The pandemic might have delayed its release, but the Realme 6 Pro is finally here in the Philippines.

Realme stepped up their game and rearranged its midrange line. To explain briefly, the Realme 6i is now the successor to the Realme 5, the Realme 6 to the Realme 5 Pro, and the one we have here, the Realme 6 Pro, has been promoted to replace the sub-Php16k smartphone of last-gen’s Realme XT.

But enough introduction, here in our Realme 6 Pro review, we’ll see what this device has in store for us and how much big of an improvement it is to the 5 Pro for Realme to promote its status.

Realme 6 Pro Specs

  • Android 10, Realme UI
  • Dual SIM, Dual Standby
  • 6.6-inch FHD+ IPS display, 2400 x 1080 pixel resolution, ~398ppi
  • 90Hz refresh rate, Corning Gorilla Glass 5
  • 2.3GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 720G octa-core processor
  • 6GB/8GB RAM
  • Adreno 618 GPU
  • 64GB/128GB UFS 2.1 internal storage, expandable via microSD
  • 16-megapixel (~f/2.0 + 8-megapixel (ultra-wide, f/2.2) dual front cameras
  • 64-megapixel (f/1.8) + 8-megapixel (ultra-wide, f/2.3) + 12-megapixel (2x tele, 20x zoom) + 2-megapixel (macro) quad rear cameras, LED flash
  • Ultra-wide video, 120fps slow-mo Nightscape 3.0, Real-time bokeh
  • Headphone jack
  • Dolby Atmos, Hi-Res Audio
  • 4G LTE
  • WiFi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac, dual-band
  • Bluetooth 5.1
  • Dual-frequency GPS, NAVIC
  • USB Type-C
  • Dimensions: 163.8 x 75.8 x 8.9mm
  • Weight: 202g
  • Colors: Lightning Blue, Lightning Orange, Lightning Red
  • 4,300mAh battery, 30W fast charging

Design and Build Quality

With their underdog status, Realme is really making a statement by coming up with new designs in their releases — despite being only months apart. As you can see, the Realme 6 Pro has a more imaginative design than its predecessors. The rear Corning Gorilla Glass 5 panel has a lightning-like reflection that’s animated as it reflects light.

The review unit we have is the later-released Lightning Red color variant. A Lightning Blue option is also available locally, but no word about the Lightning Orange’s arrival because it’s said to be India exclusive.

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This flashy colorway on the back is wrapped in glass. The back panel is slightly curved that makes it really comfortable in the hands. Although, it’s a bit bulky when compared to other devices.

Its height and weight is forgivable since we’re getting a large 6.6-inch screen and 4,300mAh battery out of it. A Corning Gorilla Glass 5 with a pre-applied screen protector shields the screen, while a three-layer waterproofing build allows it to withstand water splashes and accidental drops on water. But no official IP rating. You can strap the free clear case for extra protection.

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The 90.6% screen-to-body ratio allowed the Realme 6 Pro’s screen to fully maximize the device’s large size. That’s thanks to its ultra-thin bezels, and the exemption of notches with the use of a punch-hole on the top left for the dual selfie cameras.

Since the screen is really large, the wide notch is almost unnoticeable and not distracting. Other than the cameras and the thin earpiece on the top, the screen fills up the front of the device.

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The back panel might have a new design, but the quad cameras are still on the same location on the top left. They are in a vertical orientation inside a tolerable camera bump. Next to it is the LED flash with the AI Quad Camera tag. The Realme is also on the bottom left.

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The top is clean and only houses the noise-canceling microphone. On the bottom, we have the loudspeakers, USB Type-C port, primary microphone, and, thankfully, a headphone jack.

On the left side we have the SIM tray that can house two nano SIM cards and a microSD card. Below that is the volume controls, adjacent to the lock/power button on the right side that doubles as the fingerprint scanner.

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The volume controls are a bit flimsy but do provide a clicky sound when pressed. On the other hand, the lock/power button is flat, whic is not the most ergonomic thing to press. Although, we prefer having a more reliable physical fingerprint scanner instead of an in-display one.

Overall, we’re really liking the design of the Realme 6 Pro. It may be a bit bulky, but it does have an attractive look that doesn’t compromise the features.

Display and Sound Quality

One of the main highlights of the Realme 6 Pro is the display. Despite its large 20:9 6.6-inch size, it’s one of the cheapest smartphones to come with a fast 90Hz refresh rate. For a perspective, regular phones only has 60Hz. We expect more smartphones to come with fast refresh rates in the future.

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90Hz is fast and smooth enough, but the difference from the standard 60Hz is not that noticeable when compared to the 120Hz panel that devices like the Galaxy S20 Ultra have. Nevertheless, the entire interface, as well as compatible games and videos look really smooth on this one.

Moving on, the color quality and contrast is fine for an IPS panel. The display panel could be brighter, but still bright enough to be useable outdoors. Sharpness is also decent with its FHD+ 2400 x 1080 pixel resolution at ~399ppi.

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The lack of stereo speakers on the Realme 6 Pro is forgivable considering how good the single bottom-firing loudspeaker is. It has loud volume, with audible bass that provides a full and rich sound. It’s great for listening to music, watching videos on YouTube, and even films on Netflix.

For private listening, you can plug in a pair of earphones. The Realme 6 Pro also has Dolby Atmos support for those who need it.

Hardware and Performance

The Realme 6 Pro is powered by the controversial Qualcomm Snapdragon 720G processor. It’s ironically inferior in terms of gaming and CPU performance than the MediaTek Helio G90T processor of the more affordable Realme 6.

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However, the Snapdragon 720G actually has better efficiency thanks to its smaller 8nm built (vs 12nm), connectivity features like Bluetooth 5.1 (vs 5.0), and other relevant features.

Realme 6 Pro Benchmark scores

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Benchmark scores of the Realme 6 Pro shows that the Snapdragon 720G and its Adreno 618 GPU are indeed slower than the Helio G90T. Still, in our real-world tests, it provided a reliable performance.

The review unit that we have here is the 8GB/128GB RAM and storage configuration. No word yet if the 6GB/64GB variant will make it here.

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Doing menial tasks like browsing the interface, taking pictures, browsing social media, and more feels really seamless on this thing. Speed was even improved by the fast 90Hz refresh rate.

Gaming was also great. Mobile Legends was playable at the highest graphics settings with the High Frame Rate (HFR) mode enabled. Call of Duty Mobile and NBA 2K20 also ran with no fuss at high graphics settings.

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Asphalt 9 and all of its intense action also ran smoothly at default graphics but the smoothness was gone in High Quality mode.

Overheating shouldn’t be a big issue, either. But I did notice it starting to warm up after about 10 minutes of playing.

Software and User Interface

Just like most of Realme’s newer releases, the Realme 6 Pro runs on the latest Android 10 operating system with Realme UI on top. It’s a departure from the ColorOS UI that Realme smartphones used to share with OPPO.

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It goes without saying that the Realme UI is cleaner and more straightforward. The Google Search tab is below the home screen for easy access. On top of it your easy-access apps.

You can swipe middle-down to summon the local search tab. While swiping from top-down reveals the control center and the notifications tab. You can swipe further down to access more controls.

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The app drawer is easily accessible by swiping bottom-up. The task switcher is also pretty intuitive and lets you close all running apps via a single button.

Navigation buttons are set on default. For a more modern experience, you can enable the iPhone-like gesture buttons on the settings menu.

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For those who are into customization, you can long-press on the home screen to select different icon styles, themes, remove the app drawer, and more.

Standard Android 10 features are also present on the Realme 6 Pro. There’s the Digital Wellbeing that provides a look on your smartphone usage. Parental controls is also present.

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The camera app is the same as before. It also uses the standard Google Keyboard that’s easy to type on and get used to.

Bottom line is, the Realme UI on the Realme 6 Pro is really clean, straightforward, intuitive and compliments the device’s hardware.

Camera Quality

The Realme 6 Pro has a total of six cameras. We have two shooters on the front: A 16-megapixel sensor for selfies and an 8-megapixel one for group shots. While on the back we have four shooters that consist of a 64-megapixel main shooter and a 8-megapixel ultra-wide. We also have a 12-megapixel telephoto lens that’s starting to reach more and more midrange phones. And lastly, the obligatory 2-megapixel macro camera.

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It also features 120fps slow-mo selfie video, and up to 240fps slow-mo on the rear cameras. 4K video recording is present, as well as UIS Max Video Stabilization that dramatically reduces shakiness despite the lack of optical image stabilization.

As usual, the 64-megapixel outputs 16-megapixel images with pixel-binning. The image quality is good. The colors, with or without the Chroma Boost enabled, look vibrant and realistic.

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Outdoors | 64-megapixel main camera | 16-megapixel output (Pixel Binning)
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Outdoors | 64-megapixel main camera | 16-megapixel output (Pixel Binning)
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Indoor | 64-megapixel main camera | 16-megapixel output (Pixel Binning)

Exposure, contrast, and dynamic range are also great. Plus, the details and rendering of the image look clean. This is possibly one of the benefits of the new Snapdragon 720G processor.

The Realme 6 Pro’s main camera also performed well in low-light scenarios. Noises and grains are inevitable, but kept at a minimum compared to other devices. The difference between the standard and night mode are almost unnoticeable.

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Low-light | 64-megapixel main camera | 16-megapixel output (Pixel Binning)
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Night Mode | 64-megapixel main camera | 16-megapixel output (Pixel Binning)

Using the full 64-megapixel resolution will obviously capture more details. Although, the lighting should be right to avoid any visible noise. The file size on this mode is also noticeably higher — which is at around 20MB versus the 5MB on the 16-megapixel mode.

You should stick to the standard 16-megapixel mode, unless you’re planning on printing the image on something like a billboard.

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64-megapixel main camera | Full Resolution| 20MB

The 8-megapixel ultra-wide camera, to no surprise, takes less impressive photos. Details are not that sharp, but the colors, contrast, and dynamic range is still better than the competition. Again, possibly thanks to that new processor.

Its wide field of view is great for cramming a lot of subjects on a single frame. This is useful for architectural photography, group shots, landscapes, and what not.

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Outdoors | 8-megapixel ultra-wide
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Outdoors | 8-megapixel ultra-wide

The 12-megapixel telephoto lens provides 2x of optical zoom. At this magnification, it allows you to take better portraits of people, or remove any distraction from the foreground, while maintaining a clean image with impressive color rendition.

There’s a 5x zoom quick toggle. Since it’s digital, more noise are now present, but still usable. But if you really wanna get close, you can slide the toggle to go up to 20x zoom. Albeit, you’d suffer from heavy noise and grains exposure.

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1x zoom | 64-megapixel main camera
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2x optical zoom | 12-megapixel telephoto camera
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5x hybrid zoom | 12-megapixel telephoto camera
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20x hybrid zoom | 12-megapixel telephoto camera

Completing the quad-camera setup for the Realme 6 Pro is a 2-megapixel macro camera. Honestly, we feel that this one was added just to up the camera count.

The image quality looks really bad and getting the right focus is hard unless you move a bit further — beating its purpose. If you want to capture smaller subjects, you’re better off using the 64MP mode and crop it after.

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2-megapixel macro

The 16-megapixel front-facing camera takes sharp images, which is really nice for a selfie camera. This gives the AI Face Beauty mode a lot of details to work with, without making the overall image look soft.

Colors and contrast is fine. The exposure is also great, although the shutter speed is a bit slowed down in low-light scenarios, so make sure you keep those hands steady.

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16-megapixel front camera
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16-megapixel front camera | AI Face Beauty

One of the highlights of the Realme 6 Pro is its secondary 8-megapixel ultra-wide camera on the front.

The wide field-of-view it provides is great for group selfies, but the overall image quality is not the best. Still usable, though.

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8-megapixel ultra-wide

Overall, we’re really pleased with the cameras on the Realme 6 Pro. It captures images with great quality and provides flexibility, front and back, to whatever you want to take pictures with.

Security

For a cleaner look, manufacturers are resorting to side-mounted fingerprint scanners if they can’t have on-screen ones. Since it doubles as the unlock button, you can unlock the device instantly in a more natural way.

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You can register five different fingers. But at this placement, all you really have to sign is your left index finger and right thumb. It unlocks the device instantly without having to press the button.

For a faster process, you can enable the Face Unlock. With the Raise to Wake turned on, your device is ready for you the moment you pick it up. It can instantly detect your face before you can even reach the fingerprint scanner.

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Software-level security features are also present. Find My Device, Smart Lock, Payment Protection, File Protection, Emergency SOS, number blocker and filter, Pseudo Base station blocking, app lock, Kid Space, and Private Safe are all present on the Realme 6 Pro.

Connectivity

The Snapdragon 720G brings some of the latest connectivity features on the Realme 6 Pro. There’s the dual-band WiFi, fast and efficient Bluetooth 5.1, dual-frequency GPS with India’s NAVIC, and USB Type-C. All of which worked seamlessly in our tests. Overall, no complaints.

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The tiny earpiece on the top outputs clear audio. While the dual microphone array, as per the party on the other line, picked up my voice fine during voice and video calls.

Battery

The Realme 6 Pro has a 4,300mAh battery. As per usual, we did our test using the PCMark battery test where it loops different synthetic workloads until the battery reached 20%.

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We ran the test under the 90Hz refresh rate, with the screen brightness and volume set to 50% and the Bluetooth and WiFi off. Under these circumstances, we got a score of 10 hours and 26 minutes, which is less impressive than the scores we got on other devices.

This translates to a whole day of light to moderate usage, even at 90Hz. But if you’re gaming hard, expect to reach for the charger before the day ends.

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Speaking of charging, the 30W Flash Charge included on the back can easily top up the Realme 6 Pro in only under an hour. Overheating shouldn’t be a big issue for as long as you don’t keep on gaming while charging.

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Verdict

The Realme 6 Pro is clearly a feature-rich mid-range offering from the emerging brand. Realme might be an underdog, but their strong releases prove they really know how to wow the people.

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With the 6 Pro, you’re getting a large screen with a smooth 90Hz refresh rate that compliments its reliable processor.

It also features a flexible set of cameras. There’s an ultra-wide camera on the front and a telephoto lens on the back. The 64-megapixel main camera also takes clean and overall impressive shots.

All that are accompanied with a decent battery life with fast charging.

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But still, it’s not a perfect device. The choice of going with the Snapdragon 720G, despite its satisfactory performance, is a bit questionable for the price. If having a secondary selfie camera and fast 90Hz screen isn’t a big deal, the cheaper Redmi Note 9 Pro offers a more compelling value.

Realme 6 Pro price and availability in the Philippines

The Realme 6 Pro is now available in the Philippines for a price of Php16,990. You can get it in tons of Realme stores nationwide, as well as in Realme’s flagship store in Lazada.

Clearly, the specs upgrade also bumped the device’s price tag. This practically makes the 6 Pro a successor to the Realme XT, and the vanilla Realme 6 to the 5 Pro from the last generation.

Pros

  • Unique and attractive design
  • Large and smooth 90Hz display
  • Reliable processor
  • Capable and flexible cameras
  • Decent battery with fast charging
  • Full and loud speakers

Cons

  • Macro camera is useless
  • No OIS
  • Processor of choice is a bit disappointing for the price

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