Chinese handset maker Realme has not been lively in the British isles for lengthy, but it has produced a authentic splash. The initially Realme handset I reviewed, the X50 Pro 5G was a authentic head-turner — a nicely specified mobile phone at a very good price. Now we have the company’s acquire on severe zooming in the condition of the six.six-inch Realme X3 SuperZoom. Inspite of the obvious emphasis on digicam capability, there is certainly a ton much more on supply listed here, including a superior-conclusion processor, loads of memory and storage, and extraordinary battery lifetime, all for £469 (inc. VAT).
The X3 SuperZoom has a neat and tidy industrial structure. At its website, Realme emphasises the glass that is made use of both of those entrance and again. But search very carefully and you may see that the sides of this mobile phone are produced from plastic. It does a very good task of wanting like metal, and is not in any way a offer-breaker, but it is noteworthy mainly because plastic use is one of the methods Realme has saved on creation costs.
The six.six-inch X3 SuperZoom has a 120Hz IPS screen and operates on a Snapdragon 855+ chipset with 12GB of RAM and 256GB of (non-expandable) interior storage. It really is driven by a four,200mAh battery.
Photographs: Sandra Vogel / ZDNet
My critique handset was the Arctic White variant — a sort of creamy white that is variously rippled with shades of blue, green, orange, mauve and pink as it demonstrates mild. It really is eye-catching and different, but if you want, there is certainly also a Glacier Blue alternative.
The tender-touch finish is commendably resistant to fingerprints, and also implies that the mobile phone feels comfortable in the hand — though it was nevertheless rather slippery on tender furnishings.
The quad digicam array sits in a vertical lozenge that protrudes significantly from the again of the handset. This had the unlucky result of producing the mobile phone to go all-around — rather noisily — on a desktop when I prodded at the screen.
The fingerprint sensor is crafted into the energy button on the right facet of the mobile phone. I am not the finest enthusiast of this locale, though I’ve developed made use of to it by a variety of reviews. Positioning apart, the X3 SuperZoom’s fingerprint reader is effective nicely.
The remaining edge of the handset residences a pair of quantity buttons, and on the base is the speaker grille, SIM caddy (which accommodates two SIMs), and USB-C cost slot. There is no three.5mm headset jack, and no official IP score for dust and water resistance.
The X3 SuperZoom has 32MP (extensive) and 8MP (ultra-extensive) entrance cameras, and four rear cameras: 64MP extensive, 8MP ultra-extensive, 8MP periscope telephoto and 2MP macro. The fingerprint reader is incorporated into the energy button on the right facet.
Photographs: Sandra Vogel / ZDNet
The show is flat, produced from Gorilla Glass 5 and has a pre-equipped screen protector. There is a sizeable bezel at the base edge, and the other 3 bezels are barely negligible. However, the six.six-inch screen suits into a neat chassis that is seventy five.8mm extensive by 163.8mm deep by 8.9mm thick and weighs 202g. Realme promises a screen-to-entire body ratio of ninety.5%, though we work out it at eighty four.8%.
The leading remaining of the screen has a lozenge-formed punch-hole for the dual entrance cameras. This is fairly distracting at initially, but I soon got made use of to visually blanking them, and the screen by itself has some good additionally points.
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The six.six-inch screen is IPS Liquid crystal display rather than AMOLED, but the colors are nevertheless very robust. The resolution of 2,four hundred by one,080 pixels (399ppi) is completely very good adequate for online video viewing, electronic mail, world wide web browsing and e book studying. The screen has a flagship-course 120Hz refresh level, which you can manually scale again to 60Hz alternatively, you can enable the handset to pick out the refresh level immediately.
It really is a disgrace the mono speaker is a bit of a enable-down, given the top quality of the screen. There is loads of quantity — much more, in actuality, than lots of handsets control — but it is brief on bass tones and is fairly distorted at the maximum amount. It really is very good adequate for radio listening, but when keeping the mobile phone in landscape method to check out online video I had to acquire treatment not to address the speaker with my palm.
Photographs taken with 1x, 20x and 60x zoom.
Photographs: Sandra Vogel / ZDNet
The X3 SuperZoom has six cameras, two at the entrance and a quad-digicam array at the again. The entrance cameras are 32MP f/2.5 extensive-angle (80.4°) and 8MP f/2.2 ultra-extensive angle (105°). It may possibly audio like overkill to have dual entrance cameras, but the ultra-extensive angle alternative is actually very helpful for team photographs, or when you want to body one or much more people towards a backdrop.
The 2MP macro digicam has a 4cm target distance.
Impression: Sandra Vogel / ZDNet
The quad-digicam array at the again is as follows: 64MP f/one.8 extensive angle (seventy eight.6°) 8MP f/2.three ultra-extensive angle ( 119°) 2MP f/2.four macro (4cm target distance) and 8MP f/three.four periscope telephoto (5x optical zoom).
This is an excellent specification, but there are restrictions. The macro lens can take a moderately very good-top quality shot, but the ideal focal distance of 4cm is limiting. There is no zoom on the macro, so you are remaining with going the handset in direction of and away from the subject. Every single little bug I tried out to photograph in my locked-down garden flew away as I approached it. The good thing is my cat was much more docile. In the authentic planet, I’d get very annoyed, very speedily.
On the zooming entrance, 5x and 10x photographs were of acceptable top quality, but at the time you get earlier the incremental screen taps that acquire you to 10x it is a concern of pinching at the screen to zoom further more, and frankly the gains are not well worth the inconvenience. What did impress me was the color fidelity: those people bouquets are a brilliant, shocking pink, and the X3 SuperZoom gets as shut as any mobile phone digicam I’ve tried out.
I’ve presently observed that the SIM caddy supports two SIMs. There is no facility to improve the interior storage by means of MicroSD, but that is not seriously essential. There is 256GB set up, of which 18GB is made use of out of the box, leaving 238GB cost-free. That storage is UFS three., and it is rapid. This, along with 12GB of RAM and a Snapdragon 855+ chipset, implies the Realme X3 SuperZoom seriously zips along.
The Geekbench 5 CPU test documented very respectable average scores of 786 (solitary core) and 2440 (multi core). Set it towards the OnePlus 8 Pro with its leading-conclusion Snapdragon 865 chipset, which obtained 907 and 3375 respectively, and you can see the distinction. Having said that, the OnePlus handset costs £899 for the identical RAM/storage mixture, and I did not come across that the £469 X3 SuperZoom ‘s general performance held me again in any way.
Battery lifetime is extraordinary too, with the four,200mAh battery lasting for seventeen.5 several hours below the Pc Mark Work 2. benchmark. Extra anecdotally, my mainstream utilization sample usually saw me finish the working day with amongst 70% and fifty five% of a comprehensive cost remaining. Receiving to a comprehensive cost is just not too a lot of a inconvenience, either, as the 30W ‘Dart’ charger really should acquire you from zero to comprehensive in fifty five minutes.
Android 10 arrives with a handful of added capabilities courtesy of the Realme UI overlay. The Sensible Sidebar, which is a staple of Realme handsets, delivers a customisable shortcuts bar you can pop out by sliding inwards from the screen’s right edge this attribute is also on Oppo handsets, in which it is termed Quick Resources. Realme applications include a music participant, photograph viewer, climate app, compass, file supervisor, and a variety of other extras. Third-occasion offerings, which include Facebook and Opera, can be removed if you don’t want them.
The X3 SuperZoom in Glacier Blue.
Impression: Realme
Conclusions
Realme has sent an extraordinary set of specs in a sub-£500 handset, with compromises produced in all the right sites. A superior-top quality screen with a rapid refresh level, loads of RAM and interior storage, very good battery lifetime, and a structure that seems exclusive are all additionally points.
In actuality, it is a disgrace that Realme places so a lot retail outlet on the camera’s 60x zoom capability, mainly because this simply just isn’t going to are living up to the assure. SuperZooming apart, although, this is nevertheless a very capable smartphone for the money.
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