Realme 13 Pro review: Solid performance, elegant design

Realme 13 Pro

Realme is known to provide premium specifications at a relatively low cost. The company has a range of smartphones across different price brackets and its number series always aims to strike the perfect balance of good features with a nice design.

Realme 13 Back

The Realme 13 Pro carries the same DNA as the previous generation number series smartphones from the company and has a starting price of Rs 26,999, around Rs 4,000 more than the Realme 12 Pro. So, has Realme packed enough upgrades with their latest number-series smartphone to justify the increased pricing? Is it worth buying? We used the smartphone for some time now. Read on below to know it performs.

The 13 Pro comes with the same design language as the Realme 13 Pro+. It is one of the most attractive smartphones in its price range. The smartphone has a glass back with a sandblasted finish. The Monet Purple colour adds a touch of premium-ness and the phone is easy to hold with one hand.

It also has a big elevated camera module at the centre, with golden rims, similar to the frame of the smartphone. Despite the glass back, the phone is easy to hold and weighs less than 190 grams. Realme has also provided IP65 protection, and in our testing, we had no problems using this phone under the rain, as it comes with the Rainwater Smart Touch technology.

Realme 13 front closeup

Further, the two speakers are present at the top and bottom part of the frame, which have Hi-res support. They produce a clear and loud sound. At the bottom, we also get a USB-Type C port for charging or data transfer.

On the display front, the Realme 13 Pro flaunts a 6.7-inch AMOLED panel which comes with a peak brightness of 2,000 nits, Full HD+ resolution, and up to 120Hz refresh rate. The display with slightly curved edges at the side delivers an outstanding indoor and outdoor viewing experience, with its razor-thin bezels and punchy colour output. Notably, the curved edges were immune to accidental touches in our usage. However, we missed HDR support on this phone.

Realme UI offers the option of Vivid, Natural, and two different Pro modes to fine-tune the colours of the display as per the requirement. The phone also comes with Armor Shield Glass with Gorilla Glass 7i protection for increased durability. The Realme 13 Pro also comes with a screen protector pre-applied on the display out of the box, which is good news for its buyers, as it’s hard to find a screen protector for curved display smartphones.

The Realme 13 Pro 5G is powered by the Snapdragon 7s Gen 2 chipset, which is similar to last year's Realme 12 Pro+ 5G. During regular day-to-day usage, you will experience no lag or slowdowns while using this phone. To push its limits, we played some demanding games such as BGMI and Call of Duty in high graphic and frame rate settings, and the phone performed admirably.

Realme 13 charging port

The Realme 13 Pro runs Android 14 with Realme UI 5.0 skin, offering a familiar Realme software experience with plenty of customisation options. However, bloatware is still an issue on this phone, as it has more than 15 pre-installed apps, which can be uninstalled though. Realme has promised two years of Android OS updates and three years of security updates with the Realme 13 Pro.

Like most other Realme smartphones launched in 2024, the 13 Pro also has a slew of AI features. We particularly liked the AI Eraser and AI Smart Loop AI features. However, there’s still scope for improvement and output speed.

For photography, the Realme 13 Pro has a 50MP Sony LYT 600 OIS primary sensor, along with an 8MP ultrawide lens, and a 2MP macro sensor. The primary camera captures impressive shots in daylight with realistic colours, minimal noise, and has good dynamic range too. However, it did produce slightly boosted colours in certain situations and hence the photos turned out to be oversaturated.

Realme 13 camera sample

Under low light, the phone’s low light mode works well and fine-tunes the output image with accurate colours and accurate exposure. The shadows and the saturation level are also satisfactory and do not feel over-processed. However, the ultra-wide sensor has average output under artificial lighting, with lots of noise in the shadow area.

Unlike Realme 13 Pro+, the Realme 13 Pro uses computational skills to separate the foreground from the background in portrait mode, as it lacks a dedicated telephoto camera. Still at 2x, the images produced by the camera have a natural blur of the background, with adequate focus on the subject. With the gradual blur, the photos appear more natural and pleasant as well.

The Realme 13 Pro also has a 32MP front snapper that has adequate details and maintains the natural skin of a person. For videos both the primary and front cameras max out at 4K 30fps with decent stabilisation support and details. However, the lack of night mode support for videos means that the phone struggles in the videography department under low light.

The Realme 13 Pro 5G is backed by a 5200mAh battery that easily lasts a full day in heavy usage. Therefore, you do not have to worry about charging as it does not get drained very quickly even during gaming or while watching videos for long hours. However, the charging speed could have been faster, as the phone takes more than an hour to fully charge with the supplied 45W charging adapter.

The Realme 13 Pro is a solidsmartphone under Rs 30,000. It offers a premium design, has an impressive main camera sensor, provides all-day battery life, and the display meets the expectations of most users. It also has plenty of AI features and the speakers are loud enough.

However, there are too many bloatware apps preinstalled on this phone and the low light or videography performance isn’t the best. However, these shortcomings aren’t a deal breaker. If you are looking to buy a premium design smartphone with a balance of performance and cameras, the Realme 13 Pro is a good buy for under Rs 30,000. With additional bank offers you can even buy the base variant for less than Rs 25,000. At that price, it provides a lot of value for money.