Today, Oppo unveiled the Find N5, the thinnest folding book-shaped phone ever, but it doesn’t just have a slim design: it can connect to a Mac computer for file transfer and even remote control. It’s not the first Android phone with this feature, but it’s the only one available outside of China.
To pair the Find N5 with a Mac, you first need to install the Oppo O Plus Connect app on your Mac, which you can download from the Oppo website – I tested the beta version. Connecting the Mac to the phone is quick if they’re on the same Wi-Fi network, and all the phone controls are built into the Connect & Share section of the Settings app.
As long as both phones remain on the same network, you can view your phone’s files directly from your Mac and transfer them wirelessly, which is an achievement in itself considering that even wired file sharing between Android phones and Macs is clunky and dependent on third-party software.
What’s even more impressive is the remote control option, which maps your Mac’s display to your phone. You can use it in full screen mode, or better yet, fold your phone in half to create a miniature laptop. This works as long as both devices are online, but unlike file sharing, they don’t have to be on the same network.
Oppo has created several ways to use macOS from the small touchscreen. You can turn the bottom half of the display into a keyboard, like on a laptop, or use it as a trackpad instead – with support for multi-touch gestures. Other options include a clunky on-screen mouse and some buttons that replicate common keyboard shortcuts.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s still pretty awkward to use all of this. The screen is too small to use fully, and macOS wasn’t designed with touch gestures in mind, so touch isn’t always a good substitute for a mouse. I tried this a few times during the week with my phone, and while it was usually smooth, once it was so laggy that it was completely unusable. I wouldn’t even want to rely on it for work, but in a pinch I can see its appeal.
File sharing is the more straightforwardly useful part of it. This is an extension of the existing Oppo O Plus Connect app for iPhone and iPad, which since last year has allowed file sharing between Oppo, OnePlus and Realme phones and these Apple devices. A similar application supports file sharing with Windows computers, but this is the first time that a remote control option for Mac computers has been introduced.
For the first time for Oppo, that is. Another Chinese phone maker, Vivo, introduced a similar option in April 2024, which I have not yet had the opportunity to try out. That’s because it’s only available on Vivo phones that run OriginOS, the exclusive Chinese version of Android. With the launch of the Find N5 worldwide – with the exception of the US, where sister brand OnePlus has announced it will not launch the phone – this is the first time that Mac computers and Android phones have come so close in the rest of the world.
Oppo says it plans to roll out the feature to more phones, but we’ll have to wait to find out which ones and when – and whether that includes OnePlus phones available in the US.
