Realme 9i 5G Review: 5G Upgrade With Improved Appearance

Realme 9i 5G Review: 5G Upgrade With Improved Appearance

Realme has been improving in the low-cost market, and the Realme 9i 5G continues this trend. The phone seems to be the same as the Realme 9i, which came out earlier this year. It has a 90Hz display, a MediaTek Dimensity 810 chipset, three 50MP cameras, and a unique design. It also has a big 500mAh battery and can be charged quickly with 18W. All of this for less than $15,000 seems like a good deal.

Realme 9i 5G Price

In India, there are two different kinds of Realme 9i 5G. The base model costs Rs. 14,999 and has 4GB RAM and 64GB storage. The other model, which has 6GB RAM and 128GB storage, costs Rs.16,999. There are 3 color options for the phone: “Rocking Black,” “Soulful Blue,” and “Metallica Gold.” You can buy the phone online from the Realme website or from Flipkart.

Realme 9i 5G Specs

Before we talk about the device in detail, let’s look at its specs on paper:

⦁ Display: 6.6 inches IPS LCD
⦁ Chipset: MediaTek Density 810
⦁ RAM & ROM: 4GB RAM 64GB Storage and 6GB RAM 128GB Storage
⦁ Software: Android v12
⦁ Rear camera: 50MP + 2MP + 2MP
⦁ Selfie camera: 8 MP
⦁ Battery: 5000 mAh
⦁ Weight: 187 grams
⦁ Dimensions: 164.4 x 75.1 x 8.1 mm

Realme 9i 5G Design and Build

The Realme 9i 5G will stand out from a long distance. You can tell how unique and expensive the phone looks just by looking at it. The back of the Realme 9i 5G has a new Laser Light Design. The shiny, reflective back looks like the back of old CDs, but it’s covered with glitter instead.

The phone has three color options: Soulful Blue, Rocking Black, and Metallica Gold. I’m reviewing the Gold version, which is now my favorite. The back is made of plastic, and on my gold version, it picks up a lot of smudges and fingerprints, sometimes making the phone look less shiny.

Another thing that stands out is that there is no camera unit. The three lenses in the back are just put on the back panel. The Realme 9i 5G only has a thickness of 8.1 mm and weighs about 187 grams. You can notice that the corners are curved and the edges are flat, so the phone won’t dig into your hands if you use it for a long time.

Realme 9i 5G Camera

There are three cameras on the back of the Realme 9i 5G. This has the main camera with 50MP, a portrait lens with 2MP, and a macro sensor with 2MP. There is an 8MP camera on the face of the phone for taking selfies. It has modes like 50MP mode, portrait mode, night mode, street mode, photo mode, pro mode, panorama mode, ultra-macro mode, slow-mo mode, and text scanner mode.

During the day, the main camera’s shots show a lot of detail. The lens quickly focuses on the subject, which makes for good photos. It took good pictures with pretty natural colors during the day. But sometimes it makes the images look strange because it makes the contrast stronger.

Overall, it did a great job of making bright and clear colors. The HDR mode makes the pictures even better without making them too sharp. But the main camera has trouble with low light at night, and it sometimes loses details.

Here, the night mode is handy because it keeps some of the colors by minimizing exposure and noise. But the shots taken with the Night mode still didn’t have enough details. The processing speed has gotten much faster with the new SOC, but the images don’t look much different.

Realme 9i 5G Charging and Battery

The Realme 9i 5G has a large 5000mAh battery and can be charged quickly with 18W. The backup battery can easily last for a whole day of use, and if you don’t use it too much, it might even have some power left over for the next day. I got about 6 hours of screen time with my light use, which is good. This was done by scrolling through Instagram, making calls, playing games, and watching YouTube videos.

Now, let’s talk about how fast the 18W fast charging is. It’s not so fast. From 0% to 100%, it takes about 2 hours and 30 minutes to fully charge the phone. The 4G version had fast charging with 33W, therefore it would have been lovely to see the same thing here. But for some purpose, Realme has also taken shortcuts with how the phone charges.

Display of Realme 9i 5G

The FHD+ IPS LCD screen on the Realme 9i 5G is 6.6 inches. The LCD cover has a refresh rate of 90 Hz and a peak brightness of 400 nits. The screen gets bright enough to utilize indoors, but it’s hard to see outside when the sun is right in front of it.

Even though the IPS LCD panel makes the colors less vivid, they are still good enough for everyday use. The text on the browser is clear, and the display has a cool color tone. In the display settings, you can also change the color tone. I thought the default mode was good enough even for my daily use.

Next, the 90Hz panel makes sure that the scrolling is smooth. With a touch sampling rate of 180Hz, the panel can respond quickly to your touch while you play your new favorite battle royal games. My display was smooth and didn’t shake at all.

Realme 9i 5G Performance

The Realme 9i 5G has a Mediatek Dimensity 810 chipset, up to 6GB of RAM, and 128GB of storage space. It is a good mid-range chipset that works well for casual use and can handle multiple tasks simultaneously. You can also use the internal storage to add 5GB to the RAM.

The way RAM was managed was also very good. Even after hours, apps opened right where I left them. For casual use, the phone works well. I ram multiple apps at the same time, and I haven’t seen any jitter or lag. The app opened quickly as well.

I tried some gameplay like COD Mobile, Apex Legends Mobile, and Asphalt 9 because they use many resources. Except for Apex Legends Mobile, all of the games ran well on low to medium settings.

Realme 9i 5G’s software and user interface

Regarding software, the Realme 9i 5G continues to run on Realme UI 3.0, based on Android 12. The Realme UI has a lot of features and ways to customize it. On the other hand, it is very easy to use the interface.

One of my favorite parts of the phone is the Smart Slider. By swiping on the edge of the screen, you can get to some shortcuts. Other UI features include a split-screen option, windows that can be moved around, and many ways to change the wallpaper and home screen.

You can also change to dark-colored themes and use other basic features. Then there are the standard features, like multi-window, which is helpful on the big 6.5-inch screen. Now, let’s talk about the flexible windows feature, also called floating windows. This lets you keep one app open on the screen while you use another.

Conclusion

Let me obtain this straight: the Realme 9i 5G is not a big improvement over the version without 5G. Realme is only betting on how its phones look, which is not something that everyone likes. With a 90Hz screen, the performance is good enough. The battery life is good, which makes the whole experience better. But Realme has taken many shortcuts to make a cheap 5G phone.