Realme 12 Pro: The best-designed smartphone under ₹25,000

Realme, a China-based consumer electronics manufacturer, has introduced its middle-range number series smartphone recently named Realme 12 Pro. This series contains the Realme 12 Pro 5G plus the Realme 12 Pro+ 5G smartphones that are the inheritors of Realme 11 Pro 5G and Realme 11 Pro+ 5G, individually.

The newly launched 12 series, living up to its expectations, is equipped with masterpiece design and extraordinary cameras for a price under ₹25,000. The mobile manufacturer has transformed the design besides improving the camera and the performance to strive in the mid-range cost market.

Being a leader in the budget smartphones category, Realme is guaranteed to continue its drive in 2024 as well. Many smartphones in this price range feature secondary or tertiary cameras, narrowed down to 2-megapixel macro lenses or depth. However, the latest 12 series offer telephoto lenses, a rare case in the below ₹25,000 segment.

Although its low-light camera could have been a little better, one can simply be amazed by its design, which is almost perfect. This feature is likely to be further enhanced with a frame made of metal in the future. While this phone is certain to appeal to the consumers, it is not a complete phone as it is not eye-catching for the power users.

So, let’s see what the Realme 12 Pro brings for the buyers and check whether the latest innovation is a worthy investment or not.

Realme 12 Pro Review

Design

Riding on the success of Realme 11 Pro, Realme 12 Pro was built with a similar design. The 12 series, available in two colors – Submarine Blue and Navigator Beige, consists of a softer vegan leather back supported by an overhauled camera module design. Let us discuss the Submarine Blue for now.

Laden with the premium golden accents at the back panel and near the camera section, the submarine blue color is pleasing to the eyes. These two phones, the Realme 12 Pro and 12 Pro+ are attractively-designed phones with similar design looks under the ₹25,000 division in 2024 so far.

The rear camera component looks fascinating, with Realme collaborating with France-based watchmaker Ollivier Savéo to assist in the design aspect. The camera is supposed to look similar to watch dials, and the smartphone company has pulled off the visual effect pretty well.

The phone, rated IP65 (to be protected against dust and water), has a lightweight design at only 196g, giving a wonderful feeling when in hand. Also, the vegan leather material on the backside confirms an untouched look, without any smudges or finger marks. The ergonomic curves improve the ease of grip for the users. Optical in-display fingerprint sensors are one of the fastest phones in the mid-range category.

Display

Realme has built the latest 12 Pro with a similar display, just like its predecessor. It comes with a 6.7 inch AMOLED display (120 Hz) refresh speed and full HD+ resolution, with the display supporting 1 billion plus colors, HDR10+, and nearly up to 950 units of topmost brightness. The full HD+ display is excellent looks-wise and is very crisp, and the color is bright. The HDR content is visibly great on YouTube, however not yet available on Netflix. So, in general, this one has a compact AMOLED panel supplemented by a dual stereo speaker setting which is more than required for an immersive content consumption feel.

Are the cameras up to the mark?

The 12 Pro is built with two pillars, a camera, and the design elements. The design seems to be unmatchable within this budget while the cameras are one of the best under the ₹25,000 segment.

Realme has designed a new camera array that comprises a 50-megapixel OIS-powered Sony IMX882 primary camera, a fresh 32=megapixel Sony IMX709 telephoto camera, enabled 2x with optical zoom along with an 8-megapixel ultra-wide shooter. This is a big enhancement over last year’s dual camera setting although the cameras do have some glitches.

Hence, the primary and telephoto cameras perform very well in daylight which provides good colored pictures and the portraits are outstanding with the 2x lens.

So, does the Realme 12 Pro perform well enough?

The Realme 12 Pro is designed with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 processor, built on the 4nm process. The latest innovation has improved marginally in terms of performance, compared to the Dimensity 750 processor, used in the Realme 11 Pro. The 12 Pro has 8 GB LPDDR4X RAM along with 128 or 256 GB of UFS 3.1 storage.

Battery

The capacity of the battery and the charging speed continue to be the same in the Realme 12 Pro with a 5000 mAh battery and 67 W fast charging support. It is fair enough for a single-day usage with around 10-15 percent battery with reasonable use.

Should you purchase it?

With the Realme 12 Pro living up to its expectations with the best design and excellent cameras under the ₹25,000 segment, it is worth buying it for those who wish to go for a visually attractive device with a striking display coupled with promising camera abilities, the Realme 12 Pro is an outstanding choice.