If there is one phone we enjoyed using last year, it’s the realme 11 series. Compared to the Realme 10 series, the realme 11 models featured a new design language, faster processors, and better cameras.
I tried out the realme 11 Pro+ 5G 11, which featured a significant improvement over its predecessor in styling, functionality, and performance.
Now, just six months later, realme Philippines has finally released the successor to the successful realme 11 series – the realme 12 5G. In this review, we will be taking a closer look at the realme 12 Pro+ 5G specifically.
Compared to its predecessor, the changes in design aren’t as drastic. But under the hood, realme has made this phone a lot more powerful and fitted an even better camera.
Still, the question remains – is the realme 12 Pro+ 5G a phone you should pick up in early 2024? Well, let’s find out in this review.
Table of Contents
Design and Construction
At first glance, it appears realme did not change much on the realme 12 Pro+ 5G especially when it comes to the styling of the phone itself. You still get the large circular camera housing located at the top center of the phone.
If you look closely, though, you’ll notice that the layout of the cameras is a bit different. The main shooter is no longer located at the center, with the other two lenses hidden on the sides.
Instead, the realme 12 Pro+ 5G camera layout is in a grid. They even added a fourth separate lens module for what seems like a depth sensor just to keep the design flawlessly symmetrical, and then placed the camera flash at the top. We’ll talk more about the cameras later.
The bezel of the camera housing itself is different too. You get a fluted bezel design, which gives the realme 12 Pro+ 5G a more premium-looking design. It also reminds me of the fluted bezel design of some Rolex watches.
As for the rest of the phone, there aren’t too many changes. The back panel still features the same textured synthetic leather-rubber combination but without the fake stitching. There’s also a zipper-like design that runs down the middle of the phone.
The updated design makes the realme 12 Pro+ 5G look a lot better compared to its predecessor. However, some users might still have a different opinion about the styling.
On the right side, you’ll find the volume rocker along with the power button. At the bottom, you’ll find the dual-sim 5G card slot along with the USB-C port and one of the loudspeakers. At the top, you’ll find the other loudspeaker, while the left side remains clean.
The new Submarine Blue color is very stunning too. Like before, it’s easy to hold and still slim to easily fit your pockets.
Overall, realme didn’t give the realme 12 Pro+ 5G a drastic makeover compared to the jump from the realme 10 series to the realme 11 series. Instead, they decided to enhance the new design language further to make it look and feel a lot more premium.
Display and Multimedia
Open up the phone, and you are greeted by a 6.7-inch AMOLED Full HD+ curved display. Based on the specs, the screen appears to be a carryover from the realme 11 Pro+ 5G. It features the same 1080×2412 resolution with 950 nits of peak brightness, 120Hz refresh rate, and 240Hz touch sampling rate. At the top of the screen, there is a pin hole cut out for the front camera.
Like before, you get slim bezels all around, giving you more screen to work with. The colors are quite vivid out of the box, and like before you do get the option to choose whether you want to set screen colors to vivid or natural. From the factory though, it is set to Vivid as standard.
What’s new with the realme 12 Pro+ 5G is the option to choose the color temperature. Instead of just natural, warm, or cool, you can personally select the color temperature you want. Although my personal preference would be just natural.
With 950 nits of peak brightness, you won’t have any issues using the phone under the sun. Even when we were at the beach, we could still see everything on the screen quite clearly. Not to mention you get nice colors and deep blacks, making it great for watching movies or just checking out the photos and videos you captured using the camera.
Since you do have a 120Hz refresh rate, gamers will be able to enjoy playing games on this phone. Paired with the dual loudspeakers, you get a more immersive experience. Although, I do wish the speakers did sound a bit better. Interestingly, realme says the speakers are tuned by Dolby Atmos.
It still lacks bass for my liking, but as before the mids is clear. More importantly, the speakers are loud, making it easy to hear the in-game audio. Still, it’s best used with a pair of Bluetooth headphones or earphones.
Cameras
One of the most enjoyable features of the realme 11 Pro+ 5G last year was the camera. It featured a 200MP main shooter which captured some great footage. So we had high expectations with the realme 12 Pro+ 5G’s camera.
On paper, you might think realme downgraded in terms of specs. The triple rear camera is highlighted by a 50MP main shooter, paired with a 64MP periscope portrait camera and an 8MP ultrawide.
Meanwhile, the front camera is now a 32MP selfie shooter. However, the 50MP main uses the highly acclaimed Sony IMX890 sensor, which is one of the most capable camera sensors in the market today. Meanwhile, the 64MP shooter uses an OmniVision OV64B sensor.
The results? You get a phone camera that is very capable and versatile for all kinds of photography or videography. Whether you’re shooting landscape, portrait, or something far from, the realme 12 Pro+ 5G can do it. You do get 120x zoom to work with after all.
Given the capability of the sensors, you also get great images. The photos come out sharp and vibrant. However, they’re not oversaturated or too flat either. The camera’s algorithm does a great job of balancing it all. Even at night, you can capture great images, and there’s good contrast too when shooting sunsets.
Mind you, I did not use portrait mode or the other shooting modes that often since the photos came out great as is. All I did was turn on Auto HDR and AI in the settings. But you do get several unique shooting modes like Street Photography Mode, Moon Mode, and Starry Mode Pro to name a few.
Even up to 3x zoom, the image quality remains the same. It’s only when you are using 10x zoom or beyond does the image quality starts to drop. But still, the photos are still useable if you’re not too OC.
While there is 120x zoom, it’s not the best when shooting in low light. At the same time, you do need to have very steady hands to make the most out of the 120x zoom of the realme 12 Pro+ 5G.
In terms of video, the realme 12 Pro+ 5G can capture footage at a maximum of 4K. While the camera does have a stabilization function, this only works when shooting at 1080P.
I noticed that the video isn’t quite stable when shooting 4K handheld, so it’s best paired with a gimbal to make the most out of it. But with the Ultra Steady function turned on, you can get some cinematic shots using the realme 12 Pro+ 5G.
The quality of the video is identical to that of the images. In well-lit environments and areas, the videos captured are superb even when you’re just shooting at 1080P. At night or in low-light, you still get nice footage, but it’s not as sharp and you do start noticing the noise more in the video. However, it’s still very much usable especially if you plan on shooting content with this phone.
Check out some of the photos and videos we were able to capture using the realme 12 Pro+ 5G in the gallery below.
Performance and Benchmarks
Aside from the new camera, another big upgrade on the realme 12 Pro+ 5G is found under the hood. The phone is now powered by an Octa-core Snapdragon 7s Gen 2 chipset with an Adreno 710 GPU.
Our review unit comes with 12GB of RAM which can be expanded by an additional 12GB for a total of 24GB. It also had 512GB of storage, which is more than enough. But if you do plan on downloading several apps and games and capturing content, you might find it lacking in the future. Mind you there is no microSD slot to expand storage further.
It’s no surprise that the realme 12 Pro+ 5G can handle day-to-day tasks without any issue given the new chipset. You can leave multiple apps running in the background, and you can still watch videos on Netflix or YouTube without experiencing any lags or slowing down.
But it is during gaming that the realme 12 Pro+ 5G excels. I was able to run Genshin Impact on full settings without running into any issues whatsoever.
The phone was able to run the game well, and the loading times were relatively fast even at max graphics settings. There’s even a game booster mode to help improve the gaming experience. Paired with the 120Hz display, you can enjoy exploring the world of Teyvat on this phone.
However, the phone did heat up after more than 45 minutes of playing Genshin on the max graphics. It was only when the phone heated up did the game started experiencing frame rate drops, and the game started slowing down. Still, it’s an impressive feat considering the realme 12 Pro+ 5G isn’t exactly a gaming phone.
To give you a better idea of how it performs, check out the benchmark scores below.
Antutu Benchmark v10: 664,294
Antutu Storage: 1,939MB/s (Read), 1,868MB/s (Write), 702MB/s and 474MB/s (Random Read/Write)
GeekBench v6 CPU: 1,030 (Sigle Core), 2,888 (Multi-core)
GeekBench v6 GPU: 1,675 (OpenCL), (Vulkan)
PCMark Work 3.0: 12,600
3dMark Wild Life: 3,084 (18.5fps average)
OS, Apps, and UI
The realme 12 Pro+ 5G runs on Android 14 skinned with realme UI 5.0. If you’re used to realme smartphones, then you’re bound to enjoy using this phone. However, you still won’t like the host of bloatware that comes with it once you start up the phone.
Like before, you’ll find realme’s very own app market together with the Google Play store. So first-time users better beware of the difference. As for the bloatware, you get the usual Hot Games and Hot Apps folders which you’ll eventually end up deleting.
The other pre-installed apps might be useful for some, but still, I do wish realme UIs came with less bloatware from the factory. I eventually deleted all of them to free up space too since storage is somewhat limited.
There aren’t too many new special features with realme UI 5.0 aside from smart suggestions and the new Flash Capsule. Flash Capsule is effectively realme’s version of the Dyanmic Island where in timers, notifications pop up at the top portion of the screen. And for old users, you still get split view, flexible window, quick return, and the smart sidebar like before.
Battery and Connectivity
The battery on the realme 12 Pro+ 5G continues to be a 5,000mAh unit. Despite the new, more powerful chipset, the phone did not seem to be more power-hungry. I was able to use the phone an entire day for taking photos, videos, and playing games, and I still had around 25 percent battery life by the time I got home.
I did notice the phone uses up a lot of battery when you’re playing graphic-intensive titles. When I was trying out Genshin on max graphics, I went from 100 percent to 83 percent battery after playing for just 45 minutes. So better bring a power bank if you plan on doing some intensive gaming sessions on the realme 12 Pro+ 5G.
To give you a better idea, we ran PCMark’s Work 3.0 Battery test and were able to get a result of 12 hours and 19 minutes, which is still a decent result.
When you do need to recharge, it doesn’t take too long. The realme 12 Pro+ 5G features 67W SuperVOOC fast charging. According to realme it can recharge the phone from 1 percent to 50 percent in just 19 minutes. Interestingly, this is a lot slower than the 100W charging speed of the realme 11 Pro+ 5G we tried out last year.
In terms of connectivity, you get 5G connectivity, Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth 5.2, Beidou, GPS, Galileo, GLONAASS, and QZSS.
Conclusion
The realme 12 Pro+ 5G might not have changed too much in terms of design compared to its predecessor, but realme did make changes where it matters – performance and camera. Consequently, realme didn’t make the phone too expensive despite the serious performance and camera upgrades.
At a price of just Php 25,999 (with special intro price of Php 21,999 via Lazada, Shopee and Tiktok Shop), it is a bit more expensive than before. But given the upgrades, I would say it is justified.
However, the price increase does mean it has a lot more serious contenders to go up against. Even if you already have the realme 11 Pro+ 5G 46, you won’t feel short-handed if you do trade up.
Nonetheless, the realme 12 Pro+ 5G is a great phone to buy especially if you already need to upgrade to a new model this early 2024. If you have the budget, you can’t go wrong with this phone, and you’ll surely enjoy capturing content with it.
But what do you think of the realme 12 Pro+ 5G? Would you consider buying it or wait for the newer phones to be launched later this year? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
What we liked:
* Really good cameras
* Great performance
* Good value
* Beautiful display
What we didn’t like:
* Heats up when gaming
* Slower battery charging speed compared to before
* Lots of bloatware
realme 12 Pro+ 5G specs:
6.7” FHD+ curved OLED display
2412 x 1080 pixels, 120Hz refresh
0.55mm Double-Reinforced Glass
Qualcomm Snapdragon 7s Gen 2 (4nm)
8-cores, up to 2.4GHz
8GB, 12GB RAM (up to +12GB extended memory)
128GB, 256GB, 512GB internal storage
Triple rear cameras:
– 64MP f/2.8 OmniVision OV64B periscope, OIS
3x optical zoom, 120x digital zoom
– 50MP f/1.8 Sony IMX890 main, OIS
– 8MP f/2.2 ultrawide, 112° FoV
32MP f/2.4 selfie shooter
Dual nano-SIM
5G, 4G LTE
Wi-Fi 6 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac/ax
Bluetooth 5.2
Beidou, GPS, GLONASS, Galileo, QZSS
USB Type-C
In-screen fingerprint sensor
Dual speakers, Dolby Atmos
3D VC cooling system
IP65 water and dust resistance
realme UI 5.0 (Android 14)
5000mAh Li-Ion battery, 67W SuperVOOC wired charging
161.47 x 74.02 x 8.75mm (dimensions)
196g (weight)
Submarine Blue, Navigator Beige, Explorer Red (colors)
1 Response