Realme yesterday launched its budget centric Realme 5 smartphone along with Realme 5 Pro. Realme 5 comes in three variants – 3GB RAM + 32GB internal storage, 4GB RAM + 64GB internal storage and 4GB RAM + 128 internal storage priced at Rs 9,999, Rs 10,999 and Rs 11,999 respectively. The smartphone will go on sale on August 27 on Flipkart and Realme.com.
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With its latest launch, Realme is eyeing the budget segment by offering quad camera setup along with some standard hardware. I spent a brief amount of time with the Realme 5, so here are my first impressions.
Display and Design
If we talk about the design part first, Realme 5 comes in Crystal Purple and Crystal Blue colour options. We have received the former variant for review. The phone features a Dewdrop notch display which the company is calling a Minidrop design, quad-camera setup, the Realme logo on the bottom left, and the fingerprint scanner on the top half.
Realme 5 has a plastic glossy body which attracts a lot of smudges and fingerprints. Just like Realme 5 Pro, this phone also comes with Diamond-cut finish. If you see the back at certain angles under light, the diamond pattern will show off two shades of Purple. It features a quad camera setup at the back panel along with a fingerprint sensor in the center. The right side features a power/off button, while the left features, volume controls and dual SIM + microSD card slot. At the bottom, we have a micro USB port, speaker grill, and 3.5 mm Headphone jack.
Realme 5: Things you should know!
Realme 5 features 6.5-inch HD+ display with a screen resolution of 720 x 1600 pixels with 89 percent screen ratio and Corning Gorilla Glass 3+ protection. The phone is a bit big in size and one would face difficulty to use the phone single-handedly. But one can enjoy watching videos or playing games on. The phone feels pretty solid but a bit heavy at 198 grams thanks to the big battery inside.
The screen looks sharp and well-lit during our brief testing period and we hope it would do a good job during our testing period. The display has good brightness and the colours are punchy. However, the display is not easy to view even under direct sunlight and readability in bright sunlight is an issue with this phone.
Hardware and Software
The phone is powered by a 2.0GHz Octa Core Qualcomm Snapdragon 665 Processor coupled with up to 4GB RAM and 128GB storage. The memory can be further expanded up to 256GB via microSD card slot.
As far as performance is concerned, we didn’t find any flaws in the day to day experience. The phone handles multitasking without any problem and it manages to run smoothly. In my brief interaction with the device, I wasn’t able to check out its performance while playing games. I will have more to say about its day-to-day performance and gaming experience in my full review.
For unlocking the device, there is a fingerprint sensor as well as face unlock technology apart from regular PIN and pattern options. In our initial testing, we found both of them quite fast in unlocking the device.
On the software front, the Realme 5 runs Color OS 6.0 based on Android 9 Pie. Apps were opened quickly. Swiping through the UI was smooth as well with no lags or stutters. There are various preloaded third-party apps like Opera News, UC Browser, Amazon Shopping, Paytm, all of which can be uninstalled. A full review will hopefully provide a clearer picture for the user interface.
Camera
Of course, the main attraction of the rear panel is the vertical quad camera setup. The phone has a 12-megapixel primary sensor with PDAF, f/1.8 aperture, a 119-degree 8-megapixel Wide-Angle lens with f/2.25 aperture, a 2-megapixel Macro lens with f/2.4 Aperture and a 2-megapixel depth sensor with f/2.4 aperture. For the front, the phone has a 13-megapixel sensor with AI beautification mode.
The camera specifications look good enough on paper at this price point. And in our initial testing, we found the phone clicks decent photos in good lighting conditions. However, we found the low light images to be quite grainy. The pictures I took from the front 13-megapixel camera also appeared to be decent as well. On the whole, both the front and rear camera of the phone allows you to take good images. Nevertheless, wait for our detailed camera test for the device to make the final call for the camera performance.
Battery and Connectivity
On the battery front, the smartphone is backed by a huge 5,000mAh battery which we expect to last for atleast 2 days of regular usage. The company claims to offer 49 hours worth of call time, 12 hours of YouTube and 156 hours of music via earphones. The battery is not paired withVOOC 3.0 Fast charging which was in Realme 5 Pro.
On the connectivity front, the phone features a 4G VoLTE, Bluetooth 5.0, GPS, GLONASS, micro USB and dual-SIM support. The phone measures 157 x 74.2 x 8.9mm and weighs 184 grams. As for the sensors are concerned, it comes with proximity, gravity, gyro, Accelerometer and light sensors.