realme launched the P3 Pro, the company’s latest top-end smartphone in the P series, in India today. This gets a bigger quad curved display with sleeker bezels, new design, faster SoC and a bigger 6000mAh battery compared to last year’s P3 Pro. Is this the best smartphone to buy in the Rs. under 25,000 range? Let us dive into the review to find out.
| Box Contents |
| Camera |
| Battery Life |
| Conclusion |
Box Contents
- realme P3 Pro 12GB + 256GB version in Suede Grey color
- 2-pin 80W SuperVOOC fast charger
- USB Type C Cable
- SIM Ejector tool
- Clear protective case
- User Guide and Warranty information
Display, Hardware and Design
The realme P3 Pro sports a 6.83-inch (2800 x 1272 pixels) 1.5K 42° 3D curved AMOLED display with 120Hz refresh rate, 240Hz touch sampling rate and 4500 PPI, better than the P2 Pro. The display is bright since it has up to 1500 nits peak brightness.
It offers good colour output since it has 100% DCI-P3 color gamut, and the sunlight legibility is good as well. You can select from vivid, Natural and Pro screen colour modes. There are additional Cinematic and Brilliant.
The phone has a 3840Hz high-frequency dimming technology with AI eye protection function. There is also DC Dimming. The phone also has HDR 10 support, which works for YouTube, but it doesn’t work with Netflix.
The phone doesn’t have a notification LED, but this has an always-on-display that shows contextual info and notifications all day or as per schedule. The phone has 1.6mm ultra narrow bezels on all the sides, making it compact to hold. It has X-axis linear vibration motor.
The phone has a tiny punch-hole that houses a 16-megapixel camera. Above the display, there is an earpiece on the top edge that doubles up as a secondary speaker. It has an in-display fingerprint scanner.
Coming to the button placements and ports, the power button is present on the right side along with the volume rockers. There is nothing on the left. The Dual SIM slot, primary microphone, USB Type-C port and the loudspeaker grill are present on the bottom. The secondary microphone is on the top, along with a speaker vent.
The Nebula Glow color that we have sport a “Nebula Design” featuring a celluloid texture with luminous color-changing fiber that absorbs light and glows in the dark. This design, according to realme, is inspired by the dynamic nature of nebulas and the interaction of ultraviolet light with cosmic dust. Even though the glow in the dark feature is good, the camera design is familiar.
It also comes in Saturn Brown, and Galaxy Purple colours with a vegan leather finish.
The model we have is just 7.99mm thick. Even though the phone packs a 6000mAh battery, it weighs under 200 grams, and the weight distribution is good.
The device is TÜV Rheinland-Certified for rugged smartphone protection, and Military-level shock resistance certification making it resistant to various environmental factors. It comes with an IP66/IP68/IP69 rating, which means it offers the highest level of water and dust resistance.
Camera
- 50MP 1/1.56″ Sony IMX896 sensor, f/1.88 aperture, OIS
- 2MP portrait sensor with f/2.4 aperture
- 16MP front-facing camera with Sony IMX480 sensor, f/2.45 aperture
The camera UI in the realme UI 6 is familiar. There is Pro mode, Panorama,, Film, Slo-mo, Time-Lapse, Dual-View video, Underwater mode text scanner, starry mode and tilt-shift. The rear camera offers 12.5MP output after pixel binning, and the front camera images are 16MP in size.
Daylight shots came out well, thanks to the 50MP sensor, and the dynamic range is better with auto HDR. There is AI mode which recognizes different photo scenes and automatically adjusts camera settings to make boost the colours.
Portrait shots are decent, and it offers up to 20x zoom, and the quality of the image might not be the best when you zoom in beyond 10x. Low light shots are decent, but could have been better. The night mode is useful, but it takes a few seconds to process. The front camera is decent, but could have been better.
Check out the camera samples
It can record videos in up to 4K 30 fps, slow motion 1080p at 120fps from the rear camera, but the front camera can only shoot up to 1080p 30 fps videos. Portrait video mode is limited to 1080p. There is also ultra-steady video shooting, but it is limited to 1080p 60fps. OIS does a good job for the rear camera.
Software, UI and Apps
It runs Android 15 based realme UI 6.0 out of the box. It has Android security patch for January 2025. The phone should get 2 Android updates and 3 years of security updates, similar to other phones. realme UI 6.0 offers improved self-developed technology for smooth performance, and enhanced safety and privacy tools.
There is AI Ultra Clarity 2.0, AI Snap mode, and AI Eraser 2.0, an enhancement to AI features that were present in the realme UI 5.0. There are also AI writer, AI recording summary, AI smart loop 2.0, AI reply suggestions, Circle to search and more.
Apart from the usual set of realme apps and Google apps, it comes with several preloaded apps such as Facebook, Amazon, Snapchat, LinkedIn and more. These apps can be uninstalled, but come back once the phone is reset. There are also Hot Apps and Hot Games.
Out of 12GB LPDD4X RAM, you get 11.13GB of usable RAM, and about 7GB of RAM is free when default apps are running in the background. It also has DRE or dynamic RAM expansion feature, which uses the built-in storage as RAM. This has up to 14GB of additional RAM expansion. Out of 256GB UFS 3.1, you get about 218GB of free storage.
Fingerprint sensor and Face unlock
It has an in-display fingerprint sensor that unlocks the phone quickly, but it is not as fast as a physical fingerprint sensor. You can add up to 5 fingerprints. You can also use the fingerprint for app local and payments in apps. Furthermore, you can change the fingerprint animation and also disable it, and also enable quick launch option to launch apps directly from the lock screen by holding the fingerprint. The phone also has face unlock feature.
Music and Multimedia
YouTube Music is the default Music Player. It has customizable Smart, Movie, Game and Music modes, but doesn’t have Dolby Atmos. It doesn’t have FM Radio support. Audio through the stereo speakers is good without any distortion even in full volume. Audio through earphones is good as well.
This has Widevine L1, so that you can play HD content on Netflix and other streaming apps. HDR works for YouTube, but it doesn’t work on Netflix.
Dual SIM and Connectivity
The realme P3 Pro has support for SA:n1/n3/n5/n8/n28B/n40/n41/n77/n78; NSA:n1/n3/n40/n41/n78 Network Bands in India. It has 4G Wi-Fi and VoLTE, with support for Carrier Aggregation on 4G. Other connectivity options include Wi-Fi 6 802.11 ax (2.4GHz + 5GHz), Bluetooth 5.2, GPS / GLONASS / Beidou. It has OTG support, doesn’t have NFC support. Moving on, the call quality is good, and we did not face any call drops and the earpiece volume was loud.
The realme P3 Pro’s body SAR is 1.19W/Kg and head SAR is at 1.19/Kg, which is almost similar to P2 Pro, and it is well under the limit of 1.6 W/kg (over 1 g) in India.
Performance and Benchmarks
The phone is powered by Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 4nmMobile Platform, an upgrade compared to 7s Gen 2 used in the P3 Pro models. This has Octa-Core Qualcomm Kryo CPUs that has 1 x Kryo Prime CPUs (Cortex A720-based) at up to 2.5GHz, 3 x Kryo Performance CPUs (Cortex A720-based) at up to 2.4GHz, 4x Kryo Efficiency CPUs (Cortex A520-based) at up to 1.8GHz.
There is Adreno 810 GPU that decent gaming performance. The phone has 6500mm² VC Cooling System, which is larger than the predecessor to help keep the phone cool. We did not face any issues or frame drops in the graphic-intensive games like COD, BGMI and Genshin Impact.
In BGMI HDR Extreme works, features 90 fps gaming out of the box, and has GT Boost technology, co-developed with KRAFTON that promises AI Ultra-Steady Frames, Hyper Response Engine, AI Ultra Touch Control, and AI Motion Control, enabling console-like precision, gesture-based gameplay, and esports-level responsiveness, according to the company.
In 3D Mark wild life stress test, it scored 97.4% which is good. The temperature increased from 30 to 36 degrees, which is not much, thanks to the cooling solution. That said, check out some synthetic benchmark scores below.
This shows a good improvement in performance compared to the realme P2 Pro powered by the 7s Gen 2, and is on par with the Snapdragon 7 Gen 3.
Battery life
Coming to the battery life, the phone packs a 6000mAh (typical) built-in Titan battery, compared to 5200mAh in the P2 Pro. It lasts for a whole day with Wi-Fi, but with 4G or 5G and dual SIMs it should be less.
This has 80W SuperVOOC Charge, same as the predecessor. It can charge up to 50% in about 24 minutes and up to 100% in less than an hour with the bundled 80W charger, which is good. There is smart charging and an option to stop charging at 80% to improve the battery health. However, this doesn’t show the battery health.
Conclusion
At a starting price of Rs. 23,999 for the 8GB + 128GB model, the realme P3 Pro offers a good performance and long-lasting battery life for price. Even the curved display is good with minimal bezels that you rarely see in phones in the price range. However, it still has bloatware, and the ultra-wide camera from the predecessor is gone, which you will have to compromise.
Alternatives
After the recent price cut during sale, the OnePlus Nord CE 4 is a good competition that offers a slightly better performance, but lacks a curved screen. If you pay slightly more, there is HONOR 200.
Pricing and availability
The realme P3 Pro 5G is priced at Rs. 23,999 for the 8GB + 128GB model, the 8GB + 256GB costs Rs. 24,999 and the 12GB + 256GB model is priced at Rs. 26,999. There is also Rs. 2000 bank discount as a part of launch offer.
The phone will be available from realme.com, Flipkart and offline stores starting from February 25th 12 noon.
Pros
- Curved display is brilliant
- Smooth performance
- Decent camera
- Good build quality, IP69 ratings
- Good battery life with fast charging
Cons
- Bloatware
- No ultra-wide camera