Realme 10 Pro Plus Review: Can this new mid-range smartphone set the standards high for Realme?

Is the Realme 10 Pro Plus with good specifications worth buying?

The premium mid-range segment has seen many smartphone launches from respective brands in the global market. Lately, some mid-range smartphones have been pushed forward to the premium mid-range segment by increasing prices due to inflation and GST all around these days. Xiaomi, Realme, Samsung, etc. are some of the top brands that are doing well with numerous launches.

Realme has been very successful with its number series as we saw with the Realme 9 Pro Plus (Review) launched last year that comes with a great set of cameras as it had the 50MP f/1.8 Sony IMX766 sensor which is also found on flagship smartphones and other than that all the specifications were very good thus making it a solid recommendation to the buyers out there.

Now this year, Realme is trying to change some things slightly with its Realme 10 Pro Plus which comes with an eye-catching design, a better display, a more powerful chipset, an improved set of cameras and faster charging speeds over the Realme 9 Pro Plus. So how good of an upgrade is the Realme 10 Pro Plus compared to its predecessor and is it worth buying?

Let's find out in the full review.

Realme 10 Pro Plus Design:

The Realme 10 Pro Plus sports a newer design where you get a curved display on the front and also the back is curved along both sides. The back is made up of polycarbonate which seems to be a slight downgrade compared to the Realme 9 Pro Plus which has a premium glass back. The Realme 10 Pro Plus is available in three different colours - Dark Matter Black, Nebula Blue and Hyperspace.

The HyperSpace colour looks stunning as Realme has put a lot of glittering patterns that shine and around the camera module, there is a radiating pattern that gives a prism effect and shines when light strikes at different angles The gold colour at the bottom does change to different colours once you tilt the smartphone in different angles. However, the finish is still glossy which will attract fingerprints or smudges.

The camera modules are larger where the top one has the main camera and the below one has the ultrawide camera and the macro camera. However, the cameras protrude slightly so it does wobble when kept on a flat surface. Alongside the cameras, there is a LED flashlight. The Realme 10 Pro Plus weighs around 173 grams and is thinner along the sides at 7.8mm so it does feel lighter while holding in hands.

Around the sides, there is a polycarbonate frame that does not have any buttons on the left side whereas the right side has the volume buttons and the power button. At the bottom, there is a USB Type-C port, a primary microphone, one loudspeaker grille and a dual SIM card slot. There is neither any microSD card slot for storage expansion nor there is any 3.5mm headphone jack.

The Realme 9 Pro Plus had a 3.5mm headphone jack but here do not get it. On the top, there is a secondary noise-cancelling microphone and secondary speakers. The back does not get an IP rating as such. On the front, the display is curved along the sides which makes it look premium and the bezels are very thin around. At the top in the centre lies the front camera.

Realme 10 Pro Plus Display:

The Realme 10 Pro Plus houses a 6.7-inches Full HD+ (1080x2400 pixels) AMOLED display with a screen-to-body ratio of 20:9. The display is now slightly larger at 6.7 inches compared to the 6.4-inches display on the Realme 9 Pro Plus. The display now has 10-bit colour support and since this is an AMOLED display, you get excellent viewing angles and colour reproduction is very good.

The Realme 10 Pro Plus gets support for a 120Hz refresh rate compared to the 90Hz refresh rate on the Realme 9 Pro Plus. The refresh rate has three different options to choose from - High, Standard and Auto where if you switch to Auto, the refresh rate scales either between 60Hz or 120Hz depending on the content on the display. Switching to standard 60Hz will provide better battery life.

There is no adaptive refresh rate as such which is not a big miss. Combined with the 120Hz refresh rate, you get a 360Hz touch sampling rate for faster touch responses. In terms of display brightness, the Realme 10 Pro Plus can reach a peak brightness of 800nits which is slightly better than the 600nits on the Realme 9 Pro Plus. The visibility of the display is very good under direct sunlight.

The display has three different settings to choose from - Natural, Vivid and Pro mode which contains two different options - Cinematic and Brilliant. Setting the display to Natural covers the sRGB mode, Vivid covers the DCI-P3 gamut and switching to Cinematic mode or Brilliant provides a warmer tone. There is also a temperature slider where you can set the display to a cooler or warmer tone.

Since this is an AMOLED display, you get an optical in-display fingerprint scanner that works fast and is accurate. The display on the Realme 10 Pro Plus has support for HDR10+ and also Widevine L1 but currently, Netflix cannot stream HDR as of now which will be fixed later through a software update. Overall, the display is great for media consumption and a good upgrade over the display of the Realme 9 Pro Plus.

Realme 10 Pro Plus Performance:

The Realme 10 Pro Plus is the first smartphone that is powered by the latest MediaTek Dimensity 1080 chipset which is a very minor upgrade over the Mediatek Dimensity 920 chipset on the Realme 9 Pro Plus. The only difference between both chipsets is the clock speed where the Mediatek Dimensity 1080 chipset is clocked at 2.6GHz compared to 2.5GHz on the Mediatek Dimensity 920 chipset.

This chipset is based on an efficient 6nm process and is coupled with a Mali G68 MC4 GPU. In terms of daily tasks, the smartphone can handle all things easily. All heavy games like BGMI, Call Of Duty Mobile, etc. run smoothly without any lags or stutters. BGMI could easily run at Smooth graphics with Extreme frame rates or you can run at HDR graphics with Ultra frame rates.

After long hours of gaming, the back of the smartphone does not feel warmer at all which is great especially the efficient liquid cooling system underneath. In terms of benchmarks, the scores come out well. In the CPU throttling test, the smartphone could provide a sustained performance of around 85-90 per cent with almost no throttling. 

In terms of network connectivity, you get support for good carrier aggregation and have support for 9 bands of 5G. The Realme 10 Pro Plus is available in three different variants - 6GB RAM with 128GB storage, 8GB RAM with 128GB storage and another 8GB RAM with 256GB storage where RAM speeds are of LPDDR4X and storage speeds are of UFS 2.2.

Realme 10 Pro Plus Software:

The Realme 10 Pro Plus runs on the latest RealmeUI 4.0 based on Android 13 out of the box. You get a lot of features which include customizations where you can change icon shape and size, different styles for fingerprint scanner and Always-On Display which now has some very interesting additions,  and also colours, now there is a new Shelf feature just like the OnePlus smartphones, etc.

Some Android 13 features include an enhanced Privacy Dashboard where you can set permissions and also can control which applications are using the camera, microphone and also location. There are new Media Controls with newer control centres and newer animations. The App Drawer this time supports Large Folders that can be placed on the home screen and Dynamic widgets that do refresh automatically every time.

There is also the RAM Expansion feature where you can extend another 4G RAM thus utilizing the internal storage making a total of 12GB RAM to provide better multitasking. Then there is also the Realme Labs feature which includes Dual-mode Audio, Sleep Capsule, and Heart Rate Measurement which was first introduced on the Realme 9 Pro Plus. 

However, the RealmeUI does bring a lot of bloatware which is very irritating because it is huge in number even compared to last year's Realme 9 Pro Plus but still these can be uninstalled. There are also a couple of ads present which simply is very annoying considering this is a premium mid-range smartphone. In terms of software updates, it is assured to get another two years of AndroidOS updates and three years of security updates.

Realme 10 Pro Plus Cameras:

In terms of cameras, the Realme 10 Pro Plus may seem to be an upgrade as well as a downgrade over the Realme 9 Pro Plus. The Realme 10 Pro Plus has a triple camera setup that consists of a 108MP f/1.8 Samsung HM6 sensor for the main camera, an 8MP f/2.2 ultrawide camera and a 2MP f/2.4 macro camera. On the front, there is a 16MP f/2.4 Sony IMX471 sensor for the camera.

The main camera takes images with details that look sharper and the dynamic range is good. The contrast comes out well but there is some overprocessing in the images. The amount of noise is very less but still the Realme 9 Pro Plus takes images with slightly better dynamic range and noise is also very less compared to that of the Realme 10 Pro Plus.

The images taken using the HDR mode come out with an excellent level of detail and the contrast is also very good. At night, the Realme 10 Pro Plus uses the Auto Night Mode which turns on automatically and this yields images with excellent dynamic range, good exposure and colour saturation that is natural without any oversharpening present.

If you manually disable the Auto Night Mode, the images come out with a good amount of details and good enough dynamic range but you do get some amount of noise present in the background. Here is where the Realme 9 Pro Plus outperforms the Realme 10 Pro Plus as it has OIS present which means less noise and better dynamic range and colour saturation in the background.

The 8MP ultrawide camera does a good job in terms of details and the dynamic range is also good but still, there is a lot of distortion around the edges and noise is present in the background. The colours look natural but things look overprocessed slightly. At night, the images come out with decent dynamic range but details look slightly softer and a lot of noise is present in the background.

The 2MP macro camera does a decent job in terms of details that look softer and colours that look washed out. It is better to use the main camera by going closer to a subject which results in good details and dynamic range. The portraits come out with good dynamic range and proper edge detection with a good level of background blur. The skin tones look natural without any oversharpening as such. 

On the front, there is a 16MP camera that does a good job in terms of selfies as you get good dynamic range and details look sharper with an almost less noisy background. The skin tones look natural without any oversharpening as such. The selfie portraits come out with good edge detection but there is some amount of oversharpening in the background.

The main camera can record 4K videos at 30fps and these videos come out with a good level of detail and dynamic range but there is some amount of noise in the background. It does miss out on OIS so the exposure takes a hit. The ultrawide camera and the selfie camera are limited to 1080p video recording at 30fps only. Overall, the cameras are good but still the Realme 9 Pro Plus holds a slight edge.

Realme 10 Pro Plus Battery Life:

The Realme 10 Pro Plus sports a slightly larger 5000mAh battery which is 500mAh more than the 4500mAh battery on the Realme 9 Pro Plus. In terms of normal usage which includes playing casual games, streaming social media, and web browsing with the display set to 120Hz, the smartphone easily lasted for one and a half days with some charge left.

With heavy usage and the display set to 120Hz, the smartphone lasted for one day easily. Setting it to standard 60Hz, the smartphone easily lasted for two days and with heavy usage, it lasted for one and a half days. The standard screen-on time was around 7-8 hours which is really good. In terms of charging, the Realme 10 Pro Plus is bundled with an 80W fast charger inside the box.

But the smartphone charges at 67W only and 0 to 100 per cent takes around 45-50 minutes which is fast. However, 0 to 50 per cent takes around 15 minutes but you do not get any support for USB PD charging since the charger is Type-A to Type-C.

Realme 10 Pro Plus Audio Quality:

The Realme 10 Pro Plus sports a dual stereo speaker setup that sounds loud and clear since now you have a dedicated dual speaker setup and the sound comes out equally good. The bass level is good but now you miss out on a 3.5mm headphone jack which was present on the Realme 9 Pro Plus. There is support for Dolby Atmos which provides enhanced sound quality.

Verdict:

The Realme 10 Pro Plus seems to be a good premium mid-range smartphone as it brings a unique design with a curved display that has a 120Hz refresh rate and is good for media consumption, gaming and performance are good, the battery life is good and the cameras are also good. However, there are some areas where it could have been better.

The software experience is good as there are a lot of features but RealmeUI now comes with a lot of bloatware and there are ads present which is very disappointing since this is a premium mid-range smartphone. The main camera though being a 108MP one is not as good as the 50MP camera with OIS on the Realme 9 Pro Plus and also you get a polycarbonate build instead of glass.

So if you look at the Realme 10 Pro Plus, it seems to be a good upgrade over the Realme 9 Pro Plus in terms of design, display, battery life and performance but when it comes to cameras and build quality, then the Realme 9 Pro Plus holds the clear edge. So if you want a curved display with all the good specifications, then the Realme 10 Pro Plus is a great buy.

But if you want a better set of cameras and a glass design, then the Realme 9 Pro Plus is a better option as it also brings a 90Hz AMOLED display and powerful MediaTek Dimensity 920 chipset. The Realme 10 Pro Plus is a great buy considering all the specifications in the premium mid-range segment in the market.