The OPPO A91 adjusts itself nicely into the mid-range smartphone market with a beautiful design and powerful features. Back on December 20, OPPO announced the A91 with a quad-camera setup as well as a budget-friendly OPPO A8 with the triple camera setup. The handset is available in 8GB RAM + 128GB ROM and costs $285. It’s not currently available in India, so it may be possible that the OPPO will launch “OPPO F15” in India as a rebranded version of OPPO A91. There is a Dark Blue, Red, and Blue color options for you.
Design and Body Material
The OPPO A91 design is almost a surprise package, and when you hold this device in hand you’ll feel good but slippery. The front is looking gorgeous with a water-drop notch, but unfortunately, it offers a flat display, not an edge to edge display.
On the back, it has a vertically shaped quad-camera setup, and the OPPO logo is held at the upper left side of the bottom. The pilled shaped LED flash has fixed at the right side of the quad-camera setup. The OPPP A91 offers a power button on the right side while the volume rockers and dual SIM slot on the left side. The exciting thing about this device is an under-display fingerprint sensor for authentication. The rest features like USB-C port, speaker grills, and 3.5mm audio jack are set at the bottom.
Display
Rated at the Full HD+ resolution, the display of the Phone hasn’t any issue in terms of quality and physical appearance; both are good, and AMOLED display provides an immersive experience. The OPPO A91 flaunts a 6.4 inches Super AMOLED display that can support up to FHD+ resolution of 1080 x 2400 pixels. Along with the 20:9 aspect ratio and 408 PPI density and offers an 85.5% screen-to-body ratio. Settings to control the screen color temperature are excellent so you can adjust screen brightness during the night for eye protection. In our display test, we record 430 nits maximum brightness level.
Battery
With a 4,025 mAh battery, the OPPO A91 is allowed to users about a day backup on moderate to heavy use. When we have used heavy games like PUBG, the Phone’s battery needs to charge after 12 hours. The Phone can support up to 30W for rapid charging. With 30W (VOOC Flash charge 3.0) you can charge A91’s battery 50 percent only in 30 minutes. Furthermore, the Phone allows spending around 15h for web browsing.
Software
The Android 9 Pie OS skinned with ColorOS 6.1 OPPO’s layer is pre-installed on the Phone. OPPO may roll out Android 10 updates for this Phone in the near feature. Anyway, OPPO A91 offers a great experience with some new changes including App icons, notification tray, and the multitasking pane. In terms of Software value, the OPPO A91 comes with a smart sidebar. The Smart Sidebar is a small pane on the edge of your display to quickly access your favorite applications and tools. When you start the device after purchase, the Phone will offer Smart Sidebar on the right side of the display, and you could also set at the left or right side (as per your choice). The screen recorder of the Phone allows you to capture your screen at a 720p resolution with options to record your voice. It also offers a screenshot icon to take a screenshot without having to press any hardware buttons. The Phone has shipped with navigation gestures system and also provides a great deal of customization. The Game space feature allows the Phone to perform optimally during the game, and a Clone Apps icon also provides the ability to load two of the same applications to access multiple social media platforms such as on Facebook, Whatsapp, and TikTok.
Performance
Under the hood, the OPPO A91 ticks on the MediaTek Helio P70 Chipset and coupled with up to 8GB of RAM and 128GB native storage. The Helio P70 Chipset is constructed on a 12nm Octa-core processor (4x2.1 GHz Cortex-A73 & 4x2.0 GHz Cortex-A53). There is a Mali-G72 MP3 GPU that does not offer an excellent experience for gaming. Check out some synthetic benchmarks of the A91.
GeekBench 4.1 (single-core)
Higher is Better
GeekBench 4.1 (multi-core)
AnTuTu scores
Rear Camera Setup
The most exciting thing is a 48MP immersive primary sensor for photography. The OPPO A91 has a vertically shaped quad-camera setup on the back which includes a 48MP primary sensor with f/1.8 aperture, an 8MP ultra-wide sensor with f/2.2 aperture, and a 2MP dedicated macro lens with f/2.4 aperture and a 2MP depth sensor with f/2.4 aperture.
Along with f/1.8 aperture and 26mm wider, the primary sensor has 0.8µm pixels and PDAF. The dedicated macro sensor (1.75µm) can capture as close as up to 2cm. Most of the photos captured by the 48MP primary sensor are great with a delicate balance of warm and more relaxed tones. The ultra-wide 8MP sensor can’t capture pretty images like 48MP, but it tries to provide well images with the ability (8MP).
There are also HDR and panorama features. In the camera menu, the Phone has various options such as DOC, Pro, PANO, AI Beauty, Photo, Video, Fun Video, and AR Stickers. We also capture excellent images with natural skin tones at blur background. Unfortunately, with a 48MP quad-camera setup, there is no option for 4k video recording. The OPPO A91 only can record FHD videos at 30fps and Super Slow-motion videos at 720fps.
Front Camera
OPPO A91 hasn’t focused on the selfie lovers; it ships with only 16MP sensor that is lower MP than other competitors. On the front panel, the water-drop notch houses a 16MP sensor with f/2.0 aperture. Along with f/2.0 aperture and 26mm wider, the sensor has 1/3.1" and 1.0µm pixels. It can record FHD videos at 30fps. Anyway, as for the quality of selfies, the camera works good (not better) with plenty of light available.
Pros and Cons
Pros
Super AMOLED display
Quad rear camera setup
8GB RAM with 128GB more significant storage
Cons
No option for 4k video recording
Selfie experience isn’t good
We feel warming during the gaming experience
Verdict
Only for $280 price tag, the OPPO A91 offers a 48MP quad-camera setup, Super AMOLED display, an under-display fingerprint sensor. The OPPO A91 is one of the best mid-range phones with 4,025 mAh battery, 30W fast charging, 8GB RAM for better PUBG experience, and 128GB more significant internal storage. If you dislike the 16MP sensor of A91 and want to save some money, you can also purchase Redmi Note 8 Pro with a 64MP quad-camera setup, a 20MP selfie sensor, and 4,500 mAh battery with 18W fast charging. Bear in mind, the Redmi Note 8 Pro costs $200 for sole model 6GB RAM + 64GB ROM, and it also has an IPS LCD instead of AMOLED display.
Alternatives
The best competitor of OPPO A91 is a Realme 5 Pro. The Realme 5 Pro has 6.3 inches display, quad 48MP rear camera setup, 4,035 mAh battery with 20W fast charging, powerful SDM 712 (10nm) Chipset. The 8GB RAM with 128GB ROM variant of Realme 5 Pro costs $240 price instead of OPPO A91’s $285 price. With a very affordable price, the Realme 5 Pro also has some low features like IPS LCD and rear-mounted fingerprint while A91 offers AMOLED display and Under-display fingerprint scanner. On the other hand, you can also purchase Redmi Note 8 Pro with a 64MP quad-camera setup, 4,500 mAh massive battery, rear-mounted fingerprint sensor, and Helio G90T (12nm) SoC. The Redmi Note 8 Pro costs $200 for a 6GB RAM variant with 64GB ROM, and it also has LCD, not an AMOLED display. So, if you want to enjoy a 64MP immersive primary sensor, 20MP selfie sensor for the best photograph and avoiding some cons such IPS LCD, 6GB RAM, and rear-mounted fingerprint sensor, then you can buy Redmi Note 8 Pro.
Compare with Competitors:
OPPO A91 vs Vivo S5
OPPO A91 vs Galaxy A91
OPPO A91 vs Realme 5 Pro
OPPO A91 vs Redmi Note 8 Pro