Remember when foldable phones first launched in 2019? They seemed impossibly futuristic at the time, but in hindsight now, wow those devices were bulky and fragile.
Fast forward six years and the form factor has matured beyond most of us could have imagined. The best foldable phones today are barely thicker than a “normal” phone, and durability is no longer an issue, as they’re mostly water resistant and can survive a few drops (I know, because I’ve dropped my fair share in recent years).
The newest foldable that just launched today in Singapore is the Find N5 from Oppo, and it takes the crown as the new “world’s thinnest foldable phone.”
The Find N5 measures only 8.93mm when folded and weighs 229g. The former number is the leader in the category right now, while the latter number is a very close second in the industry.
Compared to Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold 6, which measures, 12.1mm when folded, the difference in thickness is noticeable.
But compared to the previous “thinnest foldable phone,” the Honor Magic V3, the difference is almost impossible to perceive in real life. So this means this extreme thinness really only stands out if you’re used to Samsung or Google’s foldables. If you’ve been using the best Chinese foldables already, the Find N5 isn’t immediately as jaw-dropping.
But there are other bits of Find N5 that can also claim to be best in the industry. For one, the Find N5 is the most water-resistant foldable phone right now, with an official IPX9 rating. In the video below at the 1:34 mark, you can see me let a water fountain splash water all over the device, and it operated fine right after.
The Find N5 also has a very good tele-macro zoom lens that can shoot at 70mm focal length and get a minimum focus distance of just 10cm, resulting in very impressive close up shots like these.
Finally, the Find N5 can also connect to Apple’s Mac computer. Now, you do have to install Oppo’s O+ software on the Mac, but once it’s installed, you can connect the Find N5 to a Mac seamlessly. Once connected, you can share files between the two devices via drag and drop, and perhaps most impressive yet, you can remote control the Mac with the Find N5.
The above photo shows my Find N5 mirroring my MacBook Pro screen, and from there, I can interact with the MacBook via the Find N5, meaning I don’t have to touch the Mac at all.
Oppo’s O+ software is perfectly safe, by the way. It follows all of Apple’s protocols and is available on Apple’s own app store.
There’s a lot more about the Find N5 I haven’t even touched on, such as the 8.1-inch main folding screen that’s the largest in the foldable space, and the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite chip that’s the best in the Android space. That will come later in the full review. As of right now, the Oppo Find N5 is looking like the new best all around foldable phone, and the fact it will sell outside China is a big deal.
I do not have retail price at the time of this reporting — and the pricing will vary wildly between Europe and, say, Hong Kong or Thailand — but the phone will surely cost less than the $1,800 established by Samsung’s foldables. In China, I can make a very educated guess it’ll start at around 9,999 yuan, which is around $1,300.
