Realme 6i review

Realme has its own UI, premieres on Android 10

The Realme 6i is among the first Realme devices to boot Android 10 with the brand new Realme UI launcher. The maker has promised us a new take on ColorOS that's made by Oppo, and with the most recent Series 6 and X50 it surely delivered.

The new launcher looks a lot like vanilla Android with no-nonsense homescreens, simplistic notification/toggles area, and easy-to-use task switcher. An App drawer is available, too, and it is as clutter-free as one could hope for.

Realme UI 1.0

The new Realme UI supports different icon packs, so if you are not happy with the default one, you can opt for material style, pebbles, or you can even fully customize them by your liking.

Customizing system and icons

There are a lot of powerful tools within the settings menu if you want full control over your Android OS. Or you can leave everything as is and enjoy hassle-free Android experience optimized by Realme's AI algorithms and machine learning.

Settings

Similar to the recent Galaxies, the Realme UI offers a Smart Sidebar on the edge of the screen - you can customize the actions and app shortcuts that appear there.

Smart Sidebar

The multimedia apps such as Gallery, Music, and Videos - are provided by Realme. There is also a redesigned File Manager and even a Phone Manager app. And with that, the non-Google app list is complete.

Gallery • Music • Videos • Phone Manager • File Manager

Depending on the market, your Realme 6i may or may not come with some pre-installed third-party apps that may or may not display annoying notifications. Worst-case scenario, you'd have to disable or remove such apps and services.

Performance and benchmarks

The Realme 6i packs the newly introduced MediaTek Helio G80 - a gaming-centric SoC for budget purposes. It is fabricated on the 12nm FinFET manufacturing process from TSMC.

The Helio G80 packs an octa-core CPU with two high-performance Cortex-A75 cores ticking at 2.00GHz and six energy-efficient Corext-A55 cores working at 1.8GHz.

The Mali-G52 MC2 GPU is in charge of graphics, and each of its two cores is clocked at 1000MHz (Kirin 810 G52 ones tick at 820MHz). These should provide great performance on the 720p screen.

The Realme 6i here packs 4GB of RAM and has 128GB storage, but a 3GB+64GB model exists on some markets.

The compound AnTuTu test puts the Realme 6i behind the Realme 6 and 6 Pro, though that's understandable - it has inferior GPU raw performance and a slightly lesser main processor. The performance is more than adequate for the class, though.

AnTuTu 8

Higher is better

• Huawei P40 Lite
  325777
• Honor 9X Pro
  312668
• Realme 6
  288931
• Redmi Note 8 Pro
  279355
• Realme 6 Pro
  268785
• Realme X2
  257443
• Realme 6i
  202275
• Honor 9X
  187528
• Samsung Galaxy A51
  175363
• Xiaomi Redmi Note 8T
  167395

Indeed, the Realme 6 and 6 Pro use newer high-performance A76 cores, plus all cores run faster. The Realme 6i has A75+A55, once again - enough for the budget class and nobody should be experiencing bottlenecks with this processor.

GeekBench 4.4 (multi-core)

Higher is better

• Huawei P40 Lite
  7846
• Honor 9X Pro
  7836
• Realme 6
  7815
• Redmi Note 8 Pro
  6999
• Realme X2
  6926
• Realme 6 Pro
  6513
• Realme X
  5915
• Realme 6i
  5890
• Realme 3 Pro
  5881
• Xiaomi Redmi Note 8T
  5620
• Samsung Galaxy A51
  5401
• Honor 9X
  5345
• Realme 3
  4936

GeekBench 4.4 (single-core)

Higher is better

• Huawei P40 Lite
  2844
• Honor 9X Pro
  2831
• Realme 6 Pro
  2639
• Realme 6
  2606
• Realme X2
  2508
• Redmi Note 8 Pro
  2472
• Realme 6i
  1835
• Samsung Galaxy A51
  1668
• Honor 9X
  1559
• Xiaomi Redmi Note 8T
  1519
• Realme 3
  1482
• Realme X
  1475
• Realme 3 Pro
  1471

GeekBench 5.1 (multi-core)

Higher is better

• Honor 9X Pro
  1911
• Huawei P40 Lite
  1862
• Realme X2
  1750
• Realme 6
  1726
• Realme 6 Pro
  1666
• Redmi Note 8 Pro
  1622
• Realme 6i
  1349
• Samsung Galaxy A51
  1294

GeekBench 5.1 (single-core)

Higher is better

• Honor 9X Pro
  594
• Huawei P40 Lite
  591
• Realme 6 Pro
  565
• Realme 6
  548
• Realme X2
  545
• Redmi Note 8 Pro
  493
• Realme 6i
  388
• Samsung Galaxy A51
  347

The raw performance of the dual-core Mali-G52 is indeed mediocre at best.

GFX 3.1 Car scene (1080p offscreen)

Higher is better

• Honor 9X Pro
  21
• Huawei P40 Lite
  21
• Realme 6 Pro
  18
• Realme 6
  18
• Redmi Note 8 Pro
  18
• Realme X2
  16
• Realme 3 Pro
  13
• Realme 6i
  9.4
• Realme 3
  8
• Honor 9X
  7.7
• Xiaomi Redmi Note 8T
  7
• Samsung Galaxy A51
  6.6

Luckily, the Realme 6i has a lower resolution screen (720p), and the onscreen tests show it is a great gaming device for the class and provides the same graphic punch as its Realme 6 siblings. Nice!

GFX 3.1 Manhattan (onscreen)

Higher is better

• Realme 6i
  31
• Honor 9X Pro
  30
• Huawei P40 Lite
  30
• Realme 6 Pro
  27
• Realme 6
  27
• Realme 3
  26
• Redmi Note 8 Pro
  24
• Realme X2
  24
• Realme 3 Pro
  20
• Honor 9X
  12
• Xiaomi Redmi Note 8T
  11
• Samsung Galaxy A51
  8.9

GFX 3.1 Car scene (onscreen)

Higher is better

• Realme 6 Pro
  19
• Honor 9X Pro
  18
• Huawei P40 Lite
  18
• Realme 6i
  17
• Realme 6
  16
• Realme 3
  15
• Redmi Note 8 Pro
  14
• Realme X2
  13
• Realme 3 Pro
  11
• Honor 9X
  6.5
• Xiaomi Redmi Note 8T
  5.9
• Samsung Galaxy A51
  5.6

Thanks to the 720p display, the Realme 6i turned out to be an excellent performer. It will not hesitate whatever the task at hand, but most importantly - the 6i should provide unmatched performance for this sub €200 budget class.

We experienced no bottlenecks and throttling, no heating issues either.