Realme 2 Review – A Decent Budget Phone With A Notch

When Oppo first announced the launch of its sub-brand Realme along with the Realme 1, it was clear that it wanted to take on Xiaomi on the budget phone market. The Realme 1 did get noticed although it didn’t exactly create a stir.

This time with the release of the Realme 2, the company once again wanted to compete again Xiaomi, who is currently the segment’ dominator. So is it going to be a good buy? Continue to read on with our in-depth Realme 2 review.

Oppo Realme 2 was introduced when the Indian market has already flooded with smartphones with a similar price tag. The phone comes in two versions, the 3GB RAM at Rs. 8,990 and the 4G RAM at Rs. 10,990, with three different colors: Diamond Black, Diamond Blue, and Diamond Red. Realme 2 launch date in India was set on September 4, 2018.

Realme 2 Design

The Realme 2 keeps most of its predecessor’s design cues. The diamond-cut back cover which is made from glass now comes in other colors. At the back, there is a fingerprint sensor. The dimensions of the Realme 2 and Realme 1 are almost identical.

The Realme 2 is just a bit thicker since it has a larger battery. There’s a silver accent around the camera unit as well as the fingerprint sensor, making it looks more premium compared to other devices in the same price range.

Despite having the same size as the Realme 1, the Realme 2’s front screen takes up more. Moreover, because of the notch on the top of the screen, the display covers 88.8% of the phone’s body.

The notch, which placed the front camera, the earpiece, and the proximity sensor, is quite wide. All the advantages and the drawbacks that notched phones bring about can all be found.

The rear panel of the phone is said to be made of 2.5D nanoscale composite materials. When being held against the light, it is supposed to reflect the light and give a sense of space. But in reality, the effect is more or less the same as the Realme 1's back.

The cover still retains fingerprints and smudges easily. If users dropped the phone from a significant height, the back would crack. A TPU case is provided for more protection. All in all, for the budget segment, the Realme 2 stands out from other devices for its premium design.

Realme 2 Display

Realme 2 features a 6.2-inch HD+ display which has a screen-to-body ratio of 88.8%. The phone offers a 1520 x 720 resolution a 19:0 aspect ratio and supports up to 16.7 mil screen colors. The brightness is adjusted through the Auto-Brightness feature for both indoors and outdoors.

The Night Shield setting helps reduce the blue light which is emitted by the screen. The display remains looking almost the same in different viewing angles. The colors of the display are sharp and vivid but not too strong. Overall, the display of the Realme 2 is something in between, it is not remarkable but isn’t disappointing either.

Realme 2 Performance

The Realme 2 phone is equipped with Qualcomm Snapdragon 450. The phone comes in two storage versions, a 3GB/32 GB one and a 4GB/64GB one. The storage can easily be expanded to 256GB with a microSD card.

It runs on Android 8.1 Oreo-based ColorOS 5.1. It offers Bluetooth, GPS, OTG, Wi-Fi and 4G VoLTE. The phone’s sensors include a light sensor, proximity sensor, magnetic induction sensor, acceleration sensor, and G-sensor.

The phone contains several user-friendly features such as Screen Multitasking feature, Smart Call, Assistive Ball, Smart Assistant, and Smart Driving. There is a Clone Phone setting which can be used to transfer data in one phone to another. With the Clone Apps feature, it's possible for users to use two different social media accounts at the same time from one phone.

Some secure login options of the phone include passcode, face unlock and fingerprint sensor. Besides, there is a Smart Lock feature for setting up trusted locations like their houses, offices where their devices will be kept unlocked.

The speakers of the phone are only suitable for low volumes playing since at high volumes, the background sound is distorting.

The phone offers a Realme Game Space setting for lag-free gaming with the assist from features including No Disturbance, Gaming Acceleration, and Network Protection. The phone can handle high-end games with no lagging even though its back cover gets heated up quite a bit.

The Realme 2 comes with a user interface that is simple to navigate, which is suitable for people with simple demands and don’t want to tweak their phone a lot.

Realme 2 Camera

At the back, the phone houses a dual camera. On the back, there is a 13+2MP one with an aperture lens of f/2.2. The secondary sensor is for depth sensing. On the front is an 8-megapixel one with an aperture of f/2.2. The camera relies on AI-Beautification algorithms from Oppo for images enhancement.

The image quality is almost the same as the Realme 1. The phone can take good clear shots in daylight. Depend on what you are shooting, the HDR mode will be automatically turned on.

The camera can still deliver quite clean images indoors. The colors remain fairly accurate although the light source gets a bit overexposed. For its prices, the phone delivers overall good images.

However, in low-light settings, the camera has a hard time. The images shot in these backgrounds don’t have many details and it is easy to spot noise in the images.

The portrait mode, compared with Xiaomi phones, isn’t as good. Facial features are really softened by the AI beautification to the point that there seems to be overly photoshopped.

Realme 2 Battery

According to the company’s claim, the phone can last up to two days with its 4,230mAh battery. However, in reality, the phone did not meet that claim. After a full day of handling tasks like taking photos, playing games, surfing the internet and browsing social media, the phone has only 30% remaining battery at the end of the day.

If users take on heavy titles such as PUBG Mobile, it is likely the battery will even run out much quicker. The phone doesn’t have a fast charger so it will take a long time for a full charge.

The Realme 2 Review above includes everything about the phone, from its price range, specifications, performance and battery life to cameras. There are also many Realme 2 reviews from users that you can also take a look online for more references. You can type in "realme 2 mobile review," "real me 2 review", or "realme 2 phone review"