The OPPO F5 Youth is the affordable variant in the F5 series. It packs the same design and the same software of the OPPO F5 and F5 6GB however, the Youth has a toned hardware inside in where the smartphone has a camera with a lower megapixel count and also a lower RAM. So what do I think about the smartphone? Check it out on our review of the smartphone below

Hardware and Design

The OPPO F5 Youth has a similar design to the OPPO F5. The smartphone has a full-screen display and again, there’s no difference to the one on the OPPO F5. The smartphone feels light since the smartphone is made up of plastic. Nothing to worry about it as the smartphone still feels fine.

The OPPO F5 Youth still uses a Micro USB port despite most smartphones being released recently uses a USB Type-C Port. This one doesn’t come with fast charging too and actually I really miss that feature on OPPO smartphones.

Holding the smartphone was comfortable. If you’re not confident of holding the smartphone because of its large display,  you don’t have to worry as this one is ergonomic thanks to its 18:9 display aspect ratio which makes the smartphone narrower despite having a large screen display.

The fingerprint scanner of the smartphone is ergonomically placed at the back which makes the smartphone easier to unlock and speaking of unlock, the face unlock technology of the OPPO F5 Youth is as fast and actually, I barely use the fingerprint scanner of the smartphone but of course, that’s pretty useless when you’re in the dark.

Display

The OPPO F5 Youth still uses a 6.0-inch Full HD+ display with a resolution of 2160*1080. The display isn’t the best in the market but it has pretty good colors and I really love the thin bezel on the smartphone along with the rounded edges. It just adds to the beauty of the smartphone.

The colors are good and I can easily use this smartphone outside even in direct sunlight. Gaming on an 18:9 display is better too as I don’t have any problems with blocking most of the view as the smartphone is wider when playing landscape.

Overall, I love the fullscreen display of the smartphone and its FHD+ display with rounded edges.

Software

The OPPO F5 Youth is running on ColorOS 3.2 with Android 7.1 inside. The UI of ColorOS 3.2 is fun to use and it’s very similar to other OPPO smartphones. So if you came from an OPPO smartphone, well, you won’t have any problems with it.

However for the first time OPPO smartphone users, some might get confused with its UI as this has a home screen with no app drawer. Don’t worry, it’s still user-friendly and everything on the smartphone is easy to access.

As expected, it comes with some apps including phone manager that lets you clean up and accelerate the smartphone and also to optimize the applications and memory. Pretty useful apps that most smartphones have these days.

Performance

Here’s the interesting thing about the OPPO F5 Youth. Despite being branded as the Youth variant with a smaller RAM and a different camera, OPPO still opted to choose the same chipset – MediaTek Helio P23. It’s actually powerful and it can run most games without problems.

The smartphone doesn’t heat up that much when playing which is a good thing. Oh, and when it comes to games, you don’t have to worry about it that much as the OPPO F5 Youth was able to play most games without problems including Rules of Survival. Most of the games would run at the highest settings however if you plan on playing other 3D heavy games then better set it at low to medium settings to achieve a smooth gameplay.

Despite having only a 3GB of RAM, the real-life performance and experience wasn’t really affected. Yes, it will be slower compared to the OPPO F5 but for casual smartphone users, it wouldn’t be a really big problem. 

Battery Life

The battery life performance of the OPPO F5 Youth is very much the same with the OPPO F5. It will last a day of normal usage without even asking for a power bank, however, if you’re into heavy gaming then better bring power bank or charger always with you. 

Camera

The OPPO F5 Youth sports a 16-megapixel f/2.0 camera on the front with AI Beautification technology. With this tech, the beautification feels more natural. And yes, the beautification of the camera looks good, however, I noticed that there’s a big difference when it comes to the camera of the OPPO F5 to the OPPO F5 Youth. I noticed that the quality is a lot better on the OPPO F5 and I can immediately notice the details are less sharper compared to the OPPO F5.

Don’t get me wrong, the OPPO F5 Youth’s camera performs well but it isn’t as near as the OPPO F5 in terms of quality. The colors are just fine sometimes however at lowlight, it’s a hit and miss. The depth effect on the blur mode is still good but not the best and it sometimes misses the edges.

Check out the shots that I took using the smartphone below.

As expected, the OPPO F5 is still superior when it comes to camera and the OPPO F5 Youth has just a fine camera at well-lit conditions however at lowlight, the images are little bit soft.

Verdict

OPPO did a great job with the OPPO F5 and with the OPPO F5 Youth? Well, I’m really happy with it. Aesthetically, the F5 series doesn’t have a difference with each other but inside it is where you can feel the difference. If you want a more affordable OPPO F5 then go for the OPPO F5 Youth however if you can, better go for the OPPO F5 which has a better camera and a larger RAM.