Realme has made its presence felt in our country this year following the well-known model of most Chinese companies, smartphones with good technical characteristics and even better price.
The next work of the company will soon appear on the shelves of stores and, as you guessed from the title, we are referring to Realme 7 Pro. The new mid-range phone comes with some special features and substantial improvements on the Realme 6 Pro – of which it is the replacement – and managed to impress us a few times.
Screen – Design
Let’s go from the outside in. On the front, we will find a 6.4 ”screen with a punch hole selfie camera on the upper left, while on the back is the quad camera on the opposite side. The material of the back is plastic with a striped design and a thin vertical line that essentially divides the back in two – it all concerns the “anti-glare” design of the back, which eliminates reflections. The truth is that it goes a little beyond the usual, extremely glossy smartphones that circulate in its category and may stand out for this very reason in the eyes of some, with the bonus of the absence of fingers thanks to the material and design.
Returning to the screen, we start quite well. The panel is Super AMOLED technology with Full HD + resolution and enhanced with Gorilla Glass (Realme did not specify the version), which practically means excellent colors, deep black and good resolution along with protection against minor damage. In addition, the phone has an “always-on display” feature for constant display of notification icons. The whole above package is hard to find in this price range, so everything is welcome and indeed, they perform quite well. Below the bottom ports of the device is the fingerprint sensor, which is located below the screen. Since using it, always with the finger that touches the sensor clean, we have not encountered problems with delay or failure to read / unlock.
To complement the audiovisual experience, the Realme 7 Pro incorporates stereo speakers by combining the headset high on the screen with another speaker on the opposite end, and even uses Dolby Atmos to enhance the audio experience while also supporting Hi Res Audio for music lovers. Needless to say, all of the above together make video watching a very enjoyable experience, especially for the money you need to invest in the device.
However, not all news is positive. The Realme 6 Pro – even the Realme 7 – has a refresh rate of 90Hz and therefore the animations on the screen are displayed smoothly. For some reason, the Realme 7 Pro has a refresh rate of 60Hz and the extra step of supporting HDR10 was not done – something that is present in competing models. However, the use of a Super AMOLED panel may balance things out for some who prefer a better overall experience with the cost of smoother scrolling, etc. However, the software (Realme UI) does a pretty good job of “smoothness” and is by no means for a bad experience, it just is not something new or better than the competition.
At the bottom of the device, there is a USB-C port (from where the mobile phone is charged), a 3.5mm headphone port and the speaker mentioned above. On the right is the power button while regarding the SIM and microSD cards, there are two slots for Nano SIM and an independent slot for microSD card.
Performance
As in the Realme 6 Pro, a dragon is hidden in the device’s board and more specifically, the Snapdragon 720G itself. Although not upgraded, it is still a SoC with a fairly good balance between battery management, temperature and performance in each area. Even in demanding games, such as PUBG or Call of Duty Mobile with the graphics in … full extra, the mobile performed consistently well without raising the temperature significantly. In terms of memory, it has 128GB of storage and either 6GB or 8GB of RAM, as it is expected to be released in two versions with different prices each.
The company has equipped the device with the Realme UI, which is based on Android 10 and is quite “clean” with some changes but not many. It comes to us from the factory with pre-installed applications from both the manufacturer and Google.
The “juice” of the technical characteristics, however, is found elsewhere. The Realme 7 Pro has a 4500mAh two-cell battery that can withstand even a full day with light gaming and everyday use. But even if we overdo it and need charging at any time of the day, the impressively fast (very fast, we would say) charging steals the show.
The included 65W charger can go from 0% to 100% in less than three quarters, while starting charging at around ~ 30%, charging is completed in less than an hour with parallel heavy gaming – unheard of numbers for category data and more. SuperDart Charge technology, as Realme calls it, is making its debut with the Realme 7 Pro and we expect to see it in more models.
Camera
On the back of the phone there is a quad camera with a lens for almost any occasion. The implementation of a rectangle with rounded corners is quite elegant and the camera system does not stand out much.
Going into the interior of this system, we find the Sony IMX682 sensor, an upgrade from Realme 6 Pro. The 64 Megapixels camera with f / 1.8 aperture is defined as basic and is framed by an 8 Megapixels wide-angle lens with f / 2.3 aperture, a 2MP aperture with f / 2.4 aperture and a 2MP macro lens with f / 2.4 aperture. Respectively, at the front is the 32MP selfie camera with f / 2.5 aperture.
What some may have already noticed is that where the Realme 6 Pro had a wide-angle lens for selfies, the Realme 7 Pro does not use anything similar and also does not have a telephoto lens – the good photo quality due to Sony’s sensor practically allows us to shoot a photo and then zoom in and cut it as you wish. Maybe not the best solution, but in fact, the same work is done with about the same quality.
The main camera performs very well (always, for the data of the category) in well-lit areas or during the day, but the impressive results come at night. If the lighting is good, then you may not even need to turn on night mode – but if this is necessary, then the results are impressive. With indistinguishable noise and good preservation of detail, the evening photos left us very satisfied with the result.
The wide-angle lens does not maintain the same quality levels, especially in dark shots, as there is (not very easily) color distortion at the edges of elements. In general, however, it does its job with decent lighting conditions. The macro lens is at the same quality level as the wide one, except for the color distortion, so “doing its job” is the biggest compliment it can get from us. The filters available are also interesting, with those of Flamingo, Cyberpunk and Modern Gold standing out.
On the other hand (literally), the selfie camera captures beautiful photos by understanding where the face is if there is bright light / reflection in the background and maintaining the necessary details. Correspondingly, it does a good job of blurring the background when we want to focus on the person. In terms of quality, it leans more towards the main rear camera than towards its branches.
[thescore]
Conclusion
The Realme 7 Pro offers above-average performance in almost every area with three particularly bright spots: screen, charger / battery, main camera. Since it will be released with a suggested price of € 329, it is a very good choice for someone who wants something more than usual for a mid-range mobile phone and, honestly, charging times on their own can be a basic purchase criterion for someone who makes constant use of his mobile phone.
Disappointments are not lacking, such as overall camera performance and the omission of a high refresh rate, but looking at the bigger picture, the gains outweigh its shortcomings.