Realme 5 vs Redmi Note 8: Which one Should you Buy?

Realme and Xiaomi have become the greatest competitors in the budget and mid-range smartphone department. With new launches almost every month, we consumers are blessed with cheaper and feature-packed smartphones to choose from. Let’s compare the latest budget smartphone rivals from these two companies i.e. the Realme 5 and the Redmi Note 8.

Build and Design:

Redmi Note 8 has a gradient glass back finish making it look premium and compact on the hand. The camera bump is a little more and it lacks the curved edges on the back unlike the Realme 5 which has a crystal-like pattern plastic back finish. Note 8 weighs 190 grams with 8.4mm thickness whereas Realme weighs 198 grams with 9.3mm thickness due to its bigger battery. Though the back finish is up to your personal preferences, Redmi Note 8 is less prone to scratches and is more durable than Realme 5.

Winner: Redmi Note 8

Display:

Redmi Note 8 has a 6.3 inch FHD+ IPS (2280 x 1080 – 409 PPI) display with Corning Gorilla Glass 5 protection whereas the Realme 5 has a bigger 6.5-inch display but with lesser resolution and protection i.e. (1600 x 720 – 269 PPI) and Corning Gorilla Glass 3+. Both displays have the same waterdrop notch design with thin bezels on all three sides and a little larger chin. Although the viewing angles and color reproduction are similar on both displays, Redmi Note 8 wins here due to the higher resolution for your content.

Winner: Redmi Note 8

Software and Performance:

Both phones have the same Qualcomm Snapdragon 665 Octa-Core 2.0 GHz (11nm) processor with Adreno 610 GPU which is good enough for your day to day tasks and all types of gaming at medium graphics. You may experience lag or frame drop sometimes on high-end games like PUBG and Asphalt 9. There are no excessive heating issues on either phone and on your hands, you won’t notice the heat difference between these two after intense gaming workouts. The benchmark scores are also pretty neck-to-neck for these two. So, there’s no clear winner here. Even though both these phones run on Android Pie, Redmi Note 8 will be getting the MIUI 11 update in December 2019 whereas you will have to wait for the Color OS 7 update on the Realme 5 until 2020. Although both the OS have some bloatware, I personally think the MIUI is cleaner and smooth.

It’s a Tie here.

Camera:

Both phones have the same quad-camera setup except for their primary sensor i.e. 8MP f/2.2 ultrawide, 2MP f/2.4 macro and 2MP f/2.4 depth sensor. Redmi Note 8 has a 48MP f/1.8 primary sensor whereas Realme 5 has a 12MP f/1.8 one. The front camera on their notches is also the same 13MP f/2.0 sensor. After looking into the sample images, we found out the images of the Realme 5 to be brighter and clearer though sometimes overexposed.

Redmi Note 8 has boosted colors and a wider dynamic range. In difficult lighting conditions, both phones perform similarly in exposing both your subject and the background. During portraits, edge detection and clarity are also similar between these two. The ultrawide images have good color reproduction and no fish-eye distortion from both these phones. The night mode pictures are bright on both but less grainy on the Realme 5. The macro shots have more clarity on the Redmi Note 8. Under good lighting conditions, selfies and selfie portraits are very good with enough clarity and saturation from both the phones.

It’s a Tie Here.

Battery:

Redmi Note 8 has a 4000 mAh battery whereas Realme 5 has a whopping 5000 mAh. But there’s a catch. Note 8 has 18W fast charger included in the box whereas Realme 5 has no fast charging support. In terms of our standard video loop test, Realme 5 lasted around 22 hours whereas Note 8 lasted only around 13 hours. It is not only due to its bigger battery but due to the lower resolution display. In terms of charging Note 8 with the 18W fast charger, it took us around 2 hours to charge from 0 to 100 whereas Realme took around 3 hours to charge from 0 to 100. Also, I really need to complain here to Realme for providing us a Micro-USB port instead of USB Type-C on the Redmi Note 8.

Winner: Redmi Note 8

Other Features:

Both phones have a single downward-firing speaker and the sound quality is pretty similar on both. If I really had to pick a winner, it would be the Note 8 but by a very small margin. I would highly recommend you to take advantage of the headphone jack found on both the phones instead of relying on the speakers for engaging in your content. Both the phones have Dual-SIM Card Slot of 4G volte with extra micro-SD card slot. Redmi Note 8 supports SD-card of up to 512GB whereas Realme 5 supports up to 256GB which I think is more than enough on a smartphone.

Also Read: Realme 5 and Realme 5 Pro Launched with Quad Rear Cameras

Both phones have a physical fingerprint sensor on the back and support Face Unlock. The speed of fingerprint and Face Unlock on both the phones is equally fast and reliable. I recommend not to depend on the Face Unlock too much for security unlike in the flagship phones and iPhones.

Also Read: Redmi Note 8 and Note 8 Pro Arrives in Nepal

Redmi Note 8 also comes with a Notification LED and IR blaster on the top unlike Realme 5 which lacks both. Redmi Note also has better WideVine version support which basically means than you can stream online content from various streaming providers with a higher resolution than on the Realme 5.

Overall Winner: Redmi Note 8

Availability and Price:

Redmi Note 8 comes in three color options:  Space Black, Neptune Blue, and Moonlight White whereas Realme 5 comes in two color options: Crystal Blue and Crystal Purple.

You can expect a discount of 4-5% on these phones from various offline stores and don’t forget to watch out for offers from Daraz and SastoDeal.