Realme GT Neo 3 review: Realme makes a compelling case to choose speed over substance

The Realme GT Neo 3 was the latest smartphone from the company to make its debut in India. However, the main theme of the GT Neo 3 is speed, whether that comes in the form of a powerful chipset, a super-smooth display, or incredibly fast charging.

The Realme GT Neo 3 price in India starts from Rs 36,999 for the base 8GB/128GB model, while bumping up the storage to 256GB will set you back Rs 38,999. The 12GB/256GB variant of the Realme GT Neo 3 (150W) will set you back Rs 42,999. The company also recently launched the Realme GT Neo 3 Thor: Love and Thunder Limited Edition handset with 12GB/256GB of memory for Rs 39,999 in India. So without any further delays, let’s take an in-depth look at the Realme GT Neo 3.

Design and Build

With the Realme GT Neo 3, the company follows the same ambitious design of previous Realme phones. The phone comes in blue and white colours with two racing stripes running across the left of the device. There’s also a matte black model with no racing stripes if you are looking for a more subtle touch. The back of the phone is carved out of a piece of matte AG glass, making the surface quite smooth and resistant to fingerprints.

The Realme GT Neo 3 comes in three colour options including Asphalt Black, Sprint White, and Nitro Blue, although the Black model doesn’t feature the racing stripes. The camera layout on the back of the GT Neo 3 is similar to that on the OnePlus 9 Pro (Review), although it has one less camera sensor. The rest of the design is pretty standard, with the hole-punch camera cut out on the front and the traditional buttons and ports.

The Realme GT Neo 3 retains the plastic build from the Realme GT 2 Pro, while the Neo 3 also comes with a glass back. However, the phone does opt for a polycarbonate frame. Users can also opt for the Realme GT Neo 3 (150W) Thor: Love and Thunder Limited Edition, which the company released today in partnership with Marvel Studios. The overall design and build of the Realme GT Neo 3 are pretty good, the phone has a unique finish and is comfortable to use.

Display

On the front, the GT Neo 3 sports a vibrant 6.7-inch FHD+ AMOLED panel with 10-bit colours. The screen also supports HDR10+ and 100 percent DCI-P3 colour coverage. The display also supports a 120Hz refresh rate and a touch sampling rate of up to 1000Hz. The screen on the GT Neo 3 is quite fast and responsive, making it excellent for gaming. The phone also comes with a dedicated display chip that kicks in for frame interpolation when gaming. The display pumps out sharp images and vibrant colours, while also offering excellent viewing angles.

Additionally, the panel has slim bezels ensuring plenty of screen real estate. HDR content looked good on the display, while the screen also supports Widevine L1. The drawback is that the display here is not flagship-grade and can only scale the refresh rate between 60Hz and 120Hz. Realme has done a solid job with the display on the GT Neo 3, it is nothing out of the ordinary, but if it ain’t broke, why fix it.

Performance

Moving on to performance and the Realme GT Neo 3 certainly managed to impress. The GT Neo 3 was the world’s first smartphone to feature the MediaTek Dimensity 8100 SoC. Furthermore, the chip is paired with up to 12GB of LPDDR5 RAM and up to 256GB of UFS 3.1 storage. Realme has also equipped the GT Neo 3 with a large vapour chamber with 9 layers for optimal heat dissipation.

In our Geekbench test, the MediaTek chip on the GT Neo 3 performed exceptionally, surpassing the Realme GT 2 Pro (Review) with the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chip in the multi-core test. The phone scored 962 points in the single-core test and 4017 points in the multi-core test. However, this wasn’t the case with gaming as the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chip is capable of handling games on higher settings at higher frame rates.

Among the games tested on the GT Neo 3 were Call of Duty: Mobile, Diablo Immortal, Apex Legends, and BGMI. The dedicated display chip also helped by ensuring minimal frame rate drops. The phone was capable of performing at its best for long periods. In terms of performance, the Realme GT Neo 3 did surprisingly well, the MediaTek Dimensity 8100 is an excellent Snapdragon 800 series alternative.

Cameras

For optics, the Realme GT Neo 3 gets a triple-camera setup with a 50 MP Sony IMX766 sensor at the helm with support for OIS. The main camera is accompanied by an 8 MP ultrawide lens and a 2 MP macro unit. On the front, the Neo 3 opts for a 16 MP selfie camera with an f/2.45 aperture. Let’s take a look at real-world camera performance.

The main camera on the Realme GT Neo 3 takes detailed shots in daylight with good dynamic range. Images were sharp with mostly accurate colours, although saturation can be on the heavy side at times. Noise was also kept in check, while the camera's 50 MP mode could also be used to capture even more detail in a shot. However, that extra detail did come at the cost of overall image quality.

The ultrawide camera also works well in daylight, although there’s visibly less detail and sharpness. You also notice the colour shift straight off the get-go. As compared to the main camera, the results here are much-less saturated. Image quality on the ultrawide lens does drop off in low light, indoors, or in other complex lighting settings. The macro camera here was a hit or a miss, it rarely produced good shots and those shots required too much time.

Switching to night mode brings in more light and detail in scenes when you have little light to work with. It is also effective in providing good colour tones and good exposure. Night mode on the ultrawide all depends on the ambient light in the scene but can often result in underwhelming images. The 16 MP selfie camera also takes detailed photos in bright light. It also snaps portraits with good edge detection and nice image separation, although image quality falls apart in the absence of good lighting.

The Realme GT Neo 3 also comes with a ton of different camera modes including Dual Video, Ultra Macro, Tilt-Shift, and more. You also get a Pro mode. The GT Neo 3’s main camera can also record 4K videos at 60fps, while the primary sensor also supports OIS which provides stable footage. Overall, video recording is fairly average on the Realme GT Neo 3, although it was great to have 4K video recording at 60fps. The main camera performance on the Realme GT Neo 3 was pretty solid and reliable, although the same couldn’t be said of the other lenses.

Battery

Another impressive aspect of the Realme GT Neo 3 (150W) is the fact that the phone offers excellent battery life and super-fast charging. The phone packs a reliable 4,500 mAh battery that delivers an entire day of heavy usage on a single charge. However, charging support is the real star of the show here. The phone’s 150W charging support can fully power the battery in a little over 15 minutes, giving you more than enough time to power your handset just before heading out.

The Realme GT Neo 3 also comes with 80W fast-charging support, which is touted to go from 0 to 50 percent in just 12 minutes. It is worth noting that the standard Realme GT Neo 3 with 80W charging has a larger 5,000 mAh battery. The MediaTek chip does a good job of conserving battery life, eating around 20 percent of the phone’s battery after an hour of gaming. A heavy user will find the Neo 3’s battery more than sufficient to last the entire day.

Software

On the software side, the GT Neo 3 runs Android 12 with the Realme UI 3.0 skin on top. There’s not a lot to say about Realme UI. Realme’s interface is easy to navigate and most bloatware on the device can be uninstalled. Realme UI has a ton of wallpaper to choose from, while you also get an always-on display and access to a floating window that can be accessed with a sideswipe.

The Realme UI 3.0 experience is getting better with every major update, although it could have been done without some of the bloatware. Realme has also committed to two years of major OS updates and three years of security updates with the Realme GT 2 Pro, which was quite disappointing. Especially considering what Samsung is offering at the same price point.

Verdict

The Realme GT Neo 3 is another impressive addition to India’s flagship killer space. While one may not consider a MediaTek chip flagship killer worthy, I’d say that the Dimensity 8100 definitely makes the cut. There’s no doubt that speed is the underlying theme of this handset but it still tends to do most other things right as well. The GT Neo 3 opts for a fast chip, a vibrant display, a sizeable battery, super-fast charging, good software, and an edgy design. While the rear main camera on the GT Neo 3 is quite reliable, the other cameras on the back leave a lot to be desired.

Put aside the 150W charging and the Realme GT Neo 3 is still a great smartphone under Rs 40,000. And while the 150W charging is nice to have, I think it is overkill and you’d be better off going for the sub-40K variants. However,  be available for purchase at Rs 39,999, which is an excellent sub-40K buy. So should you buy it? If you are looking for a fast phone across the board that performs like a flagship killer in every area but the ultrawide and selfie cameras, then the Realme GT Neo 3 is the way to go.

Also Read: OnePlus 10R Review: Speed is the name of the game