First impressions of Realme 12+ 5G

Realme is on a roll. After the unveiling of Realme 12 Pro series earlier this year, the company is back with the Realme 12 5G series. Newly announced phones include the Realme 12 5G and Realme 12+ 5G. We spent some time with the Plus variant, which already looks like a decent budget phone. The Realme 12+ has a similar design to the more expensive Realme 12 Pro lineup. You get a vegan leather finish and a primary rear camera with OIS support. This is not a common feature you will find in this price segment. Before we test the phone thoroughly, here are our first impressions.

From the back, the Realme 12+ 5G looks similar to the Realme 12 Pro. It has a vegan leather finish on the back that is soft to the touch and doesn’t attract fingerprints. It is much better than plastic or glass panels for that matter. Realme has kept the branding to a minimum, with a simple Realme logo on the bottom left. Apart from the wagon leather finish, which costs 50 percent more than the plastic back, you also get a circular triple rear camera setup.

The rear triple camera design is also taken from the Pro series but lacks the golden ring. However, the Realme 12+ 5G still has a clock-like sunburst dial and a golden line running down the middle of the back panel. What is completely different is the frame of the phone. Realme has given the handset flat sides with rounded corners. It is made of plastic, but one could easily mistake it for metal. The sides are highly reflective, and I prefer the boxy design over the curved edges that were seen on the Realme 12 Pro series.

Realme has once again succeeded in making a good looking smartphone. As for button placement, both the volume and power buttons are on the right side of the handset, with the USB Type-C port, speaker grill, microphone, and SIM tray below. At the top, the Realme 12+ 5G has a 3.5mm headphone port, a second microphone, and a second speaker. I love that Realme has included a headphone port on the handset. The phone also gets an IP54 rating.

Coming to the front, the Realme 12+ 5G has a large 6.67-inch AMOLED display with slim bezels on three sides and a chin slightly thicker than the rest. The display is vibrant and offers HDR 10+ support, a 120Hz refresh rate, and a full-HD+ resolution. Realme also claims that the display has a Rainwater Smart Touch feature that allows you to use the touchscreen even in the rain or with wet hands. We will examine this in the full review. You also get an in-display fingerprint scanner on the phone.

Now, let’s talk about that camera setup. It’s probably the only phone in this price range to offer a Sony LYT-600 50-megapixel sensor with optical image stabilization. The main selling point of the Realme 12+ 5G is the camera, which the company claims can take really good photos. We’ll check out the camera in the full review, but in my few hours with the phone, I found the software to do most of the photography. Apart from the 50-megapixel primary camera, you also get an 8-megapixel ultra-wide unit and a 2-megapixel depth sensor. For selfies, there is a 16-megapixel front camera, which takes good selfies in decent lighting conditions.

On the inside, the Realme 12+ 5G is equipped with a MediaTek Dimensity 7050 SoC which I initially liked. I’m obviously running some benchmarks and playing some games to see how the phone performs under stress. You get 8GB of RAM and 256GB of internal storage on the handset. The phone supports both RAM (virtual) and storage (microSD card) expansion. For connectivity, you get the usual set of dual-SIM, 5G, dual-band Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth 5.2, and GPS satellite connectivity.

Finally, the Realme 12+ 5G has a 5,000mAh battery that supports 67W fast charging. Fortunately, a charger is provided in the box. Realme claims the phone can be fully charged in just 48 minutes, but we’ll have to test that. In the software department, the phone runs Realme UI 5.0 based on Android 14 out of the box, and yes, there’s plenty of bloatware to deal with. Realme promises two years of Android OS upgrades and three years of security patches.

Realme 12+ 5G Initial Thoughts

For an initial price of Rs. 20,999, the Realme 12+ 5G looks like a great budget phone. I’ll be testing the camera, performance, software, and battery life to see what it fares. The Sony LYT-600 sensor with OIS is certainly a rarity in this segment. This phone will compete with the recently launched phone. Nothing Phone 2a(Review), a really good budget smartphone.

Stay tuned for our full review to find out if the Realme 12+ 5G is worth considering in your quest to buy the best budget phone.