256 GB storage and at ¥8,999 (US$1,400) for the 12 GB / 512 GB variant. The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold3, on the other hand starts from US$1,799.99 while the Xiaomi Mi Mix Fold begins from about US$1,521.

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