Realme 6 Review: A Formidable Midranger

Introduction

Realme 6 and 6 Pro are the latest devices to join the ever-growing roster of devices under the Realme banner. Like its predecessors, both devices looked impressive both on paper and in design.

I was given a week with the 8GB + 128GB variant of the Realme 6 and so far, I can say that it was quite an enjoyable experience, to say the least.

With that said, here’s my full review of the Realme 6. Check the Lazada listing for the Realme 6 here.

Specifications:

Design and build

The single front camera is one of the differentiating features of the Realme 6 from its Pro sibling

Realme 6 is a bit on the bigger side with its 6.5-inch FHD+ display with a 90Hz refresh rate. Yes, you read that right, it has a 90Hz refresh rate. Sharing the front of the phone is a punch hole that houses its lone 16MP front shooter. In addition, the display has a Corning Gorilla Glass 3 keeping nice and protected.

On the right hand of the phone is its fingerprint scanner, while on the opposite of it are the volume rockers and sim card tray. The sim card tray supports two nanoSIM cards and a microSD card for storage expansion. At the bottom are is the USB Type-C charging port flanked by the speakers on the right and the 3.5mm audio jack and microphone.

The rear has its quad-camera setup with the comet-inspired design on its plastic back. We received the Comet White version of the phone which I think is pretty sleek and sexy. However, because the rear is plastic and reflective, prepare for a fingerprint-filled experience with the phone. It does come with a case though.

Yep, that is a 3.5mm audio jack!

Its design is solid. I am a fan of the punch-hole display instead of the more traditional notch. In addition, it has enough heft and its shape has a nice contour which makes it fit comfortably in use. It is because of these that I didn’t seem to mind the larger size of the Realme 6. One-hand usage is, of course, a lot of adjusting and readjusting hand positioning which is expected.

The buttons are pretty clicky which I appreciate especially with them being on either side of the phone. It helps when playing or watching a video as it keeps you from accidentally pressing the power button or boosting or lowering the volume.

Performance

The Realme 6 has a MediaTek Helio G90T, a chipset built for gaming. In addition, we got the 8GB RAM variant with 128GB of internal storage. [there is a 4GB/128GB option]

GeekBench

The combination of its hardware and its 90Hz refresh rate makes it such a good phone for gaming and everyday usage. It handled shooters like Call of Duty Mobile and Garena Free Fire: Rampage even better and handled MOBAs like Mobile Legends: Bang Bang and Marvel Super War with ease. The Realme 6 even held up with Asphalt 9. All of which I cranked up settings to max.

AnTuTu

Along with gaming, I used the Realme 6 for a lot of multimedia like YouTube, Netflix, and Spotify. Its display performed unsurprisingly well. However, its speaker is your run-of-the-mill speaker. It was pretty loud but lacked bass and had quite the distortion when maxed out. I do appreciate however that the speaker is placed on the right of the charging port, which meant I hardly covered it when holding the phone landscape when gaming. I would suggest using either a Bluetooth speaker or your earphones.

PCMark

I mentioned that the phone is a bit big but this size came in handy in both gaming and media watching. If not giving more space to handle the phone, its size gave more space for gameplay. The larger display helped with rhythm games Cytus and Cytus II and more so with selecting my units more accurately in Auto Chess.

3DMark

The 4300mAh battery on the Realme 6 is enough to last you most of the day even with long gaming sessions. I only found myself charging the phone once a day which with the 30W Flash Charge meant you’re back to gaming or back on the go in a couple of minutes. It also charges via a USB-C port, which in this day and age should be expected but very nice to see.

Unlocking the phone was pretty reliable. Whether it be via the side-mounted fingerprint scanner or face recognition. I personally prefer the flexibility of an in-display or rear-mounted fingerprint scanner but because of how reliable face recognition was, I relied on it when handling the phone with my left hand.

Camera

As far as the camera goes, the Realme 6 has four in the back with a 64MP main and 8MP ultra-wide, 2MP portrait, and 2MP macro accompanying it.

I found the main shooter the most reliable of the four cameras. Albeit, I’ve said this many times, having an ultra-wide is always a welcome addition to the lenses of a phone.  The color is pretty punchy which I just appreciate.

Without a telephoto camera, the Realme 6 shoots up to 5x zoom but at max zoom, it is grainy but still holds up in terms of the structure of the objects in the photo.

The phone has a Night Mode, like most Android devices nowadays, which drastically assists in lower-light environments. Without Night Mode, the cameras struggle in low light.

The lone 16MP front camera is a decent shooter with Portrait mode. Portrait mode on the rear shooters is generally reliable and produced beautiful shots. On the front camera though, it could be improved. The front shooter also comes with AI Beauty mode if that matters to you.

Masks, definitely important when going out. I was smiling, I promise!

Software

The Realme 6 runs on Android 10 with Realme UI on top. Realme UI is one of the newer skins on top of Android and it’s actually very enjoyable. It doesn’t have a lot of pre-loaded apps with it and even has unique features like being able to edit the icons of the basic apps.

I think editing the icons of some apps is one of the more fun features of the UI especially as someone who likes changing the look of things every so often. You get to choose whether the icons of apps like Camera, Messages, etc will be rounded out or pointed or has a foreground to name a few customizations. The strength of Android, for myself at least, has always been about customization and this feature just deepens that customization out of the box.

Realme UI is pretty simple and straight forward and a very clean and well-fleshed out Android skin is very welcome.

Verdict

Overall, the Realme 6 is a solid daily driver especially with what it offers for its price. At PHP 11,999 (for the 4GB variant and PHP 13,999 for the 8GB variant), you get a 6.5-inch FHD+ display, Helio G90T, and solid camera performance. The icing on the cake is its 90Hz refresh rate which is just amazing at this price point, especially since phones with a higher refresh rate usually have a much higher price tag.

I think the Realme 6 is definitely worth checking out especially if you’re due for an upgrade or are looking for a high refresh rate phone for your gaming sessions.

Ram Ronquillo

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Ram found his love and appreciation for writing in 2015 having started in the gaming and esports sphere for GG Network. He would then transition to focus more on the world of tech which has also began his journey into learning more about this world. That said though, he still has the mentality of "as long as it works" for his personal gadgets.