Oppo A3 unveiled as drop-resistant Snapdragon 695 smartphone

The Oppo A3 is a new affordable smartphone with a trick up its sleeve (Image source: Oppo)

Oppo has just released the A3, a lower mid-range handset that mates a 120 Hz OLED display to the aging Snapdragon 695 chipset and a 5,000 mAh battery. The A3 may look like any other modern phone; it's the rather durable case (in no small part thanks to the Corning Gorilla Glass 7i) including water resistance that helps it stand out from the crowd.

Andrew Sozinov, Published 07/02/2024

Oppo has taken the wraps off the A3, a mid-range smartphone with dust and water protection. This new model is an affordable version of the A3 Pro smartphone which made its debut in China in April. The company has only introduced the new phone to China for now with no word on an international release.

The A3 is powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 695 chipset that has eight CPU cores and the Adreno 619 GPU at its disposal. For reference, the A3 Pro features the more modern and more powerful MediaTek Dimensity 7050 SoC. The Snapdragon chipset has 8 GB or 12 GB of LPDDR4X RAM to work with and is accompanied by 256 GB or 512 GB of UFS 2.2 storage. For storage expansion, there is a microSD card slot.

The front is taken up by a 6.7" OLED display with FHD+ resolution (2,412 x 1,080 pixels) and 120 Hz refresh rate. As is typical for OLEDs, this is a 10-bit color depth panel; other notable specifications include the 240 Hz touch sampling rate and up to 1,200 nits peak brightness. The screen is covered with the new Gorilla Glass 7i. On the rear, we have two cameras, a 50 MP main snapper with an f/1.8 lens, and a 2 MP depth sensor (f/2.4). For selfies, the user gets a pretty basic 8 MP camera. Both front and rear cameras are capable of recording 1080p30 videos.

The smartphone packs a 5,000 mAh battery with 45 W wired fast charging based on the VOOC technology supported. Oppo claims the phone needs just 30 minutes to go from 0% to 50% charge level. A VOOC charger is included in the box. Connectivity options include 5G (dual-SIM), Wi-Fi 5 (802.11 a/b/g/n/ac), and Bluetooth 5.1. There is no NFC and no 3.5 mm headphone jack. The Oppo A3 runs ColorOS 14 based on Android 14.

Its thickness and weight are rather moderate at 7.15 mm (0.28") and 180 grams (6.35 oz). In spite of that fact, the A3 is supposed to be very durable. According to the company, the smartphone will withstand a fall from a height of approximately 6 ft. The screen is scratch-resistant, naturally, and there is also protection against dust and water, with Oppo claiming the smartphone can be used for 10 hours in the rain. There is no mention of any specific IP rating in the official spec sheet, however.

The Oppo A3 is already available for pre-order in China. On the official Oppo website, the base A3 model with 8/256 GB of memory is listed at CNY 1,600 ($220). The 12/256 GB model can be had for CNY 1,800 ($248), and the highest-end model with 12/512 GB of storage is available for CNY 2,100 ($289).