Realme 8i was launched in India because the successor of the Realme 7i and a extra reasonably priced choice than the Realme 8. This new smartphone’s headlining options are its 120Hz show, MediaTek Helio G96 SoC, and 5,000mAh battery. What can also be attention-grabbing is the Realme 8i’s beginning value of Rs. 13,999, which places it in some of the aggressive segments available in the market. Can the Realme 8i outshine the competitors, or do you have to think about different choices? I put the Realme 8i to the check to seek out out.
The Realme 8i packs in a 5,000mAh battery and helps 18W quick charging
Realme 8i value in India
The Realme 8i is on the market in two variants. The bottom variant, with 4GB of RAM and 64GB of storage, is priced at Rs. 13,999 in India, whereas the upper variant with 6GB of RAM and 128GB of storage is priced at Rs. 15,999. You could have two color choices to select from, Area Black and Area Purple. I had the top-end variant in Area Purple for this overview.
Realme 8i design
The Realme 8i has grown barely in comparison with its predecessor. It sports activities a much bigger show with a gap for the digital camera within the top-left nook. The borders are skinny on the sides however comparatively thicker on the high and the underside. There is a fingerprint scanner mounted on the ability button on the best, whereas the quantity buttons are on the left. I discovered the button positioning to be excellent as I might attain them with no need to stretch. The left of the body additionally has the SIM tray. The body is flat on the high and backside, and whereas the highest is clean, the underside seems to be busy with a 3.5mm headphone jack, major microphone, USB Kind-C port, and loudspeaker.
The physique of the Realme 8i is made from plastic and the rear panel has an “arc beam” texture that pops when mild falls on it. This panel is shiny and picks up fingerprints relatively simply. The sunshine color of my overview unit made smudges seen very simply. The digital camera module is within the higher left nook and protrudes barely. It would appear to be there is a quad-camera setup at first look however this cellphone solely has three cameras. One of many areas has a flash positioned in it.
Realme 8i has a plastic again panel that picks up smudges relatively simply
Realme has stored the thickness of this cellphone in verify, and it measures simply 8.5mm, however the weight, at 194g, is noticeable. The Realme 8i has a 5,000mAh battery and comes with an 18W quick charger within the field.
Realme 8i specs
The Realme 8i has a 6.6-inch LCD show with a full-HD+ decision and 120Hz refresh fee. That is an improve over the 90Hz 720p panel on the Realme 7i. The Realme 8i has a dynamic refresh fee function which switches between six preset body charges (30Hz, 48Hz, 50Hz, 60Hz, 90Hz,120Hz) relying on what you might be doing on the smartphone. It additionally has a 180Hz contact sampling fee and a peak brightness of 600 nits.
Powering the Realme 8i is the MediaTek Helio G96 SoC, making it the primary smartphone to sport this {hardware} within the nation. There are two RAM and storage choices: the bottom variant has 4GB of RAM and 64GB of storage, whereas the upper priced one has 6GB of RAM and 128GB of storage. Realme gives a Digital RAM function that permits the smartphone to make use of some space for storing as RAM. You may assign as much as 5GB of Digital RAM with the highest variant.
Realme gives a 120Hz refresh fee show on the 8i, which is unusual at this value level
Storage on the Realme 8i is expandable utilizing the devoted microSD card slot. It additionally has two Nano-SIM slots and helps 4G in addition to VoLTE on each. There’s additionally dual-band Wi-Fi ac and Bluetooth 5, and three satellite tv for pc navigation techniques.
By way of software program, the Realme 8i runs Realme UI 2.0 on high of Android 11. My unit had the September Android safety patch. The smartphone got here with a good quantity of bloatware preinstalled, reminiscent of Fb, Snapchat, Amazon, Dailyhunt, Moj, Josh, and some others. You may uninstall all these apps, however there are additionally some Realme first-party ones. Throughout use, I did obtain push notifications from the Themes and Realme Retailer app.
Realme 8i efficiency
The Realme 8i didn’t really feel gradual at any level, and UI navigation felt clean because of the 120Hz refresh fee. The machine might maintain app load occasions underneath acceptable limits, and multitasking was simple. Digital RAM was enabled and set to 2GB by default on my unit, and that may be bumped as much as 3GB or 5GB. The side-mounted fingerprint scanner is fast to unlock the smartphone. I favored the large show on the Realme 8i, which might get brilliant sufficient outside. There are two color modes, vivid and mild. You can too tweak the color temperature of this panel. I discovered the speaker to be adequately loud. Nonetheless, at full quantity, sound was tinny.
I ran our customary benchmarks on the Realme 8i to see the way it stands towards the competitors. In AnTuTu, the Realme 8i scored 337,297 factors, whereas in Geekbench 5’s single-core and multi-core assessments it managed 538 and 1,714 factors respectively. In PCMark Work 3.0 it scored 8,477 factors. These scores are barely greater than these of the Redmi Observe 10S (Evaluate), which I’ve examined beforehand. As for graphics benchmarks, the Realme 8i managed to attain 3,332 in 3DMark SlingShot, and in GFXBench’s T-Rex and Automobile Chases assessments, it scored 55fps and 12fps respectively.
The triple digital camera digital camera setup is designed to appear to be 4 cameras
I did play BGMI on the Realme 8i, and it defaulted to the HD setting for graphics and Excessive body fee. The sport was playable at these settings with none concern. I performed for 28 minutes and observed an 8 % drop within the battery stage. The cellphone did get barely heat to the contact after that lengthy.
Battery life on the Realme 8i was good. This cellphone might final me about 2 days with my utilization. Even in our HD video loop check, the cellphone went on for 21 hours and 17 minutes. That is higher than a few of the different smartphones on this value section. Realme provides an 18W charger within the field, which is able to charging the battery to 30 % in half-hour and 56 % in an hour.
Realme 8i cameras
Whereas it seems to be as if the Realme 8i has a quad-camera setup, it solely has three sensors. The first one is a 50-megapixel Samsung sensor with an f/1.8 aperture. The opposite two are a 2-megapixel B&W digital camera and a 2-megapixel macro digital camera. The Realme digital camera app feels acquainted. It has all of the totally different capturing modes laid out on the backside of the viewfinder making it simple to change between them. There’s an AI toggle on the high, and when enabled, the AI can detect what you might be capturing and make changes accordingly.
The Realme 8i makes use of pixel binning to ship 12.5-megapixel output from its 50-megapixel sensor. Daylight pictures taken with the Realme 8i have been common. Objects at a distance didn’t have a lot element. The cellphone additionally sharpens pictures barely. You do not get an ultra-wide-angle digital camera on the Realme 8i, however you possibly can shoot on the full 50-megapixel decision. Images shot at full decision did have higher element, particularly in objects at a distance.
Realme 8i daylight digital camera pattern (faucet to see full measurement)
Shut-ups taken with the Realme 8i have been good. The cellphone managed colors effectively and added a tender depth to the background. You may shoot portraits with the Realme 8i and it lets you choose the extent of background blur earlier than you are taking a shot. I discovered edge detection to be good and the topic was sharp as effectively. The macro digital camera permits you to go tremendous near your topic and does handle first rate outcomes, however the output is restricted to 2 megapixels in decision.
Realme 8i close-up pattern (faucet to see full measurement)
Realme 8i portrait pattern (faucet to see full measurement)
Realme 8i macro digital camera pattern (faucet to see full measurement)
Low-light digital camera efficiency was not one of the best I’ve seen on this value section. The output didn’t have noise however it was low on element. The cellphone additionally did not seize darker areas of the body correctly. Utilizing Night time mode helped seize particulars within the shadows higher, and pictures have been brighter as effectively. It additionally had some enchancment in particulars and objects have been sharper.
Realme 8i low-light digital camera pattern (faucet to see full measurement)
Realme 8i Night time mode pattern (faucet to see full measurement)
Selfies taken with the Realme 8i in daylight in addition to low mild have been first rate. Portrait selfies had good separation between the topic and the background, although beautification is in by default.
Realme 8i portrait selfie pattern (faucet to see full measurement)
Video recording tops out at 1080p for the first in addition to the selfie digital camera. Footage is not stabilised by default, and shakes are seen. There’s an Extremely Regular mode however that does not assist stabilise footage to an ideal extent.
Verdict
The Realme 8i has been launched within the super-competitive sub-Rs. 15,000 section in India, and has to fend off numerous competitors. What’s extra, that is not restricted to different producers, since Realme itself sells a number of smartphones on this value section.
The power of the Realme 8i is efficiency. Its MediaTek Helio G96 SoC and 120Hz show assist ship a clean person expertise. Battery life is sweet too, however the bundled 18W charger feels insufficient, particularly after we’ve seen telephones such because the Realme Narzo 20 Professional (Evaluate) bundled with as much as 65W chargers.
The Realme 8i will not be an ideal all-rounder, and its cameras fell wanting my expectations. If picture and video high quality aren’t all that vital to you, you may think about shopping for this cellphone, however when you would favor one thing that does all of it at this value stage you may additionally think about the Realme 7 (Evaluate) which is an older mannequin however one step up in Realme’s hierarchy.
