realme just released the C25s here in the Philippines, and it’s essentially the same phone as the C25 that was launched back in April with a slight performance upgrade in the form of a MediaTek Helio G85 processor. We got our hands on it already, so here’s our first impressions.
Coming in at a size of 6.5-inches, we get a good size for doing a variety of tasks such as watching videos, social media usage, and gaming. It’s fairly thick at 9.6mm, which can be attributed to both its budget nature and huge 6,000mAh battery. This makes it slightly more difficult to hold one-handed compared to something thinner, but that’s a subjective matter anyway.
The right side contains the volume rocker and power button, which are placed towards the upper-middle of the frame.
On the left, we have the card tray that can accommodate two nano-SIM cards and a microSD card, which is pretty nice.
At the bottom, we have a 3.5mm headphone port, the main microphone, USB Type-C port, and loudspeaker.
Upfront, we get a 6.5-inch IPS LCD display running at a resolution of 720 x 1600 with a peak brightness of 570 nits, which is actually another upgrade over the C25, which only gets up to 480 nits.
Aside from the brighter screen, it’s pretty much what you’d expect from this sort of entry-level IPS panel in terms of colors, contrast, and viewing angles.
The side bezels are fairly thin, while the chin is a little thicker. The top bezel contains the speakerphone, as well as the 8MP front camera.
Checking out the back panel, it’s made of textured plastic which means you get a grippier surface without the drawbacks of glass, such as being a fingerprint and smudge magnet.
Found here are the square-shaped triple camera module on the upper left, capacitive fingerprint scanner on the upper middle, and realme logo on the lower left. Our unit here is in the Water Blue color, but the C25s is also available in Water Grey.
Taking a closer look at those cameras, the C25s’s rear module consists of a 48MP main sensor, 2MP depth sensor, and 2MP macro. Again, this is the same as the C25. Here are a few of the sample photos we were able to get:
Now getting into the internals, the C25s is powered by a MediaTek Helio G85 processor, which is a slight upgrade over the C25’s Helio G70. This is paired with 4GB of RAM and 64GB or 128GB of internal storage. In terms of performance, the G85 is only marginally better than the G70, with the biggest jump only being a 1000MHz GPU turbo speed from the former, versus 820MHz on the latter.
For this reason, we’re not entirely sure why realme decided to release the C25s in the first place with a seemingly insignificant upgrade over the C25. Or perhaps, why release the C25 at all, and not just go with the C25s? In any case, the C25s is here and is available for purchase for PHP7,490, which is the 4GB + 64GB model, and PHP8,490 for the 4GB + 128GB model.
Let us know in the comments section if you guys want to see a full review, or what your thoughts are on the realme C25s.
realme C25s specs:
6.5-inch (1600 x 720) LCD screen, 570nits
TÜV Rheinland Certification
MediaTek Helio G85 processor
4GB LPDDR4X RAM
64GB, 128GB storage
Expandable via microSD
Triple rear cameras:
• 48MP F1.8 (main)
• 2MP F2.4 (B&W)
• 2MP F2.4 (macro)
8MP F2.0 front camera
4G LTE
Dual-SIM (nano)
WiFi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac
Bluetooth 5.0
GPS, AGPS, GLONASS, BEIDOU
3.5mm audio jack
USB Type-C
realme UI 2.0 (Android 11)
6,000mAh battery w/ 18W fast charging
164.5 x 75.9 x 9.6mm
209g
Watery Blue, Watery Grey
