Chinese companies seem really keen to get their phones out before the end of the year, as hot on the heels of the Xiaomi 13 launch, there’s now the Oppo Find N2 and Oppo Find N2 Flip – two new foldable phones designed to compete with the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 4 and Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4.
These have just been unveiled on day two of Oppo’s annual Inno Day event, but as with the Xiaomi 13, this initial launch is just for China. However, Oppo has been a bit more specific about its global plans than Xiaomi; saying that the Oppo Find N2 Flip will be launching overseas – including most countries in Europe – in Q1 2023. So sometime between January and March 2023.
Sadly, there’s no word on a global launch for the company's Z Fold rival, the standard Oppo Find N2, so that might remain exclusively in China; especially as the original Oppo Find N isn’t widely available either.
As for the specs, we’ll start with the Oppo Find N2 Flip, since that’s the one you’ll most likely actually be able to buy; a clamshell foldable like the Galaxy Z Flip 4 and Motorola Razr (2022) with some selling points all its own.
The highlight is the biggest cover screen on any flip-style foldable phone so far, which has the potential to render the Oppo Find N2 Flip far more useful when folded shut than most clamshell foldables.
Oppo claims you can view up to six notifications on this display at once, and also use it to preview photos taken by the phone's ‘flagship-level’ cameras.
The Find N2 Flip also has a 4,300mAh battery, which Oppo claims offers "all-day life", plus there’s a powerful MediaTek Dimensity 9000 Plus chipset at its heart, and an apparently "almost-invisible" crease; we'll believe it when we (don't) see it. The rest of the specs are yet to be revealed, at the time of writing.
As for the Oppo Find N2, that’s a larger foldable, along the lines of the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 4. It has a 7.1-inch 1792 x 1920 foldable main display that uses AMOLED tech and has a dynamic refresh rate of up to 120Hz.
There’s also a 5.54-inch 1080 x 2120 AMOLED external display, with a 120Hz refresh rate, and the phone comes powered by a Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1 chipset, along with up to 16GB of RAM.
There’s up to 512GB of storage, a 4,520mAh battery with 67W charging, 5G support, and a triple-lens camera, with a 50MP f/1.8 main sensor, a 48MP f/2.2 ultra-wide, and a 32MP f/2.0 telephoto. There are also two 32MP selfie cameras, and the Oppo Find N2 runs Android 13, with Oppo’s ColorOS 13 interface.
It’s clad in tough Gorilla Glass Victus on both the front and back (in white and green), while the back of the black model is instead wrapped in vegan leather. It also weighs just 233g in black or 237g in the other shades, which makes it lighter than the 240g iPhone 14 Pro Max, despite that phone not being foldable.
Analysis: stiff competition from Samsung and Motorola
It’s a packed year for foldable phones, and especially for clamshell ones, with the Oppo Find N2 Flip having competition from the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 and the Motorola Razr (2022).
We won’t do a full specs comparison here – not least because we don’t have a full specs list for Oppo’s phone – but the Find N2 Flip looks to stand out through its large cover screen and its 4,300mAh battery, which is significantly larger than the 3,700mAh one in the Z Flip 4 or the 3,500mAh one in the Razr (2022).
The crease in Oppo’s phone is possibly less visible too, but we won’t be sure of that until we’ve tested it.
As for the Motorola Razr (2022), highlights include a 144Hz refresh rate, while the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 offers water resistance, and both the Samsung and the Motorola have a powerful Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1 chipset.
We won’t know exactly how the Oppo Find N2 Flip stacks up until we’ve used it, but from what we’ve heard so far, it certainly sounds like it could be one of the best foldable phones.
