Hands on with the most interesting phone you can't buy in Australia

By Alex Choros

Last updated 22 February 2022

Tech companies often refer to Australia as a market of early adopters, educated consumers wanting to be among the first to get their hands on the latest and greatest gadgets. This often works out well for us, with many major tech releases arriving locally day and date with larger markets, and ahead of many other smaller territories.

There are, of course, exceptions to every rule. Late last year, OPPO snuck in right before Christmas, announcing the Find N, its first foldable. Or its seventh, if you count the six prototype models made across four years of research and development. While OPPO's local business has grown significantly since launching back in 2014, it isn't bringing its Find N foldable here. In fact, for the foreseeable future, the Find N will be a China exclusive.

Despite this, OPPO's first non-prototype foldable is still an incredibly cool piece of tech that provides an interesting glimpse at where the category could go.

The OPPO Find N comes from the Galaxy Fold school of foldable thinking. It has an external display similar to a regular phone that then opens like a book to reveal a larger, internal display. The Find N is far more than just a Fold clone, however.

The biggest difference is that the Find N is a much more compact device. The external display is just 5.49-inch and has a more traditional 18:9 aspect ratio. It's roughly the same size as an iPhone mini. For comparison, the Z Fold 3 has a 6.2-inch external display with a tall and skinny 24.5:9 aspect ratio. Here's the pair side-by-side:

Coming from a larger phone, there's definitely an adjustment when it comes to the Find N's comparatively tiny external screen. It took me a hot minute to get used to typing on a small display again, but it’s still large enough that you can bang out a message with two hands without it feeling cramped. And despite being a smaller overall size than the Galaxy Z Fold 3's external screen, the Find N's is wider. This makes the overall Find N experience a lot more familiar, and easier to work with the Galaxy Z Fold 3's tall candy bar vibes.

Unfolded, the Find N has a 7.1-inch display, which is again smaller than the 7.6-inch screen you'll find on the Z Fold 3. The size difference isn't as noticeable as on the front, but the Samsung's larger screen is a touch better for running two apps at the same time.

Where OPPO is a clear winner, however, is the screen itself. Unlike most foldable to date, the Find N doesn't have a noticeable crease. If you're really looking for it, there's a slight difference in appearance over the hinge at some angles, but OPPO has managed to achieve the most seamless display of any foldable to date. You wouldn't necessarily assume it's foldable.

You can also barely feel a crease when moving your hand back and forth across the screen, which has been another common criticism of early foldable devices. In short, OPPO has managed to solve two of the biggest design issues associated with the form factor.

Once again, here's the Find N and Galaxy Z Fold 3.

Unfolding and folding the Find N feels good, and you can angle the hinge at anywhere from 50 to 120 degrees if you want to use half of the phone as a tripod. OPPO rates the phone for 200,000 folds, and the overall build quality seems excellent. I'm especially a fan of the black variant's textured matte back. It has a nice grippiness that makes the phone feel more secure in your hand. It is however noticeably heavier than a traditional phone.

The only weird design quirk is the power button and volume rocker sitting side-by-side when the phone is closed. Even after a few days of using the Find N, I needed to actively consider where the power button was when unlocking the phone. I'm sure you'd get used to the placement over a long enough period of time, but I would have preferred the pair to be stacked on top of one another.

As with the Galaxy Z Fold 3, the biggest issue with the overall Find N experience is that most Android apps simply aren't made for tablets. While Gmail and Chrome are a treat on the larger internal display, Twitter and Instagram are a mess, for example. Twitter runs as a blown-up version of the mobile app, with only a few tweets fitting on the display at a time. Instagram opens with black bars on either side. Despite foldable hardware maturing significantly over the past few years, the app situation isn't improving.

When you put aside the whole folding thing, the Find N is still a pretty solid phone. It's powered by the Snapdragon 888 we saw in most of last year's high-end phones. The camera setup is a small step behind the OPPO Find X3 Pro, but still very good. Battery lasted between four and five hours of screen time per charge during my shortish testing period, with both 5G and the high refresh rate displays switched on. With moderate usage, that's a full day per charge with a reasonable buffer. The only missing feature is water resistance, which Samsung added to both its foldables last year.

OPPO has a reputation for leading on value, and based on the Find N's international pricing, it would sell for around $1,700 here. That's a big discount when compared to the $2,499 Galaxy Fold 3, which is ostensibly its biggest competitor. Of course, that doesn't really matter when you can't easily buy the Find N in Australia.

If you really want to get your hands on it, you can import the Find N. In most cases, you're looking at somewhere between a $500 to $1,000 premium based on what you should actually pay, however. And as a Chinese phone, you may need to install Google Play Services yourself (although some retailers appear to have already done this). Without Google Play Services, you can't get the Google Play Store for app installation, and a whole lot of apps may refuse to work.

Google Play Services had been installed before I got my hands on the Find N, but I couldn't find a way to easily update it to the latest version. This led to some odd issues, like the QR code scanning functionality in 1Password not working. I also found the phone very aggressive at resetting the default text messaging app to OPPO's own for "security reasons", which isn't an issue that I've had with local OPPO stock. There were also some parts of the operating system stuck in Chinese.

OPPO Find N - Final Thoughts

The Find N is a promising device that gives OPPO a solid foundation for future models. The all-but-creaseless display makes it feel more refined than other competitors, and I love the more traditional form-factor when shut.

It's a shame that OPPO isn't bringing the Find N to Australia, but I have faith future models could make it past China. The Find N sold out almost instantly when it launched, and rocked up over one million backorders. While OPPO Australia Managing Director Michael Tran wasn't able to comment on upcoming devices, he told me could see the manufacturer continuing "down this path". After all, the Find N is the result of four years of research and development and six prototypes. In addition to the strong response in OPPO's home market, Tran said he had immediate interest from Australian retailers.

OPPO Find N, Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 3, & Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 3

I've got my fingers crossed, because no matter what your mobile allegiances are, competition drives innovation. A high-end foldable priced in line with the likes of the Galaxy S22+ and the iPhone 13 Pro is a great prospect in itself. If the Find N were genuinely selling for $1,700 in Australia, that would be a great deal. But given the foldable space has largely been dominated by Samsung so far, OPPO emerging as a viable global alternative means it can't just rest on its laurels. And if we start seeing more foldable phones priced in line with traditional high-end phones rather than a super premium proposition, the whole mobile industry is going to get a whole lot more interesting.