Oppo may be preparing to offer one of the first smartphones with 10GB of RAM.
A listing on China’s TENAA website suggests that a 10GB version of the Oppo Find X could be in the works.
The Find X is a premium smartphone with high-end specs, a nearly all-screen design, and a slide-out camera system that hides the front and rear cameras when they’re not in use. Oppo launched the phone this summer, but the company currently only offers models with 8GB of RAM.
The TENAA page shows 8GB and 10GB options. The rest of the specs are pretty much the same, including storage options (128GB or 256GB), and cameras (two rear and one front).
Most high-end Android phones on the market in 2018 feature at least 4GB of RAM. Some have 6GB, and others have 8GB. But so far we haven’t seen a smartphone with 10GB of RAM… but earlier this year there was a rumor going around that Vivo would launch one.
Fun fact: Vivo and Oppo are both owned by the same parent company: BBK.
Do you need 10GB of RAM in a smartphone? Probably not. I’m still pretty happy with my Google Pixel 2 which has just 4GB. But phone makers are constantly looking for bragging rights and it’s getting harder and harder to make a phone stand out by offering a fast processor, big screen, slim bezels, or large amount of storage. So RAM has become one of the latest battlefields.
There may come a time when developers come up with apps that can actually make use of that much memory. For now, it probably just means you’ll be able to keep a few more apps running in the background without having to reload them after you spend time doing other things with your phone.
via GizmoChina, The Leaker, and @UniverseIce
10GB of RAM makes a lot of sense – as long as you have a desktop mode, like DeX, where a lot of apps need to run in the foreground simultaneously. In DeX I get a lot of “low on memory” message, since Iuse the phone as a power-user would a notebook. In phone mode thou I have never seen such a message.
Your use case is the only reason I can think of where anyone would need that much RAM in a phone (as of 2018). If phone manufacturers want to stand out, how about timely security updates? Not many are doing that. Or maybe including a headphone jack (other than Samsung) or a battery large enough to actually last more than 3/4 of a day? Lots of ways to stand out.
To be fair, manufacturers are starting to pick up the pace for security updates. I have a huawei mate 9 and I still getting security updates my set is at August 2018 patch level. My tablet and my kids’ tablets are also getting the updates so far.