A burst of new excitement for us as we and all of our readers to check out something from realme Philippines for the first time this year. We missed the C25, the 8 and it's Pro but looks like we got their best release so far coz it's a 5G high midranger device.
It is the realme 8 5G.
In case you missed our unboxing video (that is why better to subscribe on Ron Not The DJ on Youtube), you can watch it here:
First came from realme 7i, it was a refresh for us to experience realme UI 2.0 for the first time. At first you may say that it is the same but we love the small retweaks that made it better with more options on pulldown menu down to the feature which you will gonna see the actual name of the TWS that you paired that is scrolling. The phone features a RAM expander mode which if 8 GB RAM is not enough and you still have more than enough in your internal storage, you can expand it up to 5 GB RAM more. Coming from a Snapdragon 662 to Mediatek Dimensity 700--powered 8 5G
On connectivity, other 5G smartphones with the same or near it's SRP have that weakness as they only offer hybrid dual nano 5G sim. With realme 8 5G, they made it possible to put in true dual nano sim slot with dedicated micro SD slot support up to 1 TB which is a welcome feature especially if you are coming from a flagship 5G phone with that much micro SD storage and you still want to downgrade with 5G, this might be for you. The Smart 5G Power Saving Mode helped us especially on the go as you may experience random areas with 5G and then LTE mobile data only. Bluetooth was one the the fastest that we got this year with our beloved 2019 released TWS. It also has VoLTE and NFC which added more value to this handset. Very good indeed on calls, texts, mobile data and WiFi.
realme 8 5G has three display modes and even that it only offers LCD display, we loved on how they tuned the "vivid" mode which was our main go-to display mode as it pleased our eyes in over a week that we used it as a main driver as we previously came in a device with AMOLED display.
As the device has RAM expander feature, we compared it on our Antutu. On normal mode, the phone scored at over 317000, performance at over 357000 and performance mode + 5 GB RAM expander mode with bit improvements in score at over 360000
On battery, realme 8 5G survived in 29 hours and 50 minutes in our video battery rundown test with it's 6.5 inch FHD+ display and 5000 mAh battery. The 18 watt charger can put in from 0 to 100% in around two hours. Used it on heavy mode in dual 5G sim mode on and auto-adjust in refresh rate mode, it was an easy 1.5 days of usage for us.
On camera, realme 8 5G has triple main cameras composed of 48 MP primary sensor and 16 MP front camera. Some of first might be a downgrade as we came from 7i, 8 5G brought in overall improvements in photo in almost all of the lighting environments including their headlining Nightscape mode. Some will gonna miss that it can't shoot 4K (due to the processor's limitations) but we have in mind that it is one of the budget 5G smartphones right now. The 16 MP selfie camera is very good from our liking,
realme 8 5G rear camera samples
realme 8 5G normal to 48 MP camera sample comparison
realme 8 5G normal to Nightscape mode comparison
realme 8 5G in 5x zoom mode
realme 8 5G HD video rear camera sample
On extras, we just found out as like the standard and pro versions - realme 8 5G does not offer FM radio for some reason
realme 8 5G only version in the Philippines comes in 8 GB RAM and 128 GB storage which is the highest and it's price in the Philippines, Php 11990 which is still one of the most 5G phones that you can buy right now. True dual 5G was the charm for us over the others plus we believe that realme UI 2.0 has more stability overall in terms of usage and on legacy app support. Cameras, sophisticated looks, 5G Smart Saving mode, the vivid display mode and 90 Hz refresh rate were our dibs on this one. Cons for us is the miss of radio and cannot shoot 4K video.
realme 8 5G for us is 4.5 out of 5.You can check our post here on how to avail realme 8 5G.
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