a tablet with tough competition

A few days ago OPPO presented its first tablet for our market in Europe, the OPPO Pad Air. This device was designed to be an entry-level model for people looking for a bigger screen to do what they already do on their phone: watch videos, make video calls, browse, and more.

The problem, as we will see below, is not the tablet itself, but the existence of a competitor within the company, through the realme subsidiary.

OPPO Pad Air Features

Design and build

The OPPO Pad Air is an almost exact clone of the realme Pad, with some lacks like the headphone jack. The weight is the same, as well as the distribution of the elements.

It is quite light and it is very comfortable to use it to show someone a video without having to open the computer or be limited to the mobile screen.

The front bezels aren’t large at all, and the screen ratio makes it comfortable to use with one hand both vertically and horizontally.

screen and sound

The panel measures 10.36 inches with a 2K (2000 x 1200) resolution, although it uses LCD technology and a 60Hz refresh rate.

For indoor use it’s more than adequate, with decent brightness, although the processor isn’t particularly fast when it comes to rotating content when switching from horizontal to vertical mode.

The screen is accompanied by four speakers with optimal performance, more than enough to play games or watch series and films if you don’t want to use headphones.

Performance

Unlike Xiaomi in the Pad 5, OPPO has opted for a much more modest hardware configuration. The processor is the Snapdragon 680 and the RAM ranges from 4 to 6 GB, with expansion via virtual RAM.

We also see basic configurations in memory, with 64 and 128 GB.

When it comes to watching series and movies, it’s safe to say we had no issues, not even browsing (although the Discover stream insists on appearing as on mobile, wasting screen size .

The problem comes while playing. With HearthStone we’ve seen some slowdowns, but the game can be used, as long as we don’t want to max out the frame rate.

However, titles like Honkai Impact Third are impossible to handle comfortably, as the hardware of the device was not designed for it.

This OPPO Pad Air seems to have been designed for consuming streaming content, making a video call, enjoying casual games and surfing the net.

The 7100mAh battery has 18W fast charging, a little weak for the size of the battery, but since we won’t have to plug in the charger every day, we forget about it.

As for the cameras, little to say, they have been designed for video calls and taking a photo that we have to send to social networks, but nothing else.

Conclusion: price is an obstacle

We are happy that OPPO has decided to enter the Spanish market with its tablets, but with a basic model.

The problem is that they have competition at home. This device is not much different from the realme Pad that we tested a few months ago, and its price is noticeably higher.

If we look at the 64 GB models, for example, we see that the OPPO Pad Air costs 299 dollars, while the realme Pad costs 260 dollars but is offered for less than 180 dollars.

[Xiaomi Pad 5, análisis: esta es la referencia en tablets Android en 2021]

In the case of the 128 GB model, something similar happens, with the OPPO tablet close to 350 dollars and the realme at 290 dollars, which remain at 230 dollars on offer.

OPPO has a different strategy, with a presence in large retail chains, but this price difference, at least without having the OPPO Pad Air yet, is too great.

As an entertainment product, to watch series comfortably or to surf, it can be useful, but we cannot think of playing intensely according to the titles.

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