Oprah buys college student new phone after joking about his broken one

Former talk show host also sent screen protector and phone case

Oprah Winfrey has proven her generosity once again, by gifting a college student a new phone after she’d joked about his broken one.

Last week, the philanthropist and former TV host visited Morehouse College, in celebration of the 30-year anniversary of the Oprah Winfrey Scholars Program scholarship, where she announced she would be donating an additional $13m to the programme.

However, the media mogul saw another opportunity to help while leaving the school, when she was chased by two freshman students, Zachariah Smith and Olufemi Yessoufou, who wanted to thank Winfrey.

During the interaction, the two students had the chance to capture a video selfie with Winfrey – who called out Yessoufou for having a cracked phone screen.

“Hey Oprah,” Yessoufou can be heard saying in a video he later uploaded to Twitter, as he and Smith pose alongside Winfrey's car. “Hey,” she responded, before adding: “That’s me. That’s me in your cracked phone.”

The video, which has been viewed more than 2.5m times, prompted hundreds of people to express their amusement at the 65-year-old’s reaction to Yessoufou’s broken iPhone.

However, the encounter didn’t end there – as Yessoufou woke up the next day to a direct message informing him that Winfrey would be sending him a brand new phone.

The message read: “Oprah already has this phone for you, and it's my job to make sure you get it," Yessoufou told BuzzFeed.

And on 18 October, Yessoufou received the brand new iPhone 11 and a phone case, as well as a note from Winfrey, which read: “Dear Olufemi, We can’t have you out here viewing the world thru a cracked screen or a cracked cover.

“The new camera you’re gonna love for sure!”

Yessoufou’s follow-up tweet showing Winfrey's thoughtful gift has since been liked more than 49,000 times.

“That woman’s heart knows no bounds,” one person wrote in response.