Oppo Find N5 Review: A Remarkably Thin and Practical Foldable Phone

Yahoo

11-03-2025

"I could get used to this," I think as I scroll through TikTok on the Oppo Find N5's spacious, 8.12-inch internal display. Videos of picturesque hikes, delicious donuts and hilarious skits fill the screen; I jump to Instagram and scroll through similarly pleasing imagery of drool-worthy baked goods and colorful blooms. Everything looks bigger and better. In my hand, the Find N5 strikes that Goldilocks balance: perfect size and comfortable feel.
This attribute shines when the phone is folded shut. The cover screen feels wonderfully normal to use (compared to the early days of foldables), with dimensions that are hardly narrower than an iPhone 16 Pro -- quite a feat for a book-style foldable. Content doesn't appear awkwardly crammed, and the remarkable thinness of the device makes it feel like a standard, flat phone (in the best, non-gimmicky way).
Indeed, Oppo has dubbed this the "world's thinnest book-style foldable." The Find N5 measures just 8.93mm thick when closed and 4.21mm thick when opened, making it thinner than foldable competitors like the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6, the Google Pixel 9 Pro Fold and even the Honor Magic V3. It weighs 229 grams, making it lighter than Samsung's and Google's foldable offerings.
The downside: The Find N5 isn't available in the US, or even in Europe. Oppo told CNET in a statement, "We carefully tailor our product launches to each region based on in-depth market research and strategic priorities. The Find N5 will not be launching in Europe."
If you do live in a part of the world where the Find N5 is available, you'll be shelling out $2,499 Singapore dollars, which converts to roughly $1,870 US dollars (£1,482, AU$2,930).
If you've been eyeing a foldable and have been deterred by bulkiness, or just haven't been sold on them, the Oppo Find N5 may be your answer.
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I found myself using the cover and internal screens on the Find N5 pretty equally. I tend to opt for the front display when sending a quick email or taking a doomscrolling break, and the internal display is ideal for settling into longer videos and multitasking (more on that later).
Both the cover and internal display on the Find N5 have a 120Hz refresh rate, with a peak brightness of 2,450 nits and 2,100 nits, respectively. The screen is easy enough to see in bright sunlight, though colors and contrast don't quite pop as much as they do on the Pixel 9 Pro Fold, for instance. But images still look sharp.
The internal screen has an anti-reflective film, which is especially helpful with such a large display, but the cover screen doesn't. I'm used to not having an anti-reflective screen on every other phone I use, so it wasn't odd for just one screen to have that coating. The crease is impressively minimal; I can hardly detect it when the screen is lit up or when I'm watching a video, browsing through photos or scrolling through social media.
Speaking of social media, content on apps like TikTok are magnified to fill the internal screen, making some text appear a little off-center, but nothing I saw was awkwardly cropped. The Find N5 also seamlessly transitions apps between the cover and inner screen when opening the phone, and vice versa.
Multitasking is where that inner display shines. A split-screen view lets you swipe between up to three apps, so I can have Google Maps, notes and the Translate app open all at once as I walk through Barcelona for Mobile World Congress -- or have one of the apps turn into a floating window that I can move around the screen. You can also use this floating window option when you're not in split-screen mode. It's the perfect way to take advantage of that mini-tablet-like display.
One of the most unique things about the Find N5 is how nicely it plays with the iPhone, iPad and Mac. You can use the O Plus Connect app to easily share media and files between the Find N5 and an iPhone -- no AirDrop needed. Having this capability across an Android phone and iPhone is truly a game changer. But you can also connect the Find N5 to a Mac to transfer files and mirror your Mac's display, essentially turning your foldable phone into a mini MacBook, even if your computer isn't next to you.
While this is a neat feature, I'm just not sure how often I'd use it. Turning a relatively smaller display into your computer and then relying solely on (teeny tiny) touch commands isn't particularly user friendly, but it's still a cool capability.
The Find N5 doesn't come with a stylus, but the cover and inner screens both support the Oppo Pen stylus.
With such a thin phone, it's reasonable to worry about durability -- or accidentally snapping it in half. Thankfully, I never felt like that was a possibility with the Find N5. The phone feels sturdy in my hands, and I wasn't able to bend it, open or closed.
The Find N5's frame is made from aluminum alloy, which Oppo says adds a 30% increase in strength over the previous model. The cover display is made of nanocrystal glass that's meant to withstand drops 20% better than the Find N4, and it has a 10% increase in scratch resistance, the company says. I walked around Barcelona all day without a case on the Find N5, and though I didn't drop it, I took comfort in the idea that it wouldn't be the end of the world if I did.
The hinge feels secure -- and it's similarly sleek and unobtrusive. It's made of grade 5 titanium alloy, and there's no awkward gap when the phone is folded. Opening and closing the phone feels smooth each time.
The Find N5 comes in two colors: cosmic black and misty white. I have the black version, and the matte backing makes it easier to grip the phone. It also does a decent job of resisting fingerprints.
There's a lot of pressure riding on the camera module to not be too bulky and overshadow how thin this phone is, and thankfully, despite being a little beefy, it doesn't protrude too much from the back. Oppo says it customized the entire camera system to be slimmer for this device. A single glass cover across all three lenses also helps keep things sleek and smooth.
The Find N5 has a 50-megapixel main camera, an 8-megapixel ultrawide camera and a 50-megapixel periscope telephoto camera. The selfie cameras for both the cover and inner screens are 8 megapixels.
Pictures I took came out bright and well-lit, from the delicious paella I ordered to the mouthwatering pastries I found in a shop window to a portrait shot of my colleague Andy Lanxon on a sunny rooftop.
Take a look at this nighttime shot below that I took just after sunset brightened up the sky to a vibrant blue and notice how the Find N5 preserved details on the facade of the Cathedral of Barcelona.
Another nighttime shot I took at midnight had more shadows along the edges, but maintained that sharpness.
Sometimes, images are a little too well lit and appear washed out, like this picture of churros with chocolate that's a tad too bright for my liking. But it still looks nice and clear.
The Find N5 can shoot 4K video at 60 frames per second, and footage looks generally smooth and crisp.
Despite its compact build, the Find N5 doesn't skimp on battery life and capacity. The phone has a 5,600-mAh battery, which lasted more than a day of me taking photos, using Maps and scrolling through social media. It has 80-watt fast charging, as well as 50-watt wireless charging, which can be helpful when you're in a hurry to head out and need a little juice.
Oppo says the Find N5 lasts for up to 25 hours of continuous video streaming. In my own three-hour streaming test, in which I played a YouTube video in full-screen mode at full brightness over Wi-Fi, the battery dropped from 100% to 89%, which is pretty solid. In a separate, 45-minute endurance test, which involves a combination of streaming, scrolling through social media, joining a video call and playing games, the battery dropped from full to 95%. By comparison, the Pixel 9 Pro Fold dropped to 96%, meaning the Find N5 ranks among our top battery scores for that test. And in a charging test, the Find N5 went from 0% to a full charge in just under an hour.
The Find N5 comes with 512GB of storage and 16GB of RAM.
The Find N5 is powered by Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8 Elite chip, which Oppo says improves CPU, GPU and AI performance by more than 40% over the Find N4. That processor has brought noteworthy performance gains to other phones, such as the Galaxy S25 lineup and the OnePlus 13.
AI features include the bread and butter of most smartphones these days: Tools like call and document summaries, translations and AI eraser, which did a good job removing photobombers from my sightseeing photos. Below is my original photo with a passerby messing up my otherwise idyllic tourist photo.
One of my favorite features, Google's Circle to Search, is also available on the Find N5, making it easier to learn more about what's on your screen -- or screens, plural. Google Gemini can also be summoned with a long press of the power button.
Every phone tested by CNET's reviews team was actually used in the real world. We test a phone's features, play games and take photos. We examine the display to see if it's bright, sharp and vibrant. We analyze the design and build to see how it is to hold and whether it has an IP-rating for water resistance. We push the processor's performance to the extremes using standardized benchmark tools like GeekBench and 3DMark, along with our own anecdotal observations navigating the interface, recording high-resolution videos and playing graphically intense games at high refresh rates.
All the cameras are tested in a variety of conditions from bright sunlight to dark indoor scenes. We try out special features like night mode and portrait mode and compare our findings against similarly priced competing phones. We also check out the battery life by using it daily as well as running a series of battery drain tests.
We take into account additional features like support for 5G, satellite connectivity, fingerprint and face sensors, stylus support, fast charging speeds and foldable displays, among others that can be useful. We balance all of this against the price to give you the verdict on whether that phone, whatever price it is, actually represents good value. While these tests may not always be reflected in CNET's initial review, we conduct follow-up and long-term testing in most circumstances.
"This feels normal" is among the highest praise you could give a foldable phone, in my book, and the Find N5 has earned it. Whether I'm using the cover display or the internal one, I'm not constantly reminded of how gimmicky the concept of a foldable phone can be, because everything feels sleek and comfortable. Yes, the Find N5 is remarkably thin and lightweight, but it's also exceptionally practical and enjoyable to use. And it's good to see that a thinner build doesn't necessarily mean slimmer capabilities.
I'm personally still not sure if I'd make the switch full-time to a foldable phone, largely because of the high price tag, but the Oppo Find N5 helped to assuage some of my reservations about practicality and bulkiness. After all, social media scrolls and multitasking just aren't the same on a non-folding phone after seeing what's possible on the flip side.