The Oculus Go games you should start with

Time to sink your teeth into your new VR headset

Whether you’re a veteran or entirely, new to VR the question of, “What do I want to play first?” is always the toughest when it comes to a new headset. Now that you’ve got your Oculus Go I’m sure you want to test out all the cool things and get the feel for just how awesome this device actually is. Well, now there’s no stress involved in that situation as I’ve pulled some of my personal favorites into the list below!

Strap that headset on, it’s time to play some amazing games.

Pet Lab

This is an adorable gem that is a series of minigames that make up one bigger game. You’re a wizard who runs a pet shop, caring for eggs and training monsters to meet your clients’ orders. It’s super cute and super fun without requiring a whole lot of movement. (I play this game sitting down on my couch.) Not only are there so many cool ways to change the looks of your little monsters, but you can even train them. The more you train the better they hold up in competitions against other players.

There is a pay-to-play option that gives you quite a head start if you choose to spend the 7 dollars to get the bonus. Otherwise this game is free on the Oculus Store for your enjoyment!

See on Oculus Store

Augmented Empire

This is more of a strategy RPG, but still doesn’t require a lot of movement to play. (Another one I play from my couch.) This heart-wrenching game draws you into a story of a broken family in a dystopian future. The city they live in is falling to shambles due to a cruel dictator that just happens to be the main characters step-mother. You play a robot in charge of being the “eyes in the sky” to look out for your human friends below, telling them where to go and who to shoot to ensure their safety and the completion of the mission. Augmented Empire can be found on the Oculus Store for $9.99 and you will absolutely lose all sense of time while you’re playing it. I seriously didn’t wanna put it down once I started.

My only advice is to make sure you touch all the things you can in the game, don’t worry about timing unless there’s an active timer somewhere. There are too many cool things you shouldn’t miss.

See on Oculus Store

Doors of Silence – the prologue

If you are a horror fan this is REQUIRED to go on her device, trust me. This game is more active so you’ll actually have to be standing to interact as you choose which direction you walk by physically turning your head. In regards to mechanics, the buttons are a little weird but it doesn’t make the game unplayable. I found this out the hard way, but the controls are very sensitive. Most Oculus Go games you have to actually click the touchpad to move, but for this one it will automatically start moving you as soon as you touch the touchpad and pressing down will have you “run” (even though your screen doesn’t appear to move faster, your character breathes heaver like he’s running?)

This game is full of jump scares and psychological horror. I LOVED it. The designers found just the right way to scare you with or without having something jump right into your face. It’s tough to get as good of an experience in a horror game as I did playing Doors of Silence, and that’s saying a lot because I write plots for a zombie horror LARP. You can find Doors of Silence on the Oculus Store for just $4.99 and it’s worth every penny.

See on Oculus Store

Ultrawings

I originally played Ultrawings on the PlayStation VR and was quite skeptical of the amount of fun I would have when I got reduced to just one hand by playing it on the Oculus Go. Surprisingly enough, it didn’t actually take from the experience at all. Yeah, I felt like less of a badass not being able to pull the clutch while steering, but those are little things that don’t even effect overall gameplay. All in all, this is a super fun game to give you the feel of what flying is really like. It’s super immersive and fun as heck. If you starts feeling nauseous playing it, just put a fan in the room to blow on you during gameplay to trick your body into thinking it’s moving the same way your eyes are seeing.

Ultrawings in on the Oculus Store for $9.99 so go get it for yourself and see all the sites and challenges you have to face within.

See on Oculus Store

Bait: Free

From first glance, this didn’t look like a game I’d want to download or even enjoy (I’m not a fishing person AT ALL) but this game was actually super cute and pretty fun! You’re a fisherman on the lakes trying to collect more fish for the museum you work for. The goal is to gather enough money to keep upgrading your resources and get better fish. But, there’s a mysterious fish that dates back to prehistoric times the museum has its heart set on. You can get Bait for free on the Oculus Store and jump right into the game. The mechanics are easy to get the hang of and the story is even easier to follow. Have a blast!

See on Oculus Store

Let this $192 robot vacuum and mop your floors while you enjoy the summer sun

Using coupon code GJHNN6BG during checkout will drop the price of the ILIFE V8s Robot Vacuum from $220.99 down to $192.96. It normally sells for around $260, and has even sold for as much as $400 for a brief period of time, but has never had a direct price drop anywhere near this price. Many RoboVac models only vacuum, but that’s where this one stands out. In addition to having a large canister for collecting dirt and debris, the V8s can also mop your floors for you.

It has its own water tank to provide a wet scrub for hard floors, and the advance i-dropping technology makes it very efficient. The vacuum can intelligently stop releasing water when it detects dirt or debris that needs to be scrubbed to prevent damaging your floors. There are 6 cleaning modes, including auto, path, max, edge, mopping, and spot.

See at Amazon

Best Places To Buy A Refurbished Phone in 2018

Phones are expensive, but they don’t have to be that expensive.

Everyone wants a high-end phone, but the problem is bringing yourself to actually pay the high prices required for one. Some people are happy to pay retail, but others are looking for a deal — and one of the ways to find discounts is to look for refurbished phones.

But as you’d expect, buying a refurbished phone isn’t as simple as walking into a store and asking for one — it takes a bit more research and understanding. To help you navigate it, we have all of the information you need right here to make a good choice in buying a refurbished phone.

What does ‘refurbished’ mean?

Even though we see “refurbished” thrown around a lot, that doesn’t mean it’s necessarily a standardized term. You may often see it used interchangeably with “recertified,” “reconditioned” or just “open box” or “pre-owned” as well. No matter the exact word, in general it means it’s a product that was manufactured to sell as new, but for whatever reason was returned to the manufacturer — either by a store, reseller or customer — and is now ready to be sold again. They’re sold at a discount, and that’s why people are interested in them.

The terminology changes, but the idea is the same.

Refurbished devices could have simply been opened and returned to a store, but could have also been returned to the manufacturer for a malfunction that was then fixed before selling again. Most of the time, depending on the country where you’re shopping, a product that was been purchased and opened — and possibly not even removed from the packaging or powered on — can no longer be sold as “new” and must be sold as refurbished instead. Stores, resellers or companies themselves then have to discount the device because it technically isn’t new-in-box and therefore can’t command the same price as a new phone.

Unfortunately, it’s hard to know when shopping for a refurbished phone why exactly the phone has made its way to refurbished status or what was done to the phone to then certify that it was refurbished.

What to look for when shopping refurbished

The issue with refurbished phones is that you don’t necessarily know which of the possible pathways it took to be refurbished in the first place. And the truth is, you may never know even after you have the phone in your hands. But there are some good tips to follow when shopping for a refurbished phone.

• Buy from the original company or reputable store whenever possible. They do the best refurbishing process, and can actually offer some sort of guarantee that the phone is in good, working condition.
• See what warranty, if any, is offered for the refurbished phones. Some manufacturers will offer a full warranty for refurbished phones, while third parties typically won’t.
• Read the fine print on the sale — even though it may be hard to find. Most refurbished or open-box phones are sold “as is” with little or no option for returns or refunds.
• Keep in mind the age of the device you’re looking to buy. Sometimes companies won’t be selling refurbished versions of the latest phones, but instead a model or two older. It may be nicely discounted, but much of that discount is likely due to it just being old.
• If the price is too good to be true … then it probably is! If you see a retailer selling a late-model “refurbished” phone for something like half the retail price or less, there’s likely some sort of catch you’ve yet to find. Refurbished phones will be cheap, but they won’t be a steal.

Where to buy refurbished

If you’re doing your researched and are ready to buy refurbished, here are some great places to look that often have refurbished, recertified, pre-owned or open-box phones.

• Best Buy sells refurbished, pre-owned and open-box phones from a variety of companies at discounts ranging from 10-30%. Open-box deals in particular are great because they’re typically devices that have just been purchased, opened and returned, not even used. Because of this, you can often find the latest models of phones for sale, rather than just old models.
• Samsung sells certified pre-owned devices, typically at least one model year old, at solid but not substantial discounts. The upside here is getting a full one-year warranty as if you bought it new.
• Gazelle refurbishes and sells phones it buys from consumers, and typically offers up popular devices from Samsung that it can turn the biggest profits on. This means there’s a small selection, and it may not always offer the latest devices, but has some great prices.
• Verizon has certified pre-owned devices, but the selection is small and isn’t always the best deal. For the most part, it only sells pre-owned Samsung phones. Buying certified from the carrier gives you a bit of security, though, as Verizon will guarantee you’re getting a working device.
• T-Mobile also sells certified pre-owned devices at deep discounts, but stock fluctuates and is generally limited to Samsung and/or LG phones. The carrier will also offer similar support to that of a brand new device, so you do have a safety net there.
• AT&T technically has certified pre-owned phones, but they’re only available online and at any given time you may find just one or two models. You’re likely better off buying an unlocked refurbished phone elsewhere.
• Sprint lands in the same situation as the other carriers, offering certified pre-owned phones but often just one or two models available depending when you look.

Do your research, pick the right store and compare prices before buying, and you’re likely to come away with a good phone at a better price than you would ever find on a new-in-box phone.

Update June 2018: All of the latest and greatest places to buy a refurbished phone can still be found right here.

You can now add kids under 13 to Project Fi group plans via Family Link

You’ll need a Family Link account to get started.

In October 2016, Google made Project Fi much more accessible for a lot of people with the introduction of group plans. Today, those group plans are expanding even more with support for kids under 13-years-old.

Per Google’s announcement post:

When you add a child to your plan, you’ll both enjoy the Project Fi features you know and love—like easy data alerts, seamless switching between networks, and automatic connection to free Wi-Fi hotspots—in addition to the features already available in the Family Link app that you can use to set digital ground rules that work for your family.

As mentioned above, this feature is being added in conjunction with Google Family Link — a digital suite of tools that helps you manage and see how your kiddos are using their devices.

To add your kid(s) to Project Fi, create a Family Link account if you don’t already have one, add them to your plan, and make sure they’ve got a phone that’s compatible with the service.

Pricing is the same as other members in your plan, meaning you’ll pay $15/month for your youngsters’ talk & text and then $10 per each GB of data they use.

Project Fi wish list: 3 things that would make me switch

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iOS 12 Beta Lets Apple Music Subscribers Search for Some Songs Using Lyric Phrases

A Reddit user has discovered that the first beta of iOS 12 includes a Music app feature that allows Apple Music subscribers to search for songs using lyric phrases.

As the image below shows, using the search phrase “Loving you isn’t the right thing to do” – the first lines of Fleetwood Mac’s “Go Your Own Way” – successfully returns the relevant song, and quotes the lyrical phrase in the single’s entry in the results.

MacRumors can confirm that the lyric search does work, but seemingly not yet for all songs with lyrics in the Apple Music archive. Several beta testers on Reddit also chimed in to confirm the feature. As Reddit user abrb3192 notes:

It definitely works. Had a line in my head for weeks and no idea where it came from. Searched “6 gear speed” and it brought back the song Strip That Down by Liam Payne. It’s not my cup of tea (the song) but at least I finally have context to the transmission reference.

Assuming the feature makes the final release of iOS 12, Apple Music subscribers should be able to discover songs for which they don’t know the name, but only know a select lyric that they can recall hearing as part of a song.

In Apple Music in iOS 11, scrolling down on the “Now Playing” window brings up an option to show song lyrics on most Apple Music songs. Lyrics are not available for all songs, especially new releases, so that might be the reason for the hit and miss results in the iOS 12 beta.

Related Roundup: iOS 12Tag: Apple Music
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Apple Music Artist Profiles Get Redesign in iOS 12 Beta With Enlarged Portraits and Shuffle All ‘Play’ Button

Apple didn’t touch upon Apple Music at all during its WWDC keynote yesterday, leaving any potential new details about the streaming music service to be discovered by early beta testers of iOS 12. For now, it appears that Apple Music remains largely the same between iOS 11 and iOS 12, but some Redditors have discovered at least one update for artists and their profile pages in the Music app on iPhone.

With the update, artist profiles now have larger images that take up half of the screen on iPhone. Under the image is the artist’s name, accompanied by a new play button. According to users on Reddit, this button shuffles all the songs in the artist’s catalog of music, making it easy to search for a band or singer and simply tap the button to start playing their music. Otherwise, the rest of the page appears normal with Top Songs, Albums, Top Videos, and more that can be discovered as you scroll down.

Apple Music in iOS 11.4 (left) compared to iOS 12 (right, via tynamite on Reddit)
In comparison, Apple Music artist pages on iOS 11 have much smaller artist images. As visible in the comparison image above, for some bands like The Raconteurs it’s easy to see why Apple would want to switch to larger artwork when some artists have most of their images cut off by the current layout.

At the same time, the iPhone X and the notch still negatively affect some artist images even with the new iOS 12 layout (like Rihanna below), so it appears Apple has some more tweaking to do to get this section of Apple Music right.

Apple Music in iOS 11.4 (left) compared to iOS 12 (right, via kevinlim512 on Reddit)
Instead of a play button, Apple Music in iOS 11 currently has an ellipses menu next to the artist’s name with options to Follow on Connect, Create Station, and Share Artist. Creating a radio station is somewhat similar to playing more of the artists music with the new play button, but it crucially diverges from that feature since radio stations also throw in songs from different artists, focusing on the genre/style of the chosen band and not the band itself.

Other images of the new profile pages have surfaced on Reddit, including for Green Day, and it appears that there is currently a slight gradient bug where the artist’s name sits.

Apple Music in iOS 11.4 (left) compared to iOS 12 (right, via brooksdbrewer on Reddit)
As Redditor tynamite explained, in the iOS 12 beta right now if you travel to an artist profile from your own library, a gray box will appear behind the artist’s name. But, “If you search or find an artist through other ways of exploring (eg. “similar artists” option), it doesn’t show the gray background at all.” As such, this is likely a simple UI bug that will be fixed in future beta updates.

There are plenty of other tidbits to discover about iOS 12, including a lyric search feature to discover songs in Apple Music.

Related Roundup: iOS 12
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iOS 12 Allows for Multiple Face ID Users on a Single iPhone X

The iOS 12 beta appears to support adding a second face to the Face ID feature, allowing a second person to unlock an iPhone X without entering the passcode. This was discovered and later confirmed by multiple users on Reddit.

Ever since the iPhone X was released last September, Apple’s Face ID authentication system has been restricted to recognizing a single person’s face to unlock the iPhone X. Though iOS is ostensibly designed as a single-user operating system, this restriction has frustrated some users who wish to allow their partner or other family member to unlock their phone for convenience and sharing purposes.

This is possible under the old Touch ID system, which has been around for nearly half-a-decade, because Touch ID allows up to five fingerprints to unlock the iPhone — so it’s easy to allow your partner’s thumbprint to your iPhone.

With iOS 12, an “Alternative Appearance” mode in Face ID allows iPhone X owners to add an entire second face to Face ID. This means two people can unlock an iPhone X, potentially making it easier for users to share their devices.

The feature doesn’t appear to be intended for this purpose. In iOS Settings > Face ID & Passcode, Alternative Appearance is described thusly:

In addition to continuously learning how you look, Face ID can recognize an alternate appearance.

It’s likely that Alternative Appearance is designed for people who have difficulty with Face ID because of more significant changes in appearance due to changing wardrobes like glasses or hats — but it has the happy coincidence of supporting a second person as well.

One thing to note is that if Face ID is reset for one “Appearance”, it will also reset the other, meaning both users will have to start from scratch with Face ID if the system is reset.

We have reached out to Apple for clarity on what this feature is intended for and whether the side-effect of support for multiple users is expected to continue through the final release of iOS 12 this fall.

Related Roundup: iOS 12
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Craig Federighi Talks Bringing iOS Apps to macOS, Reiterates No Plans for Touchscreen Macs

In a new interview with Wired today, Apple senior vice president of software engineering Craig Federighi discussed yesterday’s WWDC keynote, particularly touching upon the company’s years-long plan to bring some iOS apps to macOS. In a memorable keynote moment, when Federighi mentioned users constantly asking if Apple would merge iOS and macOS, a giant “No” appeared on screen behind him.

However, the company did detail a plan to take key framework elements from iOS and UIKit and adapt them for macOS, resulting in tools that will let third-party developers easily port iPhone and iPad apps to Mac in 2019. In the interview, Federighi again explained that right now the plan is not to build a single Apple Operating System, but to begin testing out the updated UIKit tools in its own apps for Home, News, Stocks, and Voice Memos, coming in macOS Mojave later this year.

Naturally, when news about iOS apps appearing on macOS emerges, people begin to wonder again about a touchscreen MacBook. Federighi quickly shot down that idea — which has surfaced again and again over the years — by saying he’s “not into touchscreens” on desktop computers, and likely never will be. He also mentioned that Apple doesn’t see touchscreen-enabled laptops as rivals.

“We really feel that the ergonomics of using a Mac are that your hands are rested on a surface, and that lifting your arm up to poke a screen is a pretty fatiguing thing to do,” he said.

Federighi added that he doesn’t think the touchscreen laptops out there today—which he referred to as “experiments”—have been compelling. “I don’t think we’ve looked at any of the other guys to date and said, how fast can we get there?”

Back on the topic of the iOS/macOS update, Federighi said that instead of these tools being emulators, Apple’s plan is building a software framework for iPhone that can be brought over to Mac and “made native” to Mac. Parts of this porting process will be automated, “like turning a long press on iOS into a two-finger click on a Mac,” but extra coding is predicted for UI items like menus and sidebars.

Even though the apps are effectively being shared between operating systems, Federighi emphasized that your Mac won’t start behaving like an iPhone. “It’s still macOS, you still have the Terminal, you can still attach four monitors to it, you can still hook up external drives,” he said.

In terms of potential games to make this leap, Federighi mentioned Epic’s Fortnite as a likely candidate for porting, and he also stated that websites like IMDB, Yelp, and DirecTV could gain native desktop Mac apps. While these websites could have macOS apps now, the current toolset for developers is “just more work,” Wired pointed out, and Apple’s new UIKit update in macOS Mojave should make the process a bit simpler.

It’s not currently clear when the new tools will be ready for third-party developers, but it appears it will take some time as Federighi suggested we will hear more about the project at WWDC 2019.

Tags: Craig Federighi, WWDC 2018
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Apple Maps Now Supports Transit in North Carolina

Apple Maps now supports transit in North Carolina, enabling users to navigate with public transportation in several metropolitan areas across the state.

The largest transit options supported include CATS buses and LYNX trains in the Charlotte area, GoTransit buses in the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill area, GTA buses in Greensboro, and inter-city PART buses in the Piedmont Triad area.

Apple Maps also appears to support transit directions in a few additional areas of California, including Bakersfield and Fresno, complementing the previously supported areas of Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego, and others.

The feature can be accessed by tapping the Transit tab or button in Apple Maps on iPhone, iPad, Mac, or Apple Watch.

Apple Maps has supported transit since 2015, with an initial rollout in Baltimore, Berlin, Boston, Chicago, London, Los Angeles, Mexico City, New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Sydney, Toronto, and China. Since then, Apple has expanded the feature to dozens of additional cities around the world.

Google Maps has also supported navigation via public transportation for several years now, including in the Charlotte, Raleigh, and Greensboro areas, but Apple Maps is slowly catching up with detailed routing info.

In related news, Apple at its WWDC keynote on Monday announced that CarPlay will support Google Maps, Waze, and other third-party navigation apps with a paired iPhone running iOS 12, released in beta yesterday.

(Thanks, Ram!)

Tags: Apple Maps, transit, North Carolina
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OPPO Realme 1 review: Pretty good, really cheap!

Lately, I’ve reviewed, compared, and previewed a whole host of great smartphones at mid-range price points. My conclusion: you can get a heck of a lot these days without needing to pay those flagship prices. But what about when your budget’s even tighter than that?

From OPPO and partner Amazon India, the Realme 1 will only be available online and aims to deliver a great experience at a very modest price point: starting at 8,990 rupees (~$110) up to 13,990 rupees (~$207). That’s significantly cheaper than the initial rumor of 17,990 rupees that we heard, and makes its otherwise modest spec sheet even more impressive.

Read: Oppo Find X teased: Is a real Oppo flagship coming soon?

I’ve got my hands on a more expensive, 6GB Realme 1 review unit, so let’s find out whether a phone this affordable could do everything I need it to over the course of a standard day. Here’s our Realme 1 review!

What may catch the eye of passersby is the interesting polygonal effect on the back of the device.

OPPO Realme 1 review: Design and display

Starting the day with the Realme 1 is nice enough. I tend to spend my first ten minutes of the day sitting up, reading blogs and checking emails, and the screen here is nice and bright with a decent resolution at 2,169 x 1,080, with a pixel density of 403ppi. It’s also plenty large at 6.0 inches, with an 18:9 aspect ratio. I really appreciate having that kind of real estate on a device this cheap. This is still an IPS LCD panel, rather than an OLED, and the screen feels a little cheap sometimes. I found my finger would drag when swiping, which wasn’t great.

For my next port of call, I’ll usually make breakfast and a packed lunch while watching YouTube. This is a single speaker affair, but it’s loud enough and certainly better than a lot of the competition.

Then I’m off and out, first to drop my wife at work — with Google Maps doing just fine as my GPS and letting me know which traffic jams to avoid — and then to set up shop in a cafe somewhere to get a spot of work done.

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What may catch the eye of passersby is the interesting polygonal effect on the back of the device. This subtle pattern is visible only when it catches the light the right way, but it gives the Realme 1 a bit of unique personality. It looks considerably more impressive in press photos than in reality, and to be honest you could achieve the same effect quite easily with a decal, but hey, it’s better than nothing. This is definitely preferable to the bland appearance of most budget phones.

During use, the Realme 1’s price is most apparent in the build quality. This device feels pretty cheap and hollow due to the mostly plastic body. It’s incredibly light in the way that might lead to someone mistaking it for a toy phone at first. It also has a very by the numbers design on the front. As you’d probably expect, there’s no IP rating either. The phone doesn’t feel the most durable — I’d consider getting a case.

The buttons are a very mushy and plastic-feeling.

The buttons are a very mushy and plastic-feeling. They’re also arranged strangely; the volume rocker is split into two separate buttons (which is annoying) on the left, which to me feels like definitely the wrong side. This obviously isn’t a deal breaker for a lot of people, but takes some of the sheen off of using a new phone.

I said in the hands-on that I would have liked if OPPO went for the notch device it originally showed in early images. That went down like a sack of shit with a lot of you guys, but I stand by it — not because I like the notch, but just because it would have been something interesting and a little more flagshippy for the front of this otherwise very dull device.

OPPO Realme 1 review: Performance

Before I get stuck into work, I often begin my day by calling my mum, my sister, or my pilot buddy Nathan who likewise is available during the working week. The Realme 1 serves its purpose as a phone, with decent call quality and no issues there.

For those very important people, there is also a dual SIM slot. I know a lot of buyers really appreciate that. It’s not a hybrid slot either — you’ll be able to add an SD card and an additional SIM.

From there, it’s on to work. These days, I actually use my smartphone quite a lot during a typical working day. I use it for workflow program and communication apps like Slack and Asana, checking emails, and responding to YouTube comments.

Obviously, with its Helio P60, this isn’t the most powerful device around. It’s actually more than enough for the vast majority of tasks, helped by the pretty hefty 3 to 6GB of RAM. 6GB is actually really generous at this price point. The Honor 10 — which I praised for having a lot of bang for your buck — only includes 4GB in the U.K. model and costs 399 pounds. Switching between apps is breezy, navigating the UI is nippy, and even multitasking works just fine — made easier thanks to the larger screen.

Read: These are the best dating apps in India

The phone also packs in the Mali G72 MP3 GPU, which is hardly a high-end gaming chip, but should be able to handle most games from the Play Store with little trouble. This is the reality of Android gaming: these days most chipsets can handle most games. The argument for spending more for more powerful hardware is becoming increasingly difficult to defend.

There are some scenarios where a little more power would’ve gone a long way, but they’re fairly specialized.

I decided to give Google Cardboard a go on my lunch break and found it painfully slow and sluggish, to the point of being nauseating. So there are some scenarios where a little more power would’ve gone a long way, but they’re fairly specialized.

The Helio P60 is a particularly notable inclusion because it comes with a built-in neural processing unit (NPU), which brings some AI-type features. Unlocking the Realme 1 is very fast, thanks to the very effective face detection. Apparently, the reaction time is 0.1 seconds, which I can believe based on my usage.

The only big bummer is the lack of a fingerprint sensor. That means I have to use a password on PayPal like a schmuck.

I don’t love this phone’s UI. It’s got Android 8.1 Oreo – good – and Color OS UI on top – bad. As usual though, any cosmetic imperfections can be eradicated with a fresh launcher.

Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t a buttery-smooth performer, but it didn’t stop me doing anything that I wanted to do. That’s pretty remarkable really for the price. Storage is 32, 64, or 128GB with expandable storage up to 256GB via an additional SD card slot.

OPPO Realme 1 review: Camera

Moving on with this day-in-the-life Realme 1 review, in the evening, I will typically hit the gym. This is when the camera becomes an important feature for me, as I will typically use the selfie-shooter to capture my workouts and share on Instagram. I have no shame. For me, a bad selfie-camera is a deal breaker.

The camera on the front has an 8MP sensor. That’s not a bad showing — nothing to write home about but not bad. It can record at 1080p 30fps (as can the rear). There’s no optical stabilization, but it produces just fine videos and images.

For capturing antics in the evening, the rear camera is also serviceable. It’s a single lens setup — which these days actually bucks the trend — but at 13MP it should be capable of capturing some decent detail. The aperture is quite narrow at f/2.2 and photos are distinctly average. There are some fun features here though, including the compulsory portrait mode (and some dubious beauty modes) and even a pro mode!

Low light performance is definitely sub-par, and there are occasions where photos look washed out or soft. If you live on social media, you may want something a little beefier in this regard. Outside of that, its certainly capable of handling most everyday requirements, and it’s definitely better than it has any right to be.

OPPO Realme 1 review: Final Thoughts

By the end of the day, the 3,410mAh battery still had some juice left in it. With more than five hours screen-on time and a very impressive idle life, it’s actually got some longevity under its belt, too. Apparently we can thank the AI features for this to some extent, as they help with smarter battery management.

It’s hard to imagine how OPPO and Amazon are making any money at all from this one.

Come evening, I was forced to dig for a MicroUSB cable when I needed to plug in — another reminder of the phone’s budget nature. It’s also no surprise there’s no wireless charging here, nor any official quick charging functionality — though I found it powered up at a fairly satisfactory speed nonetheless (around 2 hours to a full charge).

For 13,990 rupees, this phone lets me work, game, and take some decent photos. It has a unique appearance, and even a little AI magic thrown in for good measure. That’s a very compelling offer. It’s hard to imagine how OPPO and Amazon are making any money at all from this one.

The plastic build, lack of modern features, middling processor, and average camera mean this was never destined to be the must-have device of 2018. It’s pointless to compare this to current flagships, but it fairs well against other devices in its price category. It actually offers more bang for your buck than a lot of similarly positioned Xiaomi devices, and certainly beats the new line of lower end Nokias we recently covered. That said, those devices also have significantly nicer builds than this, and the Nokia phones have Android One, too. When going budget, it’s always up to you which compromises are important.

This feels quite cheap. If you’re willing to cover the cheap feel with a sturdy case, this is also a fantastic option on a budget.

Read next: Best Android phones for under 15,000 rupees

Still, I’ll be glad to go back to my Galaxy S8 Plus, though.

There you have it for our OPPO Realme 1 review! What do you think about this phone? Let us know in the comments.