The Oppo A74 5G is an amazing smartphone with chic design, elegant display, and strong battery life. Thankfully, Oppo has been bringing the 5G technology into the mid-range market where you have the likes of Oppo A57 5G, Oppo A77 5G, and other devices from the company’s mid-tier series of smartphones. The A74 5G is very similar to the Oppo A57 5G, though it has bigger storage.
At $233, the Oppo A74 5G is a fairly priced mid-range phone, but add a few more dollars and you’ll have a whole lot of better options to choose from, speaking of Samsung’s Galaxy A33 5G and Galaxy M33 5G smartphones. Nevertheless, you’ll hardly find another smartphone as good as the Oppo A74 5G at that price range. The Oppo A74 5G has something special to offer with its amazing specs and features.
There could be many alternatives to the Oppo A74 5G, as the smartphone performs with a lower mid-range Qualcomm Snapdragon 480 5G processor. But you’ll still enjoy a blistering performance on your day-to-day usage with the phone. Though you might miss a buttery smooth gaming experience, you should be looking for the Asus ROG Phone 5 or the Poco F4 GT if you’re looking for a full gaming phone.
Like we said from the start, the Oppo A74 5G offers something very satisfactory in all-around performance. You’ll get a decent capturing experience with the 48MP quad camera setup and a long-lasting battery life with the 5000mAh battery. Also, we won’t forget the 5G network connectivity because that’s the most interesting part of this affordable mid-range phone.
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Table of Contents
Oppo A74 5G Key Specifications
- Display: 6.5-inch IPS LCD, 90Hz
- Resolution: 1080 x 2400 pixels
- Processor: Qualcomm Snapdragon 480 5G
- Front Camera: 16-megapixel
- Rear Camera: 48-megapixel + 8-megapixel + 2-megapixel + 2-megapixel
- RAM: 6GB /8GB
- Storage: 128GB
- Battery Capacity: 5000mAh
- OS: Android 11, ColorOS 11.1
Design
Affordable phones are less likely to offer a premium design, and that’s just the case with the Oppo A74 5G. It’s more like saying that it achieved a balance between price and features, provided the phone is affordable. So Oppo has to come up with something simple to fit the large screen and battery capacity into the budget which is not a bad idea at all.
Interestingly, the simplicity is what we love most about the phone’s design, and we’re very certain that you’ll see it the same way if you care more about build quality than aesthetics. The Oppo A74 5G flaunts an all-plastic affair which can appear in two distinctive colourways known as Fluid Black and Space Silver depending on the variant you choose.
The phone doesn’t feel too big or too small to handle. You’ll find the 6.5-inch screen to be moderately sized while there’s a punch-hole cutout on its top for the selfie camera. The power button on the right corner also works as the phone’s fingerprint scanner which is very preferable to most users.
The Oppo A74 5G features a matte finish on the rear, but that didn’t stop it from feeling glossy. The camera housing is the type we see often on mid-range phones, even though it’s designed to look like that of the top-end class of smartphones. Nevertheless, the A74 5G is a nice phone to behold and use despite lacking water resistance feature.
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Display
The Oppo A74 5G has a 6.5-inch screen that features a maximum brightness of 480 nits. Though this might not be enough to offer clear visibility under direct sunlight, not all smartphones of the same price range can offer more than that. The screen impressively clocks 1080 x 2400 pixels resolution which is higher than the 720p resolution of the Samsung Galaxy A32 5G.
For a smooth scrolling experience, the display features a refresh rate of 90Hz which can be switched to 60Hz if want to save more battery. Also, the colour production looks great even though it’s an IPS LCD panel. You can count as many phones that use AMOLED panels at the same price range, but it’s high time we start paying more attention to this LCD technology because it works really fine.
Camera
For optics, the Oppo A74 5G has a quad camera setup which is said to be old-fashioned. The camera setup is led by a 48MP main sensor, supported by an 8MP ultra-wide camera. A 2MP macro and 2MP depth sensor complete the setup on the rear while a LED Flashlight also sits in the camera module. Selfies are taken with the 16MP sensor which is also good for video recording.
Through our experience with the camera, we noticed that it works well for daylight shooting because photos look sharp and detailed when captured on the 48MP sensor. If you often take pictures at night, then you might not be pleased with the performance of this phone’s camera.
The portrait mode works really well for capturing with some beautiful background blurs. The ultra-wide also allows for some decent wide-angle shots, but that’s a different case while capturing with the night mode where photos aren’t well-detailed even while using the auto mode.
The zooming capabilities of the camera are quite good in our experience. Though it’s restricted only to 6X zoom, it seems to do even more which we’re very excited to see. The Oppo A74 5G can record up to 1080p videos which is enough to shoot quality HD content with the help of the software-based technique for stabilization.
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Performance, Storage, and Software
The performance of some lower mid-range phones like the Oppo A74 5G can be unpredictable at times. Seeing a Qualcomm Snapdragon 480 chipset and a refresh rate of 90Hz, we weren’t too sure of what the performance would be like until we got our hands on the phone and used it for a while where we tested some graphics-demanding games.
Surprisingly, the Oppo A74 delivers a decent performance and processing speed. Games like Fortnite only run on medium settings which feels very satisfactory, while sometimes apps will take more time to load. This is mostly an issue with the software, and we noticed it on some other mid-range phones from Oppo.
The Oppo A74 5G offers a huge amount of storage space and yet an option to expand it using the provided microSD card slot. The smartphone comes with 128GB of in-built storage which is paired with either 6GB or 8GB of RAM depending on the storage variant you go for.
There’s not much to talk about the ColorOS interface. It’s just a normal good-looking interface, and the Oppo A74 5G runs the 11th version. Alongside the ColorOS 11 interface, this phone also comes with the Android 11 OS. Both versions are already outdated, but you’ll still get to use some interesting features and customization options.
Battery Capacity and Charging
The 5,000mAh battery inside the Oppo A74 5G is mostly seen in every smartphone of the same category. The battery is big enough to last the whole day or even more if you don’t use the phone too much. This means that you won’t have to charge the phone often even though it takes only a few hours to charge using the 18W fast charger that comes with the Oppo A74 5G.
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Oppo A74 5G: Price in Nigeria and Release Date
Oppo launched the Oppo A74 5G in some selected countries of the South East Asian region, including Europe and Australia. The company also launched the phone’s 4G variant while releasing both phones in April. The Oppo A74 5G lacks CDMA support which seems like a red flag for those in the US because it won’t work properly with US networks.
The Oppo A74 5G is selling at ₦170,500 ($233), making it one of the best affordable 5G smartphones in the market. Meanwhile, those in the US can still import the phone through online retail stores.
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Oppo A74 5G Full Specifications
General
- Brand: Oppo
- Model: A74 5G
- Release Date: April 2022
- Weight: 190g
- Colours: Fluid Black, Space Silver
- Touchscreen: YES
- Type: IPS LCD, 90Hz
- Display Size: 6.5-inch
- Screen Resolution: 1080 × 2400 pixels
- Facelock Support: YES
- In-display fingerprint scanner: No
- Sensors: Fingerprint (side-mounted)
- Dimensions: 162.9 x 74.7 x 8.4 mm (6.41 x 2.94 x 0.33 in)
Platform
- Operating System: Android 11, ColorOS 11.1
- Chipset: Qualcomm SM4350 Snapdragon 480 5G
- CPU: Octa-core (2×2.0 GHz Kryo 460 & 6×1.8 GHz Kryo 460)
- GPU: Adreno 610
Memory
- RAM: 6GB /8GB
- Inbuilt Storage: 128GB
- SD Card slot: Yes (dedicated slot)
Camera
- Rear Flash: LED FLASH
- Rear Camera: 48-MP f/2.7 (wide), 8-MP f/2.2 (ultra-wide), 2MP f/2.4 (macro), 2MP f/2.4 (depth)
- Video: 1080p@30fps
- Front Camera: 16-MP f/2.0 (wide)
- Front Flash: –
Connectivity
- Wi-Fi: YES
- Bluetooth: 5.1
- USB: MicroUSB Type-C
- GPS: Yes
- WLAN: Yes
Network
- SIM: Dual SIM (Nano-SIM, dual stand-by)
- Technology: GSM / HSPA / LTE / 5G
- 3G Support: Yes
- 4G/ LTE Support: Yes
- 5G Support: Yes
- Speed: HSPA 42.2/5.76 Mbps, LTE-A, 5G
Battery
- Capacity: Li-Po 5000mAh, non-removable
- Fast Charge: 18W
Price
- Price in Nigeria: ₦170,500
- Price in the US: $233
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