Realme X2 First Impressions: The Pros, The Cons And The X Factor

|

After disrupting the value flagship smartphone market with the Realme X2 Pro, the company has now unveiled the sub-20K Realme X2 smartphone in the Indian market. The handset has been launched in three variants; 4GB + 64GB at Rs. 16,999, 6GB + 128GB at Rs. 18,999 and the flagship 8GB + 128GB variant costing Rs. 19,999.

 

Realme X2 Price And Availability

Realme X2 Price And Availability

Like the company's flagship Realme X2 Pro, the new Realme X2 also sports a 64MP quad-lens rear camera setup; however, it is backed by the Qualcomm's latest 7th chipset- Snapdragon 730G. Launched in three color variants (Pearl green, Pearl white and Pearl black), the Realme X2 will go live for sale from December 20th, 12 noon on realme.com, flipkart.com and retail stores throughout the country.

Interested buyers having ICICI credit cards can avail flat Rs. 1,500 off on the purchase on the Realme X2 on Flipkart.com. You can also avail no cost EMI upto 6 month on all credit and debit cards of all the banks on the e-commerce website. Besides, the Realme X2 buyers can also get Jio offer benefits up to Rs. 11,500 on realme.com, Flipkart and via offline stores.

The company sent out the 8GB RAM + 128GB variant to us for testing. We used the handset for a day to evaluate the performance. Here's what we think about the Realme X2, which is essentially an upgrade to the Realme XT.

Vibrant Super AMOLED Display With Corning GG5 Protection
 

Vibrant Super AMOLED Display With Corning GG5 Protection

The Good

The Realme X2 flaunts a 6.4-inch Full HD+ Super AMOLED display which offers 91.2% screen-to-body ratio. The 1080p screen has a dewdrop notch at top that houses a 32MP selfie camera. The screen gets Corning Gorilla Glass 5 protection and also features an in-screen fingerprint scanner. The full HD+ panel on the Realme X2 offers a pixel density of 402ppi and touches maximum brightness level of 430 nits.

We found the display on the Realme X2 quite vivid and touch-responsive. The AMOLED screen's viewing angles also seemed pretty acceptable, which will please consumers who are always hooked to their mobile devices for gameplay and multimedia streaming.

Powerful Hardware- Snapdragon 730G- 4GB/6GB/8GB RAM & 4,000mAh Battery

Powerful Hardware- Snapdragon 730G- 4GB/6GB/8GB RAM & 4,000mAh Battery

Coming onto the hardware, the Realme X2 is backed by the Qualcomm's latest Snapdragon 730G SoC. Fabricated on the 8-nm process, the octa-core CPU features the enhanced Adreno 618 GPU that claims to offer 25% improvement in graphics when compared to the SD710 chipset. The SD730G is paired with three RAM and two storage options, i.e. 4GB, 6GB and 8GB RAM alongwith 64GB and 128GB LPDDR4X+UFS2.1 storage.

This is a pretty capable hardware for a device that is priced under Rs. 20,000. We will pit the Realme X2 with the Redmi Note 8 Pro, another very powerful sub-20K handset powered by the MediaTek G90T SoC.

As far as battery is concerned, the Realme X2 is backed by a 4,000mAh battery cell which gets additional support from the company's 30W VOOC 4.0 fast-charge technology. The company claims that the bundled 30W fast-charger can refuel the battery from zero to 67% in 30 minutes. We will evaluate such claims in our detailed review of the handset. As far as connectivity is concerned, the Realme X2 comes equipped with 4G VoLTE, Dual SIM, WiFi, Bluetooth 5.0, USB Type-C port, GPS and GLONASS.

Dedicated MicroSD Card Support

Dedicated MicroSD Card Support

Like the company's previous handsets, the Realme X2 also brings a triple-slot SIM card tray that allows you to use two nano SIM cards and a microSD card at the same time. You can expand the handset's 64GB/128GB to up to 256GB via microSD card if you like to keep gigabytes of multimedia content on your handset.

The Bad

The Bad

It is very difficult to find a flaw in a smartphone like the Realme X2 that brings so much to the table at such an aggressive price-point. We have just started using the Realme X2, and it seems like an all-rounder sub-20K smartphone. A slight downside of the Realme X2 is its highly glossy built which tends to pick up fingerprints and smudges rather instantly.

Besides, as per our testing, the Realme X2 camera's software algorithm takes highly saturated pictures in daytime. With some fine-tuning, the company can resolve the issues; however, you can always tone down the final image output in third-party apps. In fact the company's built-in photo-editing application is pretty capable and feature-rich.

The X-Factor

The X-Factor

The 64MP quad-lens camera setup is undoubtedly the X-factor of the Realme X2. It is almost the same camera hardware that we have tested with the company's flagship handset- Realme X2 Pro. The four-lens camera on the Realme X2 features a 64MP main camera (F1.8), 8MP wide-angle lens with 119-degree FOV (F2.25), 2MP macro lens (F/2.4) and a 2MP portrait lens (F/2.4). The camera app offers super nightscape mode, chroma-boost mode, wide-angle, time-lapse among other useful modes to step up your photography game.

As far as video recording capabilities are concerned, the Realme X2 can record 1080P@60/30fps, 720P@30/60fps, and 4K videos @30fps. For selfies, the Realme X2 features a 32MP front-facing camera.

The camera seemed pretty capable in out short testing; however, the colors captured by the sensors seemed artificially saturated, something we have noticed with the previous Realme devices. We will evaluate the Realme X2's camera performance in detail in our comprehensive review.

Besides camera, the new Snapdragon 730G paired with 6GB and 8GB RAM at a very aggressive price-point is also the highlight feature of the sub-20k handset. We will push the handset to its limits to bring you the detailed hardware and software performance overview of the device in the coming week.

Should You Buy The Realme X2?

Should You Buy The Realme X2?

The Realme X2 is a feature-packed sub-20K handset which offers a powerful hardware and a capable camera setup. The upgrade to the Realme XT improves on the underlying chipset, camera hardware and adds 30W fast-charging support to the package. Can it outshine the Redmi Note 8 Pro? We will find it out in our comprehensive review of the smartphone.

Best Mobiles in India

Best Phones

Get Instant News Updates
Enable
x
Notification Settings X
Time Settings
Done
Clear Notification X
Do you want to clear all the notifications from your inbox?
Yes No
Settings X
X