With the new K13 Turbo series of smartphones, OPPO is going after the gaming audience and considering that these phones are India’s first to come with a fan built in, the brand looks quite serious about its intentions. Apart from the active cooling, the OPPO K13 Turbo Pro and the K13 Turbo also come with tons of features aimed at enhancing not only gaming, but also the overall usage experience. I had a quick chat with Savio D’Souza, Head of Product Communications at OPPO India, where I asked him why the brand is heading in this direction.
D2: As usual, let’s start with the main USPs of the device in the spotlight, the K13 Turbo series.
- SD: KSP, of course, is cooling technology, where we’ve successfully experimented with active cooling. In most devices today, you only get passive cooling — vapour chambers, graphite layers, and so on — and we’ve been implementing these in different forms for years on our Reno devices, using new materials like graphite.
For this one, we said: let’s also add active cooling. Instead of relying on just one method, we added active cooling that works like an exhaust fan, using an L‑shaped design to suction in air and push it out.
When we talk about KSPs, performance is right at the top. Everything on this device is built to drive performance. One major aspect is cooling — but cooling without sacrificing battery life. We engineered the fan to be so compact that we could include an extra 600mAh of battery capacity. Essentially, the fan is powered by that extra battery, so you’re still getting a massive 7,000mAh battery overall — again, all for the sake of performance.
The other key feature considers user habits. Many people, especially gamers, use their devices while charging — which generates extra heat and degrades battery health. To solve this, we’ve added bypass charging: when the phone detects use during charging, power is sent directly to the device instead of charging the battery. This protects battery longevity and significantly reduces heat.
Less heat means better sustained performance, solving issues like screen heating and processor throttling. Gaming has been our main performance benchmark because, when it comes to computing, gaming is always the North Star — much like Formula 1 is for automobiles.
That’s why we believe: if you can handle gaming performance, everything else becomes easy.
D2: OPPO as a brand isn’t particularly known for gaming. Over the years, OPPO has built a reputation around certain aspects of the smartphone experience and established its positioning in that space. Gaming, meanwhile, is an area many other brands have been focusing on for quite some time.
Of course, the first step is having the right product — and I believe the K13 Turbo Series fits the bill, ticking all the boxes and then some. But that’s just the beginning.
So, when it comes to the longer term, what is OPPO’s strategy and plan for the gaming audience, and how will it develop devices that genuinely cater to those users?
SD: OPPO has always been about innovation — and not just the kind of “sexy” tech people usually talk about. For example, take batteries: when everyone else was happy with 4W or 5W charging, we pushed to 16W, and when that wasn’t enough, to 32W, and beyond.
In cameras, we innovated with algorithms and new imaging capabilities. In build quality — with our F series and Reno series — we focused on making devices more durable. We were among the first brands in India to introduce IP66, IP68, and IP69 ratings.
We also brought in features from our Find series — like the periscope camera lens — even when people were still figuring out its potential.
For us, this is just another step in the same direction. We try to figure out how to drive performance better. Driving performance in batteries: from 16W to 32W, then to 60W, 64W, and beyond. Driving performance in cameras, through better algorithms and hardware. Driving performance in durability: aluminium frames, armour bodies, SGS and military-grade certifications, and innovations like the Sponge Bionic System.
Now, the question is: how do you make a processor run faster for longer? That’s exactly what we’re working on.
For OPPO, it’s always been about finding better solutions to problems that have existed all along, and doing them better every time.
