The midrange smartphone segment has been very competitive this year. As we’re past the midway point, a new challenger has arrived in the form of the realme 13 Pro 5G.
Devices as of late have offered high-end cameras, great performance, and the inclusion of AI-powered tools to stand out. The newly-released realme 13 Pro has all of these and more, all while boasting an elegant Monet-inspired design.
Having spent some time with the device, we’ve found that the device does indeed live up to the hype. We can attest that it has a ton of favorable segments consisting of its design, smooth display, and surprisingly—battery life.
So the question here is—Is this phone for you? Let’s dive right in to see the five knockout features of the realme 13 Pro 5G before you buy it!
Table of Contents
Powerful, Contemporary Camera System
The realme 13 Pro 5G is equipped with dual-rear cameras. This is headlined by a 50-megapixel Sony LYT-600 main sensor with OIS paired with an 8-megapixel wide angle shooter.
The realme 12+ 5G sports the same cameras, albeit the realme 13 Pro 5G lacks a 2-megapixel macro sensor. However, I assure readers that this device can take better shots. We’ll leave readers with sample shots taken by my fellow producer below.
The rear cameras worked seamlessly, helping us take flagship-level portraits with the subject taking center stage. Basically, the quality was crisp, details were sharp, and photos turned out great with minimal effort.
Turns out, the device’s photo capabilities leverage AI Ultra Clarity. It uses AI to improve the resolution and clarity of your shots. In other words, the phone uses post-processing to deliver better details.
Whether it’s portraits, buildings, or plants, users pursuing smartphone photography can surely make the most out of the device. Not to mention, it comes at a great price. But of course, we’ll cover that later!
On the topic of AI, the phone also comes with a built-in eraser. Dubbed as AI Smart Removal, users can remove selected objects to remove clutter from your shots.
It not only erases photobombers, but it also intelligently replaces objects to make photos come off more natural.
The realme 13 Pro 5G isn’t a slouch when it comes to selfies. Users are treated to a 32-megapixel front-facing camera courtesy of Sony as well. Leaving samples below!
I took a liking to the phone’s selfie shooter because it produces great facial details and skin tones. It even uses AI to separate the foreground from the background.
It’s subjective, but I appreciate how the camera brightens photos. The processing isn’t as aggressive as I expected it to be, and I believe it’s a nice touch. Safe to say, users are sure to be social media-ready with the device at hand.
Sleek Design
The phone has an elegant design that’s almost indistinguishable from its better half in the realme 13 Pro+ 5G. For those interested, the only noticeable difference between the two is this model’s smaller sensor next to its LED flash.
Our unit came in the Monet Purple colorway, which had a glass back panel and what feels like a matte finish. It even has an IP65 rating, making it safe from dust and water. The phone also has curved edges, which help make for a thin, light, and sleek design overall.
The phone displays a prim, proper, and premium demeanor. While the design was inspired by Claude Monet’s artwork, I also recognized realme’s personal touches on the device.
I have to say, I’m glad realme kept the camera island design from its predecessor. Reminiscent of a luxury watch face, the jewelry-like rims really help the camera island stick out.
The camera module was made with CNC (computer numerical control) processing. This work of art was also developed meticulously, with 436 metal lines enveloped around the entire module.
Lastly, our Monet Purple (8.23mm) is thinner in comparison to its Emerald Green (8.41mm) counterpart. However, it is heavier, weighing 190 grams. The Green variant weighs 185.5 grams.
Immersive Display and Audio
The realme 13 Pro 5G has a curved OLED display panel with a refresh rate of 120Hz. It even has ArmorShell protection from Corning Gorilla Glass 7i.
Long story short, it’s an appreciated immersive display safe (and certified) against drops and other mishaps.
Going into detail, the screen offers vibrant colors, deep blacks, and true to life hues. The high refresh rate enables buttery-smooth screen animations throughout your use.
I’m giving a nod to the manufacturers for the razor-thin, asymmetrical bezels too. I actually thought it was even, but it’s pretty hard to tell. All in all, it made for an enjoyable browsing and multimedia consumption experience.
Speaking of multimedia, the phone has Hi-Res Dual Stereo Speakers situated on the top and bottom of the device. The speakers were fairly louder than I expected and packed notable clarity even in the sound stage.
Insane Battery Life
This newly-released device packs a generous 5,200mAh battery with 45W of SUPERVOOC Charge support via USB Type-C. Numbers are one thing, but the phone exceeded expectations.
In PCMark’s Work 3.0 Battery Life test, the realme 13 Pro 5G did pretty well. It was able to pump 18 hours and 37 minutes of activity. This test was conducted at 50% brightness, muted volume, and in airplane mode.
In our video loop test, the phone gave me a whopping 33 hours of consistent playback. We pulled this off with full HD movies at 50% brightness and in airplane mode.
If you want a high-performing device that lasts, I’m sure you won’t be disappointed with this device. Considering overall performance, its display, and the fact that I used it a lot over Wi-Fi—the phone speaks for itself.
Top-Tier Performance
Under the hood, the phone is powered by a Snapdragon 7s Gen 2 chipset based on a 4nm process technology. This is the same chipset behind the likes of the Motorola Edge (2024), Redmi Note 13 Pro 5G, and POCO X6.
The chipset can attend to performance-intensive tasks like gaming, totaling 8 CPU cores. Graphics-wise, the realme 13 Pro 5G packs an Adreno 710. Here are the chip’s working cores below.
4x Cortex-A78 performance cores running up to 2.4GHz
4x Cortex-A55 power-efficient cores running up to 1.95GHz
The Cortex-A78 performance cores power the device’s active apps and games, supported by the Adreno 710 GPU. Meanwhile, the Cortex-A55 power-efficient cores run most of the background and inactive apps.
I can infer that the evenly-distributed cores mesh well together. The cores altogether help end users find a balance between power consumption and device usage.
In addition, our review unit offered 12GB of RAM with 256GB of internal storage. This is a decent configuration that shines with fast storage.
The chip performed quite well with the device. I can vouch that users could definitely game even with multiple background apps running.
I should note that the realme 13 Pro+ 5G uses the same chipset. My colleague who reviewed the Pro+ model tried running Genshin Impact at max settings.
It heated up just a tiny bit, but this was expected. Performance-wise, the game was so smooth. No frame drops, no lag, just a smooth gameplay experience.
If you guys want to check out his video on the realme 13 Pro+ 5G, feel free to check it out on our YouTube channel!
Personally, I mostly spent my time with the device on Pokemon Unite. It pretty much performed as you would expect, and I have no gripes considering how things turned out.
For those interested, we’ll leave readers with our synthetic benchmark scores below.
| Benchmark | Score |
|---|---|
| Antutu | 663,044 |
| Antutu Storage Test | 76,018 |
| S. Read | 20,142 |
| Speed | 1755.3MB/s |
| S. Write | 18,264 |
| Speed | 1591.7MB/s |
| R. Access | 37,612 |
| R. Speed | 634.0MB/s |
| W. Speed | 397.0MB/s |
| 3D Mark: Wild Life | 3085 |
| Geekbench 6 CPU Single | 915 |
| Geekbench 6 CPU Multi | 2581 |
| Geekbench 6 GPU OpenCL | 1763 |
| Geekbench 6 GPU Vulkan | 2156 |
| PC Mark Work 3.0 Performance | 13,190 |
Final Thoughts
In the beginning of the article, we wanted to address if the realme Pro 13 5G is the phone for you. Honestly, if readers are under a modest budget while wanting a smartphone that can do it all—it’s a great choice.
The phone excels in a ton of segments, which served as a rather pleasant surprise. We’ll run the bullets one by one for those that need a quick summary.
Its cameras offer crisp photos with low maintenance, AI-powered post-processing to fix otherwise forgettable shots. It has a sleek design yet was made with a ton of intent behind what it could actually do.
The display is smooth, offering users a great overall scrolling and multimedia experience. Battery-wise, it’s deceptively good and can definitely last users the entire should they need it for extended periods.
Last but not least, it performs well with minimal gripes from my end. From my time with the device, I’d say the realme 13 Pro 5G is noteworthy. One thing’s for sure, it’s definitely in the running for notable mid range smartphones in 2024.
For those that are interested in this device, we’ll leave you with links below. Aside from Monet Purple, readers can look into its Emerald Green colorway.
The realme 13 Pro 5G is available with a suggested retail price of PHP 24,999. This comes with 12GB of RAM and 256GB of internal storage. You can find it available online at realme’s TikTok Shop.
