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The AMD RX 9070 XT delivers exactly what the market needs with stunning performance at an unbeatable price
5:00 pm | March 5, 2025
Author: admin | Category: Computers Computing Computing Components Gadgets | Tags: , , , | Comments: Off

AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT: Two-minute review

AMD had one job to do with the launch of its RDNA 4 graphics cards, spearheaded by the AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT, and that was to not get run over by Blackwell too badly this generation.

With the RX 9070 XT, not only did AMD manage to hold its own against the GeForce RTX monolith, it perfectly positions Team Red to take advantage of the growing discontent among gamers upset over Nvidia's latest GPUs with one of the best graphics cards I've ever tested.

The RX 9070 XT is without question the most powerful consumer graphics card AMD's put out, beating the AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX overall and coming within inches of the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080 in 4K and 1440p gaming performance.

It does so with an MSRP of just $599 (about £510 / AU$870), which is substantially lower than those two card's MSRP, much less their asking price online right now. This matters because AMD traditionally hasn't faced the kind of scalping and price inflation that Nvidia's GPUs experience (it does happen, obviously, but not nearly to the same extent as with Nvidia's RTX cards).

That means, ultimately, that gamers who look at the GPU market and find empty shelves, extremely distorted prices, and uninspiring performance for the price they're being asked to pay have an alternative that will likely stay within reach, even if price inflation keeps it above AMD's MSRP.

The RX 9070 XT's performance comes at a bit of a cost though, such as the 309W maximum power draw I saw during my testing, but at this tier of performance, this actually isn't that bad.

This card also isn't too great when it comes to non-raster creative performance and AI compute, but no one is looking to buy this card for its creative or AI performance, as Nvidia already has those categories on lock. No, this is a card for gamers out there, and for that, you just won't find a better one at this price. Even if the price does get hit with inflation, it'll still likely be way lower than what you'd have to pay for an RX 7900 XTX or RTX 4080 (assuming you can find them at this point) making the AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT a gaming GPU that everyone can appreciate and maybe even buy.

AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT: Price & availability

An AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT made by Sapphire on a table with its retail packaging

(Image credit: Future / John Loeffler)
  • How much is it? MSRP is $599 (about £510 / AU$870)
  • When can you get it? The RX 9070 XT goes on sale March 6, 2025
  • Where is it available? The RX 9070 XT will be available in the US, UK, and Australia at launch

The AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT is available as of March 6, 2025, starting at $599 (about £510 / AU$870) for reference-spec third-party cards from manufacturers like Asus, Sapphire, Gigabyte, and others, with OC versions and those with added accoutrements like fancy cooling and RGB lighting likely selling for higher than MSRP.

At this price, the RX 9070 XT comes in about $150 cheaper than the RTX 5070 Ti, and about $50 more expensive than the RTX 5070 and the AMD Radeon RX 9070, which also launches alongside the RX 9070 XT. This price also puts the RX 9070 XT on par with the MSRP of the RTX 4070 Super, though this card is getting harder to find nowadays.

While I'll dig into performance in a bit, given the MSRP (and the reasonable hope that this card will be findable at MSRP in some capacity) the RX 9070 XT's value proposition is second only to the RTX 5070 Ti's, if you're going by its MSRP. Since price inflation on the RTX 5070 Ti will persist for some time at least, in many cases you'll likely find the RX 9070 XT offers better performance per price paid of any enthusiast card on the market right now.

  • Value: 5 / 5

AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT: Specs

An AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT made by Sapphire on a table with its retail packaging

(Image credit: Future / John Loeffler)
  • PCIe 5.0, but still just GDDR6
  • Hefty power draw

The AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT is the first RDNA 4 card to hit the market, and so its worth digging into its architecture for a bit.

The new architecture is built on TSMC's N4P node, the same as Nvidia Blackwell, and in a move away from AMD's MCM push with the last generation, the RDNA 4 GPU is a monolithic die.

As there's no direct predecessor for this card (or for the RX 9070, for that matter), there's not much that we can apples-to-apples compare the RX 9070 XT against, but I'm going to try, putting the RX 9070 XT roughly between the RX 7800 XT and the RX 7900 GRE if it had a last-gen equivalent.

The Navi 48 GPU in the RX 9070 XT sports 64 compute units, breaking down into 64 ray accelerators, 128 AI accelerators, and 64MB of L3 cache. Its cores are clocked at 1,600MHz to start, but can run as fast as 2,970MHz, just shy of the 3GHz mark.

It uses the same GDDR6 memory as the last-gen AMD cards, with a 256-bit bus and a 644.6GB/s memory bandwidth, which is definitely helpful in pushing out 4K frames quickly.

The TGP of the RX 9070 XT is 304W, which is a good bit higher than the RX 7900 GRE, though for that extra power, you do get a commensurate bump up in performance.

  • Specs: 4 / 5

AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT: Design

An AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT made by Sapphire on a table with its retail packaging

(Image credit: Future / John Loeffler)
  • No AMD reference card
  • High TGP means bigger coolers and more cables

There's no AMD reference card for the Radeon RX 9070 XT, but the unit I got to test was the Sapphire Pulse Radeon RX 9070 XT, which I imagine is pretty indicative of what we can expect from the designs of the various third-party cards.

The 304W TGP all but ensures that any version of this card you find will be a triple-fan cooler over a pretty hefty heatsink, so it's not going to be a great option for small form factor cases.

Likewise, that TGP just puts it over the line where it needs a third 8-pin PCIe power connector, something that you may or may not have available in your rig, so keep that in mind. If you do have three spare power connectors, there's no question that cable management will almost certainly be a hassle as well.

After that, it's really just about aesthetics, as the RX 9070 XT (so far) doesn't have anything like the dual pass-through cooling solution of the RTX 5090 and RTX 5080, so it's really up to personal taste.

As for the card I reviewed, the Sapphire Pulse shroud and cooling setup on the RX 9070 XT was pretty plain, as far as desktop GPUs go, but if you're looking for a non-flashy look for your PC, it's a great-looking card.

  • Design: 4 / 5

AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT: Performance

An AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT in a test bench

(Image credit: Future / John Loeffler)
  • Near-RTX 4080 levels of gaming performance, even with ray tracing
  • Non-raster creative and AI performance lags behind Nvidia, as expected
  • Likely the best value you're going to find anywhere near this price point
A note on my data

The charts shown below offer the most recent data I have for the cards tested for this review. They may change over time as more card results are added and cards are retested. The 'average of all cards tested' includes cards not shown in these charts for readability purposes.

Simply put, the AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT is the gaming graphics card that we've been clamoring for this entire generation. While it shows some strong performance in synthetics and raster-heavy creative tasks, gaming is where this card really shines, managing to come within 7% overall of the RTX 4080 and getting within 4% of the RTX 4080's overall gaming performance. For a card launching at half the price of the RTX 4080's launch price, this is a fantastic showing.

The RX 9070 XT is squaring up against the RTX 5070 Ti, however, and here the RTX 5070 Ti does manage to pull well ahead of the RX 9070 XT, but it's much closer than I thought it would be starting out.

On the synthetics side, the RX 9070 XT excels at rasterization workloads like 3DMark Steel Nomad, while the RTX 5070 Ti wins out in ray-traced workloads like 3DMark Speed Way, as expected, but AMD's 3rd generation ray accelerators have definitely come a long way in catching up with Nvidia's more sophisticated hardware.

Also, as expected, when it comes to creative workloads, the RX 9070 XT performs very well in raster-based tasks like photo editing, and worse at 3D modeling in Blender, which is heavily reliant on Nvidia's CUDA instruction set, giving Nvidia an all but permanent advantage there.

In video editing, the RX 9070 XT likewise lags behind, though it's still close enough to Nvidia's RTX 5070 Ti that video editors won't notice much difference, even if the difference is there on paper.

Gaming performance is what we're on about though, and here the sub-$600 GPU holds its own against heavy hitters like the RTX 4080, RTX 5070 Ti, and Radeon RX 7900 XTX.

In 1440p gaming, the RX 9070 XT is about 8.4% faster than the RTX 4070 Ti and RX 7900 XTX, just under 4% slower than the RTX 4080, and about 7% slower than the RTX 5070 Ti.

This strong performance carries over into 4K gaming as well, thanks to the RX 9070 XT's 16GB VRAM. Here, it's about 15.5% faster than the RTX 4070 Ti and about 2.5% faster than the RX 7900 XTX. Against the RTX 4080, the RX 9070 XT is just 3.5% slower, while it comes within 8% of the RTX 5070 Ti's 4K gaming performance.

When all is said and done, the RX 9070 XT doesn't quite overpower one of the best Nvidia graphics cards of the last-gen (and definitely doesn't topple the RTX 5070 Ti), but given its performance class, it's power draw, its heat output (which wasn't nearly as bad as the power draw might indicate), and most of all, it's price, the RX 9070 XT is easily the best value of any graphics card playing at 4K.

And given Nvidia's position with gamers right now, AMD has a real chance to win over some converts with this graphics card, and anyone looking for an outstanding 4K GPU absolutely needs to consider it before making their next upgrade.

  • Performance: 5 / 5

Should you buy the AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT?

Buy the AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT if...

You want the best value proposition for a high-end graphics card
The performance of the RX 9070 XT punches way above its price point.

You don't want to pay inflated prices for an Nvidia GPU
Price inflation is wreaking havoc on the GPU market right now, but this card might fare better than Nvidia's RTX offerings.

Don't buy it if...

You're on a tight budget
If you don't have a lot of money to spend, this card is likely more than you need.

You need strong creative or AI performance
While AMD is getting better at creative and AI workloads, it still lags far behind Nvidia's competing offerings.

How I tested the AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT

  • I spent about a week with the AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT
  • I used my complete GPU testing suite to analyze the card's performance
  • I tested the card in everyday, gaming, creative, and AI workload usage
Test System Specs

Here are the specs on the system I used for testing:

Motherboard: ASRock Z790i Lightning WiFi
CPU: Intel Core i9-14900K
CPU Cooler: Gigabyte Auros Waterforce II 360 ICE
RAM: Corsair Dominator DDR5-6600 (2 x 16GB)
SSD: Crucial T705
PSU: Thermaltake Toughpower PF3 1050W Platinum
Case: Praxis Wetbench

I spent about a week with the AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT, which was spent benchmarking, using, and digging into the card's hardware to come to my assessment.

I used industry standard benchmark tools like 3DMark, Cyberpunk 2077, and Pugetbench for Creators to get comparable results with other competing graphics cards, all of while have been tested using the same testbench setup listed on the right.

I've reviewed more than 30 graphics cards in the last three years, and so I've got the experience and insight to help you find the best graphics card for your needs and budget.

  • Originally reviewed March 2025
I reviewed the Nothing Phone 3a Pro and it’s not the lights and beeps that make it the best bargain smartphone
1:30 pm | March 4, 2025
Author: admin | Category: Computers Gadgets Nothing Phones Phones | Tags: , , | Comments: Off

Nothing Phone 3a Pro: Two-minute review

The Nothing Phone 3a Pro (officially Nothing Phone (3a) Pro but I’m not typing that many parentheses) is the most interesting phone you can buy for less than $500 / £500 / AU$850, and if you’ve been craving something different than the cheerful bubblegum styling of cheap Android phones, you should consider the Nothing Phone 3a Pro no matter your price range.

For a full $140 / £150 / AU$150 less than the cheapest iPhone, the iPhone 16e, you can get the Nothing Phone 3a Pro, which has a larger screen with a 120Hz refresh rate, a bigger battery and faster charging, plus more storage and more RAM.

You also get a camera with 3x optical zoom, a feature unheard of at this price range. Most cheap phones give you wide, ultra-wide, and macro cameras, not a real zoom lens.

And all of that comes before I get to the Nothing Phone 3a Pro’s unique design (unique except for the nearly-identical Nothing Phone 3a), which takes a stripped-down approach so far that you can literally see into the back of the phone as if you have x-ray vision.

This see-through look a signature of Nothing Phone devices, along with the cool Glyph LED lights, though the Nothing Phone 3a Pro looks a bit more restrained and polished than previous models. It looks more like a circuitry subway map than an accidental phone autopsy.

The Nothing Phone LED lights are here, in a simple ring rather than an enigmatic ‘Glyph’ arrangement like I saw on the first two Nothing Phone devices. The Glyph system is more than just decorative, it’s actually quite functional and a bit nostalgic.

I remember when the LED lights were a key selling point for cell phones and I’d spend time customizing my friends’ light cues along with their designated ringtone. Nothing Phone 3a Pro let me do that again, assigning light patterns to my friends and family. I even had fun banging out my own patterns on the glyph-maker software.

I give Nothing a lot of credit – there are few phones with a feature like the glyph that is this fun. Most phones are just a slab of glass with cameras on the back. Samsung might give you a pen, but you pay a lot for it. With the Nothing Phone 3a Pro (and Nothing Phone 3a), you get the unique glyph feature that's entertaining on its own and adds unique flair to your calls and alerts.

That said, this is still a decidedly bargain phone, with a less-powerful chipset inside and limited support for US networks. I saw plenty of lag and stuttering performance on this phone, more than I’ve see on slightly more expensive and powerful phones like the OnePlus 12R or even the Google Pixel 8a.

I had no problem using my Nothing Phone 3a Pro on AT&T’s network in the New York area. Nothing says some users might have to call AT&T or Verizon to have their phone’s IMEI (a network identifier) whitelisted, or approved, by the carrier. T-Mobile fans should have no problem at all.

Performance issues aside, it’s almost sad that Nothing hasn’t created an even more premium device above the Nothing Phone 3a Pro, because it’s clear that plenty of work went into the interface and design, and phone fans who normally shun cheap phones might enjoy the minimalist and unique NothingOS. Don't knock it until you've seen it.

The Nothing Phone 3a Pro feels special. This isn’t a pared back phone like the Galaxy A56, which is like a Diet Galaxy S25. The Nothing Phone 3a Pro improves on previous Nothing Phones with a more durable design, a better display, versatile cameras, and faster performance all around. This is the best Nothing Phone ever, and this is one bargain phone you shouldn’t ignore.

Nothing Phone 3a Pro review: price and availability

  • $459 / £449 / AU$849 with 12GB of RAM and 256GB of storage
  • Available in the US through Nothing Beta program

Nothing Phone (3a) Pro front showing lock screen with AI wallpaper

(Image credit: Philip Berne / Future)

The Nothing Phone 3a Pro will be available worldwide in one configuration for $459 / £449 / AU$849. You can choose a white or shiny grey exterior and get 12GB of RAM and 256GB of storage inside. That’s a respectable amount of storage and RAM for the price – much more than the 8GB/128GB you'll get on the Samsung Galaxy A56.

While not quite this cheap, for a bit more you can buy the Google Pixel 8a or OnePlus 12R. Both of those phones get discounted frequently to match the Nothing Phone 3a Pro’s price, but those phones were both new in 2024. Samsung’s new Galaxy A56 will cost about the same as the Nothing Phone 3a Pro, but that phone won’t hit the US until much later this year.

Most of the world can simply order the Nothing Phone 3a Pro through Nothing.tech or a retail partner, but in the US there are a couple of hoops to jump through. Nothing saves money by cheaping out on radio bands, so the Nothing Phone 3a Pro doesn’t support every single band on the three major US carriers.

If you use T-Mobile in the US, you’re in luck with the most supported bands, but AT&T support lags a bit, and Verizon users will be missing enough bands that it might make sense to look elsewhere if you need the best cell service possible.

For this reason, Nothing sells the Nothing Phone 3a and Phone 3a Pro in the US under a ‘Beta’ program so that users will be aware of what they are missing. I used the Nothing Phone 3a Pro in the New York area on AT&T. I got a text message from AT&T right away that my phone wasn’t supported. I ignored the message and used the phone normally for the rest of the week and I had no noticeable issues. Network speeds were good.

  • Value score: 5/5

Nothing Phone 3a Pro review: specs

The Nothing Phone 3a Pro uses a Qualcomm Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 chip, which is a fairly new platform from Qualcomm, so it can support all of the latest software as well as upcoming AI features, should Nothing decide to add more machine learning.

The most outstanding spec is the 3x optical zoom camera, which is unique in this price range. Nothing uses periscopic lens technology, like you’ll find on the Galaxy S25 Ultra’s 5X zoom lens, to add reach.

Otherwise, the large display is noteworthy for its high refresh rate and brightness, both of which top Apple’s latest supposed-bargain iPhone 16e. Across the board, you won’t find much better specs on a smartphone without spending hundreds more, and Nothing also gives you the unique Glyph lights around back.

Nothing Phone 3a Pro review: design

  • Totally unique transparent design with LED Glyph lights
  • A bit thick and heavy, but not too much

Nothing Phone 3a Pro back showing internals, camera bump, and USB-C port on bottom

(Image credit: Philip Berne / Future)

The Nothing Phone 3a Pro stands out, even in the muted grey and white color options available. At first glance, friends who saw the transparent back, with its roadmap of flat ribbon cables and antenna lines, asked what was going on with my phone.

Folks who caught a glimpse when the Glyph lights flared always wanted to know what phone I was using.

The design is decidedly tech-forward, and the Glyph light patterns, with their matching sound cues, and the minimalist NothingOS interface only reinforce this feeling. Most phones try to disappear behind the display and the content, but the Nothing Phone 3a Pro begs to be seen from every angle. I was looking for opportunities to place this phone face down so I could watch it ring.

The design is so unusual that you won’t notice it feels a bit cheap. The seams are not as perfectly aligned as the edges on a Galaxy S25 or iPhone 16. The phone is thick – at 8.4mm, it’s thicker than an iPhone 16e or Galaxy A56.

The transparent back is glass: a Chinese knock-off of Gorilla Glass called ‘Panda Glass’ instead of plastic like previous Nothing Phone devices. The camera bump is huge and unapologetic, with textured lines that draw a circle around the frame. The Glyph lights ring the cameras, and can also act like a ring light when you’re shooting.

The Nothing Phone 3a Pro features a new Essential Key, which is a button that will take a screenshot or record a voice memo. It won’t just store these entries, it feeds them into an Essential Space app that analyzes your notes with AI to give you summaries and answers. In practice… it needs work. I hope the Essential Key gets repurposed in a future NothingOS update so that it can do a bit more.

  • Design score: 3/5

Nothing Phone 3a Pro review: display

  • Big, bright display with a fast refresh rate
  • Not as bright in our tests as Nothing claims

Nothing Phone (3a) Pro home screen showing widgets for the camera, pedometer, compass, and battery life

(Image credit: Philip Berne / Future)

The Nothing Phone 3a Pro features a huge, 6.77-inch AMOLED display that can refresh at a variable rate up to 120Hz. It looked bright, colorful, and smooth in my time reviewing the Phone 3a Pro. There was some stuttering, but I suspect the slower chipset was to blame, as the display could handle whatever video content or fast-scrolling lists I threw its way.

I wonder if this display is overkill for Nothing Phone 3a Pro. NothingOS is nearly monochromatic, and in fact there is a monochrome mode if you want to eliminate all colorful distraction from your phone. Maybe Nothing should have developed a unique display to play into those strengths, instead of competing on color and brightness with Samsung and Google.

Nothing claims the Nothing Phone 3a Pro can hit 3,000 nits at peak brightness, but in our Future Labs tests we couldn’t manage half that brightness level. We still saw peak brightness well over 1,000 nits, which is great, but not what Nothing claims.

  • Display score: 3/5

Nothing Phone 3a Pro review: software

  • NothingOS offers a unique look and plenty of widgets
  • Nothing Phone 3a Pro gets 3 years more Android, 6 years more security

Nothing Phone (3a) Pro quick settings menu drop down

(Image credit: Philip Berne / Future)

The Nothing Phone 3a Pro uses NothingOS on top of Android 15, and NothingOS could really be considered a Theme and Widget combo pack. It doesn’t add a whole lot of useful features to Android, but instead it succeeds by taking away distractions.

By distractions, I mean color and shapes. The look of NothingOS can best be described as a monochrome, low-resolution, dot matrix theme. There's an actual monochrome mode you can enable, but the basic NothingOS theme is mostly black and white, with graphics that reduce iconography, like clouds and the sun in the weather app, to a series of large dots.

It kind of works, if you like this style. Nothing even includes an AI wallpaper generator, a feature very en vogue with the smartphone elite, though in this case the choices are much more limited than you’ll find on a Galaxy or Pixel phone.

On my Galaxy I might create a ‘lamp of flowers in pink and purple,’ with thousands of possible combinations of nouns and colors. On my Nothing Phone 3a Pro I can choose ‘flora’ and ‘iridescent’, and up to 30 total combos. What you get ends up looking like a wallpaper that Nothing might have included with its phone anyway.

If you press the new Essential Key twice, you open a new Essential Space app, where you can find the screenshots that you took and the voice memos you saved. Only the screenshots that you capture using the Essential Key end up here. If you press the power button and volume down, you get a screenshot in your Gallery, but not in the Essential Space. Weird.

Honestly, I didn’t have any use for the Essential Key or Essential Space during my time with the Nothing Phone 3a Pro, and I didn’t feel I was missing anything except a better use for the new button. I rarely take screenshots or record voice memos, and I’m not going to change my behavior for this phone, so if you’re like me, you won’t see the benefit. Hopefully Nothing will add more to make this useful for more people.

  • Software score: 3/5

Nothing Phone 3a Pro review: cameras

  • Good cameras (but not as good as Nothing's bragging)
  • A 3x optical zoom lens is unique at this price

Nothing Phone (3a) Pro in hand showing camera app

(Image credit: Philip Berne / Future)

The people have spoken, and people say they want three cameras, so most cheap Android phones come with three cameras, but none of them give you optical zoom like the Nothing Phone 3a Pro. The Nothing Phone 3a Pro has a clever, versatile array of cameras, making it a solid pick if you need a real zoom lens.

Most phones at this price give you a fine wide-angle camera, a mediocre ultra-wide, and a terrible, low resolution macro camera. The Galaxy A55 and the Motorola Edge 2024 offer that camera setup, for instance. Nothing gives you a lot more camera bang for your buck.

You get a real 3x optical zoom with a periscope lens, which just means it’s more compact than a normal zoom lens. You also get a big 50MP sensor on that zoom lens, in addition to the 50MP main sensor. The ultra-wide sensor is only 8MP, but who cares when you have all that zoom.

The selfie camera is a 50MP sensor as well, which is too much for selfies. I ended up with a file that is six times as large as an iPhone 16 Pro selfie, even though it doesn’t have as much detail or clarity.

The image quality from the Nothing Phone 3a Pro is fine, but not incredible. The Pixel 8a will give you better images in this price range, at least with its main camera, though it only shoots up to 12MP. The Nothing Phone 3a Pro can shoot 50MP images, but you have to dig through settings to make that happen, otherwise you get a standard 12MP file.

It’s clear from the image samples that there is a lot of AI processing going on with the Nothing photos. On the zoom photos, I could get a pretty good shot overall, but if I look closely the image takes on an oil paint quality that makes it clear a computer filled in a lot of gaps and erased all the noise.

Before this phone launched, Nothing teased us by claiming that its new cameras would be as good as an iPhone. It’s not even close, but the Nothing Phone 3a Pro is not a bad camera. It takes much better photos than any Motorola phone I’ve used, and it has more versatility than comparable Samsung Galaxy A-series phones. It’s a solid camera setup for the price.

  • Camera score: 4/5

Nothing Phone 3a Pro review: camera samples

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Nothing Phone 3a Pro sample

(Image credit: Philip Berne / Future)
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Nothing Phone 3a Pro camera image samples

(Image credit: Philip Berne / Future)
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Nothing Phone 3a Pro camera image samples

(Image credit: Philip Berne / Future)
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Nothing Phone 3a Pro camera image samples

(Image credit: Philip Berne / Future)
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Nothing Phone 3a Pro camera image samples

(Image credit: Philip Berne / Future)
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Nothing Phone 3a Pro camera image samples

(Image credit: Philip Berne / Future)
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Nothing Phone 3a Pro camera image samples

(Image credit: Philip Berne / Future)

Nothing Phone 3a Pro review: performance

  • Performance is good enough to get by
  • There are more powerful phones with less style

Nothing Phone 3a Pro back showing internals, camera bump, and USB-C port on bottom

(Image credit: Philip Berne / Future)

Nothing took a step up with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 chip inside both the Nothing Phone 3a and Phone 3a Pro, but the platform still isn’t quite fast enough to keep up with the demands of Android 15 and NothingOS. I encountered plenty of lag in my time with the phone, often bad enough that the screen would stop responding to taps and then would catch up all at once. It was frustrating, but it didn’t happen too often, not every day.

The Nothing Phone 3a Pro isn’t going to be the best phone for hardcore games like Call of Duty Mobile or PUBG, but it will do fine with casual games like Balatro and Marvel Snap. Vampire Survivors choked the phone when the screen filled with enemies, but it recovered quickly enough that I didn’t lose the round.

Frankly, the competition at this price doesn’t offer much better performance – the Pixel 8a isn’t winning any benchmark crowns. If you want a fast phone for less, the OnePlus 12R is your best bet, otherwise you’ll just need to spend more if you want a serious mobile gaming machine.

  • Performance score: 2/5

Nothing Phone 3a Pro review: battery

  • Great battery life and excellent charging speeds
  • No wireless charging

Nothing Phone 3a Pro back showing internals, camera bump, and USB-C port on bottom

(Image credit: Philip Berne / Future)

Battery life on the Nothing Phone 3a Pro was excellent, and the phone had no trouble lasting me a full day on a single charge with battery to spare. The phone also charges very quickly, though Nothing skimps by not offering any charger in the box, fast or otherwise.

The Nothing Phone 3a Pro can charge up to 50 watts, and I tested it with my own variable charger that can charge up to 50W or more. The Phone 3a Pro charged very quickly, and I got to 100% in just over 50 minutes, which is even faster than Nothing claims. That’s faster than the Galaxy S25 and the iPhone 16.

With a 5,000mAh battery inside (and a very dark, black interface), the Nothing Phone 3a Pro conserves power nicely. In our Future Labs tests, the Phone 3a Pro lasted just under 15 and a half hours, almost the same amount of time as the Samsung Galaxy S25. In my real world tests, I had no trouble taking photos and working through a full day on a single charge.

  • Battery score: 5/5

Should you buy the Nothing Phone 3a Pro ?

Buy it if...

You like the look
You won’t find anything that comes close to the Nothing Phone 3a Pro design, with its unique transparent back glass and minimal interface.

You like the lights
It’s surprising no other phone maker is using LED lights for notification, but Nothing gives you lights, sounds, and a composer to make your own rings.

You love the price
For everything you get – the versatile cameras, unique design, great battery and charging – this phone is a steal, and worth a look over phones that cost much more.

Don't buy it if...

You play a lot of mobile games
This is not a powerhouse phone; its Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 processor could sputter at times. Skip it if you need real smartphone power.

You don’t like the look or the lights
There’s not much else going for the Nothing Phone 3a Pro that is unique, besides the design and the low price. But that’s enough for many folks.

You plan on keeping your phone for years
The Nothing Phone 3a Pro will get three years of Android updates, but after that this phone will be far behind even mid-range performers and you may have problems.

Nothing Phone 3a Pro review: also consider

Google Pixel 8a
The Pixel a-series phones are a great value, offering many of the features you’ll find on the flagship Pixel phones, with very similar camera image quality as well.
Read our full review of the Google Pixel 8a

Samsung Galaxy A56
The brand-new Galaxy A56 gives you tons of Samsung AI features and great specs for a price that is comparable to the Nothing Phone 3a Pro.
Read our hands-on review of the Samsung Galaxy A56

How I tested the Nothing Phone 3a Pro

I used the Nothing Phone 3a Pro for a week before this review was published. In that time, I tested the phone extensively, alongside the Nothing Phone 3a, using the same work and personal apps and accounts on each.

I used the Nothing Phone 3a Pro for taking photos, communicating with work colleagues using messages and Slack, and conducting video conference calls. I played games, and edited photos from my Google Photos library.

I connected the Nothing Phone 3a Pro to a Pixel Watch 3 and Nothing Buds. I also connected an Xbox wireless controller to play games. I connected the Phone 3a Pro to my car for multimedia and to other Bluetooth speakers for audio.

I tested the Nothing Phone 3a Pro on my personal AT&T Wireless account in the New York City area, including Connecticut, the Hudson Valley, and New Jersey, with no trouble.

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First reviewed March 2025

I reviewed the Lenovo ThinkPad P16 Gen 2 and the only thing bigger than its impressive capabilities is the cost
10:46 am | March 3, 2025
Author: admin | Category: Computers Gadgets Pro | Tags: , | Comments: Off

The ThinkPad P16 Gen 2 is Lenovo's flagship mobile workstation, designed as an absolute powerhouse for engineers, designers, and professionals who need a portable workhorse of a machine. ThinkPad has always been Lenovo's trusted professional brand known for its reliability, durability, fantastic keyboard, and overall excellence as a computer.

I previously reviewed the Lenovo ThinkPad P16v Gen 2, a similar computer. I like to think of it straightforwardly because the P16v is the lite version of the P16. Or, to use Apple terms, the P16v would be the MacBook Air with upgraded RAM, and the P16 is the MacBook Pro with a Max chip. They are both some of the best Lenovo ThinkPad laptops around in their own right and are overpowered by the vast majority of users. But, for those power users, the differences become apparent.

Lenovo | ThinkPad P16 Gen 2

(Image credit: Collin Probst // Future)

Lenovo ThinkPad P16 Gen 2: Price and Availability

The ThinkPad P16 Gen 2 starts at a base price of just under $2,000 at $1,849. With that, you get a core i5, an RTX A1000, 8GB of RAM, and 256GB of SSD storage.

However, you can easily break $6,000 and even $6,500 if you opt for the maxed specs of a Core i9, an RTX 5000 Ada, 192GB of RAM, and 8TB of SSD. You can grab one of these workstations on Lenovo's website or their approved retailers.

Lenovo | ThinkPad P16 Gen 2

(Image credit: Collin Probst // Future)

Lenovo ThinkPad P16 Gen 2: Unboxing & first impressions

Since I recently reviewed the ThinkPad P16v Gen 2, I had a good idea of what this laptop would look, feel, and operate like before I even opened the box. However, I still ended up surprised at just how much larger the P16 (no "v") was compared to the "v" variant. I will grant that it feels more durable than the other, but regardless, this laptop is not for frequent travelers - unless you know what you are getting into and need this power portably.

Outside of that shock, the rest of the first look was as to be expected. It looks like a quality ThinkPad laptop, and that's precisely what I have come to expect from Lenovo.

Another thing worth mentioning is the excellent port offering, yet the inability to charge via a USB-C connection due to it requiring the first-party power supply.

Lenovo | ThinkPad P16 Gen 2

(Image credit: Collin Probst // Future)

Lenovo ThinkPad P16 Gen 2: Design & build quality

Specs

Processor Options: 13th & 14th Gen Intel Core HX (up to i9-13980HX)
GPU Options: Nvidia RTX 1000 Ada – RTX 5000 Ada
RAM: Up to 192GB DDR5
Storage: Up to 8TB
Display:
16” 2560x1600 (165Hz, 500 nits, 100% sRGB)
Optional: 3840x2400 OLED (HDR, touchscreen, 400 nits)
Battery: 94Wh
Weight: 6.5 lbs (2.95 kg)
Ports: 2x USB-A, 2x USB-C (Thunderbolt 4), HDMI 2.1, SD card reader, Ethernet
OS: Windows 11 Pro

The Lenovo ThinkPad P16 Gen 2 is a very robust laptop; there is no disguising that. I show the thickness difference between an iPhone 16 Pro and this laptop in one of the linked photos. Thankfully, that mass comes with a heavy-duty build, not just a heavy build. The Magnesium-aluminum chassis also has a premium and sturdy feeling, adding to the overall appeal of the ThinkPad P16 Gen 2.

One of the best features of a Lenovo ThinkPad is the keyboard, which remains top of the line when it comes to the best business laptop I've reviewed, without any loss of feel or function. The ThinkPad P16 Gen 2 also features a full numpad, the famous red trackpoint, and a comfortable trackpad.

Lenovo | ThinkPad P16 Gen 2

(Image credit: Collin Probst // Future)

Lenovo ThinkPad P16 Gen 2: In use

My team has had the Lenovo ThinkPad P16 Gen 2 in rotation for a few months. While it's for sure not the laptop we would choose to take on a trip with us, nor one we want to bring to the coffee shop for a light afternoon of work, it is, however, the one that we want to use around the studio or within the home due to its raw performance and abilities.

Under our stress testing, we noticed that the laptop would kick on the fans and get decently hot and a bit loud, but it kicks on the fans and cools itself down.

Another feature worth mentioning is the battery. It's impressive that this kind of power can be in a laptop form factor, but then you see that it can only last 5-7 hours with light use and a mere 2-3 with heavy load, and you realize this computer's power and lack of battery.

Lenovo | ThinkPad P16 Gen 2

(Image credit: Collin Probst // Future)

Lenovo ThinkPad P16 Gen 2: Final verdict

The ThinkPad P16 Gen 2 is one of the best mobile workstations available, delivering exceptional CPU & GPU performance, a premium 165Hz display, and an unbeatable keyboard. However, its weight, fan noise, and thermal limits mean it’s best suited for desk-based professionals rather than frequent travelers.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 FE and Tab S10 FE+’s screen sizes, RAM, and storage tipped
9:00 am | February 27, 2025
Author: admin | Category: Mobile phones news | Tags: | Comments: Off

The Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 FE and Galaxy Tab S9 FE+, unveiled in October 2023, are due for an upgrade. While there's no word from Samsung on when their successors will arrive, we now know how big their screens will be. According to Roland Quandt, the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 FE will pack a 10.9" screen, which is the same as its predecessor. However, the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 FE+ will get a display bigger than the Tab S9 FE+'s: 13.1" vs. 12.4". Quandt also claimed that both the tablets will have up to 12GB RAM and 256GB storage onboard. [#InlinePriceWidget,12517,1#] Previous...

I spent a week with the world’s thinnest folding phone – here’s why I’d pick the Oppo Find N5 over the Galaxy Z Fold 6
4:19 pm | February 20, 2025
Author: admin | Category: Computers Gadgets Oppo Phones Phones | Tags: , , | Comments: Off

Oppo Find N5 review: Two-minute review

The Oppo Find N5 rear panel, folded, waterfall in the background

(Image credit: Jamie Richards / Future)

UPDATE 21 / 02 / 2025: Since the publishing of this review, Oppo has confirmed that the Find N5 will not be launching in the UK. We will update this review if and when availability information becomes known.

Additionally, the Find N5 supports 80W wired charging, not 90W as previously reported.

Oppo had one mission when making the Oppo Find N5: make the world's thinnest book-style foldable. It's a testament to the company's phone making skill that it not only succeeded, but produced such a powerful, enjoyable, and good-looking device along the way. For my money, this is the direction folding phones should be heading in, and using the Find N5 feels easier and more seamless than the folding devices I've used in the past. It's a strong contender for the best Oppo phone I've ever used.

The standout feature of the Find N5 is its design. The phone unfolded measures just 4.21mm thick, which is thinner than an iPad Pro and only beaten in the foldable space by the tri-fold Huawei Mate XT. It really is amazing to hold the Find N5 for the first time, and this slimness never stops being genuinely convenient. I'm here to tell you that this isn't a gimmick: the Find N5's profile is a big part of the reason the phone feels so useable. Even at a folded thickness of 8.93mm, it's barely bulkier than an iPhone 16 Pro Max. The displays are both great, and both the largest you'll find on a book-style phone, at 6.62-inches for the cover screen and 8.12-inches for the inner display.

The Find N5 has got the hardware power to challenge the premium slab flagships too. The Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset, 16GB of RAM, and 512GB of storage make the sole configuration a powerful one, and Oppo has made every effort to improve the historically middling battery life of the average folding phone with a huge 5,600mAh silicon-carbon cell. In the case of the Find N5, slim does not mean slow. Looking at the competition, the thicker and heavier Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6, with its smaller battery and less powerful internals, seems a bit archaic by comparison.

It's not without compromise, though. In order to attain such a slim profile, the camera system has been scaled back compared to the previous generation Find N3 (still sold worldwide as the OnePlus Open) and results can vary from great to pretty undesirable. There are also a few software bugs, but I'm aware some of this will be due to developers not optimizing for the foldable form factor.

Overall, I'm very impressed with the Oppo Find N5. It's a huge step towards foldable devices that don't feel at all constrained by their form factor, with a barely-visible crease, two great displays, and a very reasonable battery life. Any imperfections aren't impactful enough to stop this feeling like the folding phone of the future. If it wasn't for its limited availability, the Find N5 would be a shoe-in for our list of the best folding phones.

Oppo Find N5 review: Price and availability

The Oppo Find N5 unfolded, rear panel and cover screen visible, on a wooden table

(Image credit: Jamie Richards / Future)
  • International pricing TBC
  • Availability TBC, not available in the UK
  • Costs around £1500 in Singapore

Oppo hasn’t revealed pricing for the Find N5 yet, so we haven’t yet got a take on the value for money the phone offers. The phone has been confirmed to cost the equivalent of around £1500 in Singapore, but we're still waiting for further details.

As for availability, Oppo has no distribution in the US so it’s overwhelmingly likely the Find N5 won’t launch there. We aren’t quite sure of the full extent of the Find N5’s availability, either.

We’ll update this section once the phone’s pricing is officially available, but until then keep reading for a detailed review of the Oppo Find N5.

Keep in mind that if and when we hear of the Oppo Find N5's official availability and launch price in other regions, our overall verdict and score could change.

Oppo Find N5 review: Specs

Oppo Find N5 review: Design

The Oppo Find N5, unfolded, side angle, waterfall in the background

(Image credit: Jamie Richards / Future)
  • 4.21mm unfolded thickness, 8.93mm folded
  • Comes in two colors, black and white
  • Crease is barely noticeable

The Oppo Find N5 is one of the most impressively designed phones I’ve ever used – actually, rewind that – the Oppo Find N5 is one of the most impressively designed things I’ve ever used. Unboxing the phone for the first time was one of those rare “wow” moments: the Find N5 is truly incredibly thin. At a folded thickness of 8.93mm it’s about half a millimeter thicker than an iPhone 16 Pro Max, and at an unfolded thickness of 4.21mm it’s even slimmer than a 2024 iPad Pro. Holding it side-by-side with the 5.8mm-thick OnePlus Open (the previous generation Find N3 in all but name) really highlights the progress Oppo has made in the past two years.

The Oppo Find N5 also nails the ever-crucial hinge: Oppo is calling its hinge the Titanium Flexion Hinge, and what this means is that Oppo has used 3D-printed titanium alloy to create a hinge that’s more resilient and rigid while being 26% smaller than the previous generation. I noticed that the hinge has real resistance to it, feeling solid when open between around 20 and 120 degrees, and snapping open or shut on either side of this range. Oppo says the hinge should last for 10 years of normal use, though this will naturally vary between users.

The Find N5 opens nearly completely flat, and that smaller hinge makes less of an impression on the inner display, too – the crease is really only visible when the screen catches the light in a certain way, and it’s effectively invisible when you’re actually using the phone. Oppo says the crease on the Find N5’s inner display is 10% narrower and 50% shallower than the already impressively unobtrusive crease on the OnePlus Open. The crevice running down the middle of the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6 looks absolutely comical by comparison.

The crease on the inner display of the Oppo Find N5

It's difficult to get the crease on the Oppo Find N5's inner display to show up on camera (Image credit: Jamie Richards / Future)

The rest of the chassis is made of aluminum, with a glass cover screen and fiber rear panel. The bezel around the inner display is made of a thick plastic that conceals strong magnets to hold the phone shut, and the inner display itself is covered in a plastic coating. I had no durability concerns with the sturdy outer frame of the phone the inner display can be dented by anything hard, even a fingernail, so be cautious. Buttons are standard fare, with a volume rocker, ringer switch, and power button doubling as a fast fingerprint scanner.

The Find N5 pushes the boat out in terms of water resistance, and as far as I’m aware is the first folding phone to carry both an IPX8 and IPX9 rating for protection against water ingress. There’s no certified dust resistance though.

Oppo has a great track record when it comes to aesthetics, and the Find N5 is no different. In global markets the phone is available in either Misty White or Cosmic Black, and the white unit I tested featured a cool marble effect similar to the pearlescent material used for the Oppo Find X8 Pro. It’s a subtle touch that adds a hint of luxury, and contrasts nicely with the slimmed-down black camera island. Ergonomically, the phone’s rounded edges make it reasonably comfortable to hold when unfolded and decently usable one-handed, at least for right-handed users.

If I had one note about the design of the Oppo Find N5, it’s that the edges are so slim that it can actually be a little tricky to get enough purchase to open the phone. Then again, there’s not much Oppo can do about that while continuing to make these phones thinner, which if you ask me is a much more important goal. Overall, the Find N5 is a marvel of engineering that feels good to use – you can’t ask for much better than that.

Design score: 5 / 5

Oppo Find N5 review: Display

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The Oppo Find N5 inner display, waterfall in background

(Image credit: Jamie Richards / Future)
Image 2 of 2

The Oppo Find N5 cover display, waterfall in background

(Image credit: Jamie Richards / Future)
  • 6.62-inch cover screen
  • 8.1-inch inner display
  • Both screens are bright and sharp with 120Hz refresh rate

Though Oppo has leaned on the Find N5 being the “world’s thinnest book-style folding phone” in marketing, the displays here are class-leading in a different way. The Oppo Find N5 sports the largest displays on any phone of its type, with a 6.62-inch cover screen and massive 8.12-inch inner display, and both are sharp, bright, responsive panels that make just about anything look excellent.

The Oppo Find N5 features an 8.12-inch folding inner display, with a resolution of 2248 x 2480 pixels, peak brightness of 2100 nits, and variable refresh rate of 1-120Hz. At an almost-square aspect ratio of 9.9:9, the Find N5 is a great choice for watching videos, taking photos, and reading articles. This screen is a touch dimmer than the inner display on the OnePlus Open, which is noticeable but not an issue: I found the Find N5 to be more than serviceable in a variety of indoor and outdoor lighting conditions.

The Oppo Find N5 and OnePlus Open, unfolded, on a wooden table

Next to the OnePlus Open (right), the Oppo Find N5 (left) is visibly larger (Image credit: Jamie Richards / Future)

By surface area, the Find N5’ inner display is larger than an iPad mini’s, which makes it a great choice for multitasking. As for the cover screen, the Find N5 goes well beyond the idea of a backup panel, with a sharp and contrasty 6.62-inch panel that makes one-handed use not only viable, but genuinely enjoyable. Both displays support the Oppo Pen stylus, sold separately, which opens even more productivity possibilities.

The cover display boasts a resolution of 1140 x 2616 pixels, peak brightness of 2450 nits, and that same variable 1-120Hz refresh rate. At an aspect ratio of 20.7:9 it’s a touch slimmer than the conventional 19.5:9 employed by the iPhone 16 and Samsung Galaxy S25, but wider than the 22.1:9 cover screen on the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6.

The Oppo Find N5 open to Google Maps

Google Maps is a fantastic experience on the large inner display. (Image credit: Jamie Richards / Future)

Switching between the two displays remains as easy as opening and closing the phone. Opening the phone will instantly continue your activity on the inner screen, while jumping from the inner to outer screen requires a swipe up to keep things going. These are two great panels that really feel like they work together as part of one cohesive system.

Display score: 4.5 / 5

Oppo Find N5 review: Software

The Oppo Find N5 app drawer

(Image credit: Jamie Richards / Future)
  • Android 15 with ColorOS 15
  • Great multitasking features
  • Bloatware on a phone of this caliber is ridiculous

I’ve been a fan of the software experience on Oppo phones for quite some time now – ColorOS 15 (based on Android 15) is one of the cleanest, fastest, and most customizable implementations of Android on the market, and Oppo has gone out of its way to ensure the experience translates well to the folding form factor; the UI as a whole remains blisteringly fast. Default apps and AI are all fine, but I imagine most users will head for the pre-installed Google suite and Gemini for their general application and AI needs.

In many ways, ColorOS still feels like an imitation of iOS, and the projection of the OS onto the folding form factor can feel like a bizarro mashup of iPhone and iPad features. The three dot multitasking menu is here, directly lifted from iPadOS, and allows you to activate split screen or floating windows with as many as four apps at once (three in split view and one floating). Originality aside, this works very well, and I was surprised by just how much the Find N5 could handle. I also like the pop-up that appears when you switch between two apps frequently, which suggests putting the two in split screen.

There’s another unique productivity feature that Oppo has added to the Find N5, but it isn’t installed by default. The new O+ Connect app for Mac allows the Oppo Find N5 to control Apple computers remotely, with real-time screen mirroring and a virtual keyboard appearing on the phone screen. This, building on previous file sharing functionality between Oppo phones and iPhones and iPads via the same app. O+ Connect works wirelessly over LAN, though Oppo wouldn’t tell me the exact latency. I’m not sure how useful this is in practice, but the idea of seeing Adobe Premiere Pro or Ableton Live on such a small screen is genuinely novel.

As is standard with Oppo phones, the customization on offer is world-class, with gorgeous live wallpapers and various ways to change fonts and colors across the UI. Regrettably, though, the phone comes preloaded with a handful of bloatware apps that most people won’t use – frankly, it’s frustrating that a phone of this price and calibre comes with any bloatware whatsoever. This is a luxury phone: it’s more about respect for the customer than any sort of actual inconvenience. That said, once you get the app drawer looking how you want it, ColorOS sails smooth.

Software score: 3.5 / 5

Oppo Find N5 review: Cameras

The camera island on the Oppo Find N5

(Image credit: Jamie Richards / Future)
  • 50MP main camera
  • 8MP ultra-wide camera
  • 50MP telephoto camera with 3x zoom

The OnePlus Open – a.k.a the global version of the Oppo Find N3 – made waves by being the first folding phone to sport a properly flagship-grade camera system – it also had one of the largest camera bumps we’ve ever seen. With the Find N5, Oppo has prioritized a slim build to the point that the camera system has had to be scaled back. The cameras here are still usable, good even, but definitely where the compromises needed to produce the world’s thinnest book-style foldable are most acutely felt.

The Find N5 comes equipped with a 50MP main camera, 8MP ultra-wide camera, and 50MP telephoto camera with 3x optical zoom. Across the board, we see a reduction in resolution compared to the previous generation, though the main and telephoto cameras have larger sensors (Oppo hasn’t shared the sensor size for the ultra-wide). This translates to brighter images at the cost of a bit of granular detail. The main camera is decent and reliable, producing expressive photos in daylight and holding its own in darker environments too. The reach and depth of field offered by the 3x telephoto camera is especially impressive, while the 8MP ultra-wide is a mystifyingly low-spec choice that is hard to get good images from.

The OnePlus Open and Oppo Find N5, folded, rear panels and camera systems visible, on a wooden desk

Next to the OnePlus Open (left), the Oppo Find N5 has a visibly smaller camera system - but this comes at the cost of some performance. (Image credit: Jamie Richards Future)

The Find N5 also sports two identical selfie cameras – one punch-holed into each display – and they’re simply below par. Both are stuck at a measly 8MP and produce low-detail, low-contrast images. As the Find N5 is a folding phone, you can of course take selfies with the main camera, using the cover screen as a viewfinder, but that’s not really a replacement for a decent selfie camera – especially if you’re trying to be subtle.

As for the actual photography experience, the folding form factor allows for a lot of freedom with how you take your pics and videos. The inner screen works incredibly well as a massive viewfinder, and you can use the lower half of the screen as a gallery while shooting. Equally, the phone is slim enough that taking photos with the screen folded is just as pleasant. As for video, the phone maxes out at 4K 60fps.

The high-end cameras common to today’s flagship phones require a certain amount of physical space, which Oppo may have been unable to accommodate in such a slim frame. Alternatively, designing such a slim phone might have just been too expensive a process to make a better camera system cost effective. Either way, I respect that making the world's thinnest folding phone comes with some compromises, and the Find N5 can still take great photos – but this camera system is a noticeable backwards step.

Camera score: 3 / 5

Oppo Find N5 Camera Samples

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Five London phone boxes in a row

(Image credit: Jamie Richards / Future)
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A church against a cloudy sky

(Image credit: Jamie Richards / Future)
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A policeman on a motorcycle stopping traffic

(Image credit: Jamie Richards / Future)
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A London bus wrapped in pink advertising

(Image credit: Jamie Richards / Future)
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Two ducks on grass

(Image credit: Jamie Richards / Future)

Oppo Find N5 review: Performance

The Oppo Find N5 inner screen open to Call of Duty Mobile

(Image credit: Jamie Richards / Future)
  • Snapdragon 8 Elite (7-core variant)
  • 16GB of RAM
  • 512GB of storage

Oppo wasn’t messing around when it decided on the internal specs of the Find N5. This is a seriously powerful phone equipped with the latest mobile hardware and a massive amount of memory. There’s only one configuration to choose from, but with specs like these, you’re very unlikely to be disappointed.

Equipped with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset, 16GB of RAM, and 512GB of storage, the Find N5 has more than enough hardware power to handle pretty much anything you can throw at it. The phone flew through day-to-day tasks and sessions of Call of Duty Mobile with no fuss, only warming slightly during the most intense multitasking.

The Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset found within the Find N5 is the lower-powered 7-core variant, but you wouldn’t notice it in normal use. The large screen, responsive UI, and powerful internals come together to provide a consistently excellent experience.

However, I did encounter some glitchy behavior during my testing period. On one occasion, the phone fully locked up when switching between the cover and inner screen, which required a restart. Other times, apps would become unresponsive due to a change in aspect ratio or switching screens. Some of this will be for app developers to sort out, and Android 16 should bring features that force developers to make apps that deal better with changing aspect ratios, but it’s still something to be aware of.

Overall, despite a few hiccups, you should find that the Find N5 flies through whatever you throw at it, with enough storage to last years of normal use and enough memory to keep up as applications and AI get more complex. It's the first folding phone I've seen that I'd consider a genuine productivity tool.

Performance score: 4 / 5

Oppo Find N5 review: Battery

The bottom edge of the Oppo Find N5, waterfall in background

(Image credit: Jamie Richards / Future)
  • 5,600mAh silicon-carbon battery
  • 80W wired charging
  • 50W wireless charging

It’s generally accepted that folding phones will have a shorter battery life than their candy-bar counterparts, due to the use of inefficient split battery cells, and the increased power draw of a large inner screen. With the Find N5, Oppo has made every effort to counteract this trend, but there’s only so much that can be done within the bounds of folding phone design.

With a – say it with me – class-leading battery capacity of 5,600mAh, the Find N5 can make it through a day of mixed use without having to think too much about charging. That battery is larger than the cells found in either the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6 or Google Pixel 9 Pro Fold, and I found myself not really worrying about charging overnight or to 100% before leaving the house. That’s partly thanks to the adoption of silicon-carbon battery technology, which allows for a much higher power density. If you do get down to 1%, the phone enters an ultra-low power mode that keeps essential functions active until you can top up.

Charging is really no chore, as the Find N5 supports some truly rapid charging speeds. The phone supports up to 80W wired charging and 50W wireless charging over Oppo’s proprietary AirVOOC standard. That’s excellent, not just for a folding phone but for a smart device in general – there are laptops that don’t support charging this fast. Oppo quotes a 50-minute charge time from 0-100%, but I found this took around 45 minutes with an Oppo 80W charger.

I did notice the battery draining a touch faster than on modern slab flagships, but then again I also noticed an improvement versus the OnePlus Open. Relative to other folding phones, this is a winner, but compared to slab phones there’s still a little catching up to do.

Battery score: 4 / 5

Should you buy the Oppo Find N5

Buy it if...

You want the thinnest folding phone

The Oppo Find N5 is only beaten by the tri-fold Huawei Mate XT when it comes to thinness, and while we wait for the latter device to come to global markets the Find N5 reigns as the thinnest foldable money can buy. This is a futuristic piece of tech that feels very much ahead of the curve design wise.

You want a powerful mobile device

With the Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset and 16GB of RAM, the Oppo Find N5 takes on everything you throw at it with ease. The inner screen is great for multitasking, and games run very well so long as they support the squarer aspect ratio. You won't be left wanting for hardware power.

You want two great displays

The Oppo Find N5 stuns with both its cover screen and large folding display. Not only are these the biggest screens found on any book-style folding phone, they're bright, sharp, and rich with color and contrast, making the phone a winning choice for viewing videos, movies, and photos.

Don't buy it if...

You want the best cameras

The cameras on folding phones are rarely up to the standard of their slab phone counterparts, but the Find N5 takes another step back in the photography department to attain its slim profile. These cameras are fine, but nothing to write home about.

You want something familiar

I'm a big fan of Oppo's ColorOS Android wrapper, but for users who are more accustomed to Samsung or Google phones there may be a bit of a learning curve. Ironically, the amount of, ahem, inspiration Oppo takes from iOS may make jumping ship from iPhone a touch easier.

Oppo Find N5 review: Also consider

OnePlus Open

The OnePlus Open is still on sale from OnePlus directly, as well as select third-party retailers and networks. As mentioned, this is the Find N3 in all but name. Since OnePlus isn't releasing its own foldable this year, this is the closest you'll get to the Find N5 in the US.

Read our OnePlus Open review

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6

Though the Find N5 bests the Galaxy Z Fold 6 in many ways, there's a reason so many people choose Samsung's iconic foldable over the competition. Great cameras, familiar software, and integration with the Samsung ecosystem make this phone a compelling choice.

Read our Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6 review

Oppo Find X8 Pro

Want a beautiful, powerful Oppo phone with none of this folding malarkey? Get the Oppo Find X8 Pro and enjoy one of the best camera phones ever produced.

Read our Oppo Find X8 Pro reviewView Deal

How I tested the Oppo Find N5

I used the Oppo Find N5 as my main smartphone for a period of one week, putting it through daily use cases like watching videos, listening to music, scrolling through social media, and reading articles, as well as more intentional tests like gaming sessions and timed charging. The model I tested came in the white color option and came with the standard 16GB of RAM and 512GB of storage.

Using the Find N5 as my daily driver over a week or so also gave me a sense of how useful or annoying the positive and negative attributes of the Find N5 are, particularly how the phone holds up ergonomically over time. I then applied my broad knowledge of the smartphone market and journalistic training to assess the performance and value of the Find N5.

For more on our smartphone testing process, be sure to take a look at how we test phones for review.

iQOO Neo 10R runs Geekbench, confirms its chipset, RAM, and Android version
8:31 pm | February 17, 2025
Author: admin | Category: Mobile phones news | Tags: | Comments: Off

iQOO is unveiling the Neo 10R on March 11, and ahead of that we've seen a lot of leaks, rumors, and official teasers about the device. Now, a prototype has been spotted in the Geekbench database. It managed a single-core score of 1,944 and a multi-core score of 5,062. The Geekbench database listing reveals the fact that the iQOO Neo 10R is powered by the Snapdragon 8s Gen 3 chipset, paired with 12GB of RAM in the specific device that was benchmarked (but of course more options might also be available). The phone will run Android 15 from day one, as you'd expect. These are all the...

vivo V50e’s chipset, RAM, and Android version revealed
9:14 pm | February 11, 2025
Author: admin | Category: Mobile phones news | Tags: | Comments: Off

vivo's upcoming V50 has been leaking a lot lately, but it's going to be joined in the company's roster by the V50e, which we've only heard about once so far. Today the V50e, with the model number V2428, has been spotted in the Geekbench AI database, with a prototype having run the benchmark. This run has revealed the fact that the V50e will be powered by the MediaTek Dimensity 7300 SoC, and incidentally that's the same chipset employed by its predecessor, the V40e, which launched a few months ago. The V50e pairs this with 8GB of RAM, which is also the same amount the V40e has. The...

Here’s where you can buy the Galaxy S25 Ultra with 16GB of RAM
5:04 pm | January 23, 2025
Author: admin | Category: Mobile phones news | Tags: | Comments: Off

All of the Galaxy S25 models come with 12GB of RAM, across the world, right? Wrong. The Galaxy S25 Ultra also has an option with 16GB of memory, but only in Korea, China, and Taiwan. We have no clue why Samsung is keeping this so confined, we assume the company may have done some market research which concluded that people in these places are more likely to look at RAM on a spec sheet and make a purchase decision based on that. Regardless, if you want an S25 Ultra with 16GB of RAM you're going to have to purchase it from Korea, China, or Taiwan. In China and Taiwan, the model with...

Samsung Galaxy S25 and S25+ bring Snapdragon 8 Elite to all markets, both with 12GB of RAM
9:05 pm | January 22, 2025
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Just to set expectations right from the start, Samsung’s Galaxy S25 announcement spends a lot of time on One UI 7, its new AI features and the Personal Data Engine. Looking at the complete package, software may make up more than 50% of the value of the new Galaxy S25 and S25+. They have new hardware too – a custom Snapdragon 8 Elite for Galaxy chipset that promises 37% higher CPU performance, 30% more GPU compute power and a 40% faster NPU compared to the previous generation. Samsung Galaxy S25 and S25+ On the Samsung Galaxy S25, the Snapdragon is paired with 12GB of RAM – 8GB is...

Lenovo ThinkPad P16v Gen 2 mobile workstation review
10:12 pm | January 15, 2025
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Lenovo's ThinkPad lineup has always been a significant grouping of offerings for business professionals. The Lenovo ThinkPad P16v Gen 2 is no different. It targets professionals who need workstation-grade performance on the go.

The ThinkPad P16 is one of the best Lenovo ThinkPad laptops around - ideal for heavy computational and graphical work. Compared to the P16, I view the P16v Gen 2 as a ThinkPad P16 lite. But that's not any official branding; it's just my viewpoint. It's a slightly less powerful P16, but still very much enterprise-focused and workstation-esque.

Lenovo ThinkPad P16v Gen 2: Price and Availability

The Lenovo ThinkPad P16v Gen 2 starts at $1,791.92 (pre-tax) and quickly scales up to well over $3,500 before any pre-installed software options if you want to max out the hardware offerings.

These and custom builds are available on Lenovo's website, and pre-built models are available in places like Amazon or other computer retailers.

Lenovo ThinkPad P16v Gen 2

(Image credit: Collin Probst // Future)

Lenovo ThinkPad P16v Gen 2: Unboxing and First Impressions

The ThinkPad P16v Gen 2 laptop comes in the Lenovo packaging, a beefy yellow-tipped Lenovo charger (though you can also charge via USB-C, albeit slower), and other essential documentation. I was immediately reminded of the P16, though the P16v is a bit slimmer and lighter (4.89 lb vs. 6.5 lb).

Another thing that I noticed right away was the port offering and location. I'll discuss this more later, but right off the bat, I was surprised to see a full ethernet port and ports on the back; then again, though thin, this is a workstation. Lastly, I genuinely like the matte black finish on this laptop. It feels professional, and I like it for the same reasons. Though I love some sweet backpack colors, I will always choose black. I love some splashes of color from Apple these days, but I always prefer simple colors. It's clean, goes with everything, and it looks professional.

Lenovo ThinkPad P16v Gen 2: Design and Build Quality

Specs

CPU: Intel Core Ultra 7 165H to Ultra 9 185H options
GPU: NVIDIA RTX 2000 Ada Gen or RTX 3000 Ada Gen
Display: 16” WUXGA (1920 x 1200), IPS, 100% sRGB to 16" WQUXGA (3840 x 2400), IPS, 100%DCI-P3, 60Hz
Storage: 2x 2TB SSD M.2 drives
RAM: 8GB DDR5, upgradable to 96GB .

Unsurprisingly, the Lenovo ThinkPad P16v Gen 2 is very similar to the ThinkPad P16 in design, much like the name. The P16v Gen 2 is slimmer and more portable than a ThinkPad P16. However, it still feels relatively robust and like any of the best mobile workstations I've tried, with actual portability in mind. Thanks to the real estate left behind due to the 16" screen, Lenovo could add a full numpad to the right of the entire keyboard, and better yet, it's comfortable to type on.

The port offering on this computer is excellent for the modern employee needing workstation-grade power. There is an SD Card Reader, an optional Smart Card reader, a full-size HDMI port, a USB-A Port, two Thunderbolt 4 ports, and a full RJ45 Ethernet port. What's fascinating and pretty brilliant is that one of the Thunderbolt ports and the Ethernet port are on the back of the ThinkPad P16v Gen 2. This makes it super easy to plug into a Thunderbolt Docking station and/or that ethernet port, both of which you'd want running away from your desk or workspace exactly how they will when plugged into the back of your laptop.

Lenovo ThinkPad P16v Gen 2

(Image credit: Collin Probst // Future)

Lenovo ThinkPad P16v Gen 2: In use

I've had this laptop in my rotation for the last couple of weeks, and it has been a pretty good computer. It can easily handle my productivity suite of tasks, content creation and video editing, and photo editing. It can handle the 3D modeling software for my 3D printer and all of it at once. I really appreciate the ethernet port and Thunderbolt 4 port on the back, as I could have the not-so-flexible ethernet port run away from my computer when I needed to hardline into the internet at one of my job sites. Whenever I am at my desk, I can easily plug into the docking station I have set up running to my monitors and peripherals.

Lenovo ThinkPad P16v Gen 2

(Image credit: Collin Probst // Future)

Another thing worth mentioning is the reliability and usability of the ThinkPad keyboards. While I never want to use the famous TouchPoint embedded within the keyboard, it's handy when I think about using it. On top of that, the typing experience is quite comfortable, even for all-day typing, as I do.

Lenovo has also chosen to utilize the space granted by the 16-inch screen to fit in a numpad. Some laptops, even with 16-inch screens, will just fit the exact size keyboard in the center of the allotted space. Lenovo chose to utilize that space fitting in a full-numberpad. For those who work with spreadsheets, phone numbers, or numbers in general, having a dedicated numpad makes data entry exponentially faster, and that's easy to do with the ThinkPad P16v Gen 2, adding to the allure for the business professional.

Lenovo ThinkPad P16v Gen 2

(Image credit: Collin Probst // Future)

Lenovo ThinkPad P16v Gen 2: Final verdict

The ThinkPad P16v Gen 2 delivers an exceptional balance of power, portability, and professional features. While it doesn’t quite match the raw performance of the P16, its lighter build and price point make it an excellent choice for professionals on the move who need a reliable machine.

For more workplace computing, we've tested the best business laptops.

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